"The Most Fun We Ever Had," by Claire Lombardo

Family, family, family, family, and more family! Claire Lombardo’s debut novel, “The Most Fun We Ever Had” (Doubleday, 2019) consists of 544 pages focused on one family over about four decades. As readers of this blog may remember, I truly appreciate and enjoy novels focused on family, as I do this one. I just note – not as a criticism – that the focus is closer up and more exclusive than most such fictional portrayals. Sure, we see various family members’ interactions with the outside world, and the novel engages with issues of gender and class, but mostly we see, very specifically, how this family (and their spouses, partners, and children) engage with each other. This does not mean the family members are always cozily happy with each other. Not at all. But despite all the difficulties they go through, individually, collectively, and in various combinations, the family is always the true subject. The parents, Marilyn and David, meet in 1975, soon marry, and have four daughters: Wendy, Violet, Liza, and Grace. Each character has her or his own combination of gifts and troubles. The story is anchored in the present, when a big secret in one daughter’s life is revealed, and we see how everyone in the family responds. But the whole story goes back and forth in time (occasionally a little confusingly), with stops at various points between the 1970s and the present. Some of the issues that arise are alcoholism, pregnancy (both wanted and unwanted, both difficult and relatively easy), infidelity, work pressures, sibling rivalry, and eating disorders. One particularly interesting, and quite central, aspect of the story is that Marilyn and David (the parents) have a very, very close marriage, and everyone around them believes it is a perfect marriage. As it turns out, they have their own issues, but overall it is in fact a remarkable marriage. The daughters (and their partners, and even their children – the third generation) derive much strength and comfort from their parents’ marriage, but it is also daunting, seemingly impossible, for them to try to achieve the same kind of marriage. This is a novel that shows a high level of sensitivity to, and understanding of, family dynamics. There are times when the points being made are a little too obvious, a little too close to psychological or sociological “lessons.” But the interweaving individual stories, like branches impossible to separate from the sturdy tree trunk of the original nuclear family, are satisfying and compelling. I loved all 544 pages of this novel.

"The Gifted School," by Bruce Holsinger

If there was ever a fictional indictment of overly-invested, status-conscious, out-of-control middle-to-upper-middle-class parents, it is “The Gifted School” (Riverhead, 2019), by Bruce Holsinger. This novel tells the story of the fierce competition for spots at a newly-opening public magnet school for “gifted” children, and the lengths to which ambitious parents go to make their children stand out among the thousands of applicants for places in the school. The setting is an affluent suburb of Denver. The main characters are members of five families. Four of the families are connected by close friendships among the four mothers; the fifth family is from Mexico and does housecleaning for some of the other families. The novel, indirectly and sometimes directly, addresses themes of class, race, gender and privilege. The parents’ hopes and struggles for their children’s achievements and “leg up” in the world are evident even outside of the school competition. One family’s twin sons, for example, are soccer players, and due to their father’s ambitions, they are pushed into competing in ever bigger and more prestigious soccer leagues, no matter what the cost -- financial, physical, and otherwise. There are many twists and turns to this novel’s plot, and it is hard to look away. The characters are drawn well, whether they be female or male, children or teenagers or adults. Holsinger is sharply observant, and makes good use of telling details. A compelling aspect of the novel is the four-way friendship among the main characters, the moms. The author shows how important the friendships are to each woman, and the many ways in which they support each other; he also shows the complexities of the friendships and even betrayals among the friends. “The Gifted School” is horrifying in some ways, taking a hard look at human weaknesses and at issues of privilege, yet very believable, and at its heart, humane in its recognition that we are all complicated, with both problematic and redeeming qualities.

RIP Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison died on August 5, at the age of 88. It feels shocking to type that sentence. Several commentators have stated that they thought that somehow she would be immortal. This eminent African-American writer, winner of the 1993 Nobel Prize for Literature and many other literary prizes, wrote so originally, imaginatively, and powerfully, and her work was so deeply influential, that it is hard to find words adequate to describe her work. Let me borrow some words from black writers who were influenced by her. Tracy K. Smith, in The Guardian (8/11/19), says that Morrison’s novels “chose black lives as their central subjects, enthralling readers with her commitment to the inner lives of black characters.” Jason Reynolds, in the same Guardian article, praises Morrison for her “audacity,” and states that she “up-ended” all the things that black writers had been told; she told black writers that they were “free – free to write however and whatever they wanted to write.” Morrison herself said she wanted "black people writing for black people." Many writers and critics agree that it is impossible to fully express how much Morrison influenced African-American writers and writing. Even before she started publishing her own work, Morrison influenced the literary world during her approximately 20 years as an editor for Random House, when she nurtured and promoted the work of many African and African-American writers. She published her own first novel, “The Bluest Eye,” in 1970, followed by “Sula,” “The Song of Solomon,” and her most well-known and critically-acclaimed novel, “Beloved” (1987). She received the Pulitzer Prize in Fiction in 1988, only after a letter signed by well over 40 notable black writers urged the awarding of that prize. Morrison went on to publish several more novels, as well as essays and children’s books; she also taught for years at Princeton University. In 2012, she received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Obama. Through her writing (and editing and teaching), this towering American figure deeply influenced writers and readers of all backgrounds. I was one of her millions of readers, was deeply affected by her novels, and taught some of her work as well. Toni Morrison’s legacy will always live on.

"Grub," by Elise Blackwell

“Grub” (Toby Press, 2011) is a compelling and convincing satirical novel, an “updating" of George Gissing’s satire,"New Grub Street" (1891). It draws on it, borrows from it, and could never have been written without it,” author Elise Blackwell says in her acknowledgements. Note that one does not have to have read Gissing’s book to enjoy “Grub.” Blackwell also thanks her fellow writers who have told her some of their worst stories about the writing world. “Grub” features five main characters, all young, aspiring writers. They all struggle to various degrees with the writing itself, with figuring out which kind of writers they want to be, with wavering self-confidence, and with how much they are willing to compromise in order to succeed (in the cases of three of the five characters, they compromise quite a bit). Blackwell employs all the usual stereotypes about writers, with humorous effect. There are set pieces about MFA programs, writing conferences, MLA Conference job interviews, obscure literary journals, writers' jockeying with and backstabbing each other, has-been writers and critics, hangers-on, poverty, alcoholism, and more. There are roman a clef aspects as well, such as allusions to “the Jonathans,” and in particular to one of the Jonathans who refused to go on the top-rated television show, as in real life Jonathan Franzen some years ago famously refused an invitation to appear on Oprah Winfrey’s show. There are discussions of literary versus commercial novels, and of categories such as “chick lit.” The two writers who do not compromise are Henry, who believes in “New Realism” and the “open novel,” and who lives in poverty (almost starving himself) because of his purity of focus, and Margot, who writes because she loves writing, and is unwilling to do what she needs to do to become well-known (e.g., book tours, networking, self-promoting). The other three characters are most interested in success, fame, and money, and are willing to write whatever they need to in order to gain those goals. All of these characters and conditions seem quite believable, albeit exaggerated for satirical effect. The one truly unrealistic aspect is that all five of the main characters do publish at least one book each, and in some cases several, while they are quite young, unlike the legions of would-be writers, often with completed novels in hand, who are never able to do so. All of us who love literature have read and enjoyed novels about writers; this purposeful and cheerfully cynical lampoon takes all the stereotypes a bit further, producing a novel both hilarious and at times sad. The repeated recognitions it induces also let readers feel like insiders who know the real scoop…always a heady feeling! I recommend “Grub” to anyone who loves the world of literature and writers, and also has a sense of humor about the absurdities sometimes found there.