Reviews

More than a half-century of evolving disharmony between New York City Jews and gentiles goes under the burning glass in this roman à clef from bestselling author Birmingham (Carriage Trade). Hannah Liebling, aging CEO of liquor giant Ingrahams, quotes her late husband's adage that "once a man has $10 million he's no longer thought of as being Jewish. He's merely thought of as being rich." But her black-sheep son Cyril is quick to disagree: "If it's the wrong kind of money, and you're the wrong kind of Jew, it makes all the difference in the world." Against a backdrop of all-important social distinctions, Birmingham delivers standard intergenerational soap-opera: Hannah refuses to turn over the corporate reins to good son Noah because he won't let her put her baby sister, Bathy, back on the company payroll‘but Noah hates Aunt Bathy because in his college days he caught her in flagrante delicto with his father. In the meantime, courted socially by the snobby trophy spouse of a WASP liquor-bottler, Noah's Catholic wife, Carol, is scheming to gain social standing by being appointed a trustee at the Metropolitan Museum. Stir in the malevolent Yalie author of a campus sex exposé, an oversexed teenage prodigy, assorted adulteries, messy sibling secrets, homosexuality, incest, addiction and blackmail; add a sprig of statutory rape; garnish with a dash of homicide, and you have an overspiced, often implausible chronicle of upper-class intrigues that borrows from true-life stories and is sure to generate the right kind of money from Birmingham's fans. (Aug.)