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Title details for Long Island Compromise by Taffy Brodesser-Akner - Available

Long Island Compromise

A Novel

by Taffy Brodesser-Akner
Edoardo Ballerini
Audiobook
1 of 4 copies available
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1 of 4 copies available
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • An exhilarating novel about one American family and the dark moment that shatters their suburban paradise, from the New York Times bestselling author of Fleishman Is in Trouble

New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice • New York Magazine’s Beach Read Book Club Pick • Belletrist Book Club Pick
A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, Oprah Daily, The New Yorker, Time, The Washington Post, NPR, Vogue, Town & Country, New York Post, Harper’s Bazaar, Elle, Parade, Kirkus Reviews

“Joins the pantheon of great American novels.”—Los Angeles Times
“Exuberant and absorbing . . . a big old-fashioned social novel.”—The Atlantic

“Were we gangsters? No. But did we know how to start a fire?”
In 1980, a wealthy businessman named Carl Fletcher is kidnapped from his driveway, brutalized, and held for ransom. He is returned to his wife and kids less than a week later, only slightly the worse, and the family moves on with their lives, resuming their prized places in the saga of the American dream, comforted in the realization that though their money may have been what endangered them, it is also what assured them their safety.
But now, nearly forty years later, it’s clear that perhaps nobody ever got over anything, after all. Carl has spent the ensuing years secretly seeking closure to the matter of his kidnapping, while his wife, Ruth, has spent her potential protecting her husband’s emotional health. Their three grown children aren’t doing much better: Nathan’s chronic fear won’t allow him to advance at his law firm; Beamer, a Hollywood screenwriter, will consume anything—substance, foodstuff, women—in order to numb his own perpetual terror; and Jenny has spent her life so bent on proving that she’s not a product of her family’s pathology that she has come to define it. As they hover at the delicate precipice of a different kind of survival, they learn that the family fortune has dwindled to just about nothing, and they must face desperate questions about how much their wealth has played a part in both their lives’ successes and failures.
Long Island Compromise spans the entirety of one family’s history, winding through decades and generations, all the way to the outrageous present, and confronting the mainstays of American Jewish life: tradition, the pursuit of success, the terror of history, fear of the future, old wives’ tales, evil eyes, ambition, achievement, boredom, dybbuks, inheritance, pyramid schemes, right-wing capitalists, beta-blockers, psychics, and the mostly unspoken love and shared experience that unite a family forever.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Awards

  • Release date

    July 9, 2024

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9780593412213
      • File size: 443412 KB
      • Duration: 15:23:45

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from May 20, 2024
      Brodesser-Akner (Fleishman Is in Trouble) easily avoids the sophomore slump with another incisive and witty portrait of New York Jewish life. In 1980, wealthy polystyrene manufacturer Carl Fletcher was kidnapped from his Long Island home and held for a week until his wife, Ruth, paid the $250,000 ransom. Now, 40 years later, he’s still traumatized, and is dutifully tended to by the controlling but loyal Ruth. Their three children also continue to live under the shadow of the kidnapping. There’s Beamer, a moderately successful screenwriter with a secret drug and BDSM addiction; Nathan, a lawyer who’s too timid for the partner track at his firm; and Jenny, a union organizer whose chief pleasure in life is pissing off her mother. Beamer is excited about an idea for a new project starring Mandy Patinkin when Jenny texts with troubling news: due to a series of financial reversals, the family fortune they’ve all depended on is gone. How the Fletchers respond to the crisis and finally put their shared past to rest forms the core of this entertaining saga. Brodesser-Akner’s latest combines the smarts of Sarah Silverman’s stand-up, the polymath verisimilitude of Tom Wolfe’s novels, and the Jewish soul of Sholem Aleichem’s stories. This is a comedic feast. Agent: Sloan Harris, CAA.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Even at more than 15 hours, with a story covering several decades, this audiobook never slows its pace as narrated by Edoardo Ballerini. The epic begins in 1980 with the kidnapping of a Long Island factory owner and follows the lives of his three underachieving adult children, all of whom are damaged in their own way by the ordeal. Ballerini expertly captures the Jewish American nuances of the dialogue, which is deeply satirical of wealth and privilege. If there's one stumble, it's Ballerini's decision to deliver text messages robotically--as if to mimic the speed they're being typed. But this is a quibble about an otherwise masterful narration of a thoroughly enjoyable novel. D.B. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine
    • Library Journal

      Starred review from December 1, 2024

      Listeners may never have met anyone like the Fletchers, but they'll recognize something in them that's both endearing and maddening. This is the art of Brodesser-Akner's (Fleishman Is in Trouble) family epic. Emphasis on the "epic"--the Fletchers are ultra-rich, ultra-anxious, and falling apart. The book starts with the kidnapping of Carl Fletcher, whose family money comes from a Styrofoam business. His wife, Ruth, doesn't bat an eye at withdrawing $250,000 for the ransom, and also doesn't hesitate to drag her toddler son along for the ride. What follows is the trickle-down effect of Carl's kidnapping (and the family fortune) on the adult Fletcher children years later: Nathan is so worried about his family's safety that he can't stop buying insurance, Beamer (once a Hollywood golden boy) needs the money to maintain his image, and Jenny despises the money so much that she gives it all away. Narrated deftly by Edoardo Ballerini, this is a compelling listen rife with anxiety. It is social satire at its darkest; the laughs are genuine, but there is also dread as the money starts to run out. The Fletchers make so many bad choices that the sense of their impending doom never quite dissipates, and Ballerini ably conveys the intense emotion and visceral stress that drive the plot. VERDICT A great listen that might compel audiences to take a break and gather a deep breath before diving back in.--Katy Hite

      Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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