Long Island Compromise - Taffy Brodesser-Akner

 Long Island Compromise - Taffy Brodesser-Akner

Pub. Date:  July 9, 2024

She read 

A Polish Jewish immigrant escaping the Holocaust comes to New York where he eventually accumulates wealth by opening a factory. When he dies suddenly, his son, Carl is called back to the family compound on Long Island to run the business. In 1980, Carl is kidnapped and held for $200,000 ransom which is paid.  The kidnapping haunts Carl for the rest of his life, as well as affecting his three children, Nathan, Beamer, and the soon to be born Jenny.  And thus the novel embarks on recounting the lives of the siblings, as well as those of the generations that came before, the after effects of the kidnapping and the guiding influences of their wealth.  

Cleverly written with touches of wit, the story gets mired down at times with almost a stream of consciousness accounting of their lives and in particular their self loathing. Both historical and contemporary, it is a long novel (almost 500 pages) that touches on American Jewishness, the privilege of wealth, inherited trauma, self sabotaging , family dysfunction,  women’s roles. There is a bit of a fairy tale ending and it will be interesting to see what readers think of it. I think this is a book that many will love and about which others will be less enamored.  

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Thanks to #Netgalley and #randomhouse for the DRC.