Deno Trakas's novel Messenger from Mystery features English graduate student Jason "Jay" Nichols, a third-generation Greek American who claims to be named after the heroic Argonaut leader despite an introspective and self-absorbed nature. On the cusp of his transition into adulthood and from student to teacher, Jay still lives primarily in his own thoughts and studies. Having been an activist in college, he considers himself knowledgeable about local and global politics, but when the Iranian hostage crisis begins while he is teaching students from Iran, he realizes that his...