The Latecomer

 By Jean Hanff Korelitz

Celadon Books     2022

448 pages     Literary

What a fascinating book! I read The Plot about a year ago and watched the HBO series The Undoing, which is based on Korelitz’s novel, You Should Have Known. This is an author with great skill and talent. Among her many gifts is character development, which is on full display in her newest novel, The Latecomer.

I really like the summary provided in the Kirkus review, which begins “A fatal car crash sets the stage for a fraught marriage and family life.” In its essence, The Latecomer is the story of the relationship between triplets, who began their life as IVF embryos. It follows their lives as well as the lives of their mother Johanna and their father, Sal Oppenheimer, until the triplets are young adults. The third section of the book tells the story of their sister, Phoebe (the fourth IVF embryo) and how the conflict between the triplets becomes resolved. It’s a complicated story, and Harrison, Lewyn, and Sally play huge roles, both with each other and through the eyes of their much younger sister, Phoebe.

There is a lot of family drama, but there is also some illuminating knowledge. For instance I knew nothing about Outsider Art, of which Salo Oppenheimer became an expert collector. Outsider Art is art made by self-taught or naïve artists who had little or no connections with the conventional art world. The work of several outsider artists are mentioned as being part of Salo’s collection. I had to look it all up. Fascinating information.

The triplets are completely alienated from each other. It isn’t until Phoebe enters their lives when they are young adults that they begin to try to understand and relate to each other. I felt that Korelitz did an outstanding job of creating these characters and the dilemmas of their birth and upbringing. She described so well why they had so little relationship with each other, and why their family was so disheveled. However, she also tied it all together well, without any “goodie two-shoes” ending. As the Kirkus reviewer says, “The resolution, complete with a wedding, persuasively and touchingly affirms that even the most damaged people can grow and change.”

I thought the portrayal of each of the Oppenheimer triplets and the chapters dedicated to each of them was spot on and enlightening. The New York Times reviewer speaks of the old-fashioned plot points such as a tragic accident and an extramarital affair, but also contemporary like the test-tube creation of the triplets, and the birth of their frozen-embryo sister. The reviewer says, that “it’s testament to Korelitz’s achievement that her novel leaves us wanting more…The Latecomer is consistently surprising…It is a Gilded Age novel for the 21^st century.”

All in all, I loved The Latecomer. I think you will too. I just read that it will be a television series, just as You Should Have Known became The Undoing. The Plot is also being developed as a Hulu series. 

Murder at Minnesota Point

 By Jeffrey Sauve

North Star Editions     2022

208 pages     True Crime

Minnesota Point is one of the showcase spots in Duluth Minnesota, my home town. Sticking out in the harbor between Duluth and Superior Wisconsin, it is the best picnic and swimming spot on the few days that the weather is warm enough for such adventures. The Park Point neighborhood is connected to the main part of the city of Duluth by the famous Aerial Life Bridge (the only still-working bridge like it in the world.) When the murder on Minnesota Point occurred, however, people got to Park Point (its common name) by several different ferry systems.

Archivist Jeffrey Sauve became intrigued with the story of the murder of Lena Olson on the Minnesota Point beach, which happened in the summer of 1894, and decided to explore the story further. The murder was called the “crime of the century,” and it’s long, involved solution forms the basis of the book. Sauve’s research lasted ten years.

After she was found dead on the beach, the victim remained anonymous for a considerable time, and the coroner left her body for the community to see for several days before she was identified. When she finally was identified as Lena Olson, she was buried in a pauper’s grave. Slowly, the potential killer was identified, and two years later the crime was solved by skilled (for the day) detective work.

Sauve very carefully takes the case to its fitting, although unsatisfying, conclusion when the villain commits suicide in jail. He says in the introduction that “the following narrative is faithful to its unfolding, and quotations are verbatim as printed in various period newspapers. Discrepancies between sources are explained in chapter endnotes. She is remembered.”

I was very intrigued by the crime, of course, because I know the area so well from my childhood, when I was on that beach many times and had been on the beach just last summer with three grandchildren. However, I had never heard about the murder. I kept my phone close to my side as I was reading, so I could Google relevant information. For instance, I had never heard the term “O-at-ka” Beach, which was the name of the beach where the body was found. We just always called it Park Point.

The most exciting part of the narrative for me was the detailed exploration of detective work in the last years of the 19^th century. One would think that information would be extremely limited by distance and the ways in which information was shared. This particular case had detectives traveling from Duluth to Minneapolis to Chicago to Tacoma Washington. The detectives would hop on the train to travel to points all over the country, because the suspect was a very well-traveled scoundrel. Information was shared via telegraph, but of course, Sauve had modern day access to newspapers from all over the country and used these 21^st century technologies to follow the story. Those details were fascinating.

I will definitely explore the sites of the book when I return to Duluth this fall. True-crime aficionados and lovers of Minnesota history will celebrate Murder at Minnesota Point, which was published this week. Kudos to Jeffrey Sauve for his skilled detective work and page-turning writing.

Here is an excellent summary of the book.

A Sister's Story

 By Donatella Di Pietrantonio

Translated by Ann Goldstein

Europa Editions      2022

167 pages     Literary

It has been several days of beach living since I finished reading A Sister’s Story, but the emotional impact lingers. The narration is told in the first person by one sister ostensibly about the other sister, written years after the events being described. It is the story of memory but primarily the story of pain and sorrow with very little redemptive joy.

Here is the synopsis: "It’s the darkest time of night. Adriana, a baby in her arms, hammers on her sister's door. Who is she running from? What uncomfortable truth is she carrying with her? Like a whirlwind, Adriana upends her sister’s life bringing chaos and cataclysmic revelations.

Years later, the narrator gets an unexpected, urgent summons back to Pescara, her hometown. She embarks on a long journey through the night, and through the folds and twists of her memory, from her and her sister’s youth, their loves and losses, secrets and regrets. Back in Borgo Sud, the town’s fishermen’s quarter, in that impenetrable yet welcoming microcosm, she will discover what really happened, and attempt to make peace with the past.

Donatella Di Pietrantonio, expert chronicler of the bonds between mothers and daughters, revisits the places and characters of A Girl Returned with a moving novel focused on the ambivalent, ambiguous, wavering but steadfast relationship between sisters."

A quote early in the novel explains the sibling relationship: “ As children we were inseparable, then we had learned to lose each other. She could leave me without news of herself for months, but it had never been this long. She seemed to obey a nomadic instinct; when a place no longer suited her, she abandoned it. Every so often our mother said to her: ‘you’re a Gypsy.’ Later I was, too, in another way.” With few characters and minimal plot, the relationship is explained and exploited.

The novel was translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein, the translator of My Brilliant Friend and the other books in the series by Elena Ferrante. Although the style of writing is quite different, the themes bear some similarity. One reviewer said, “A Sister’s Story carries the same message of the greatest Italian literature of the 20^th century. . .a message at once tragic and hopeful—that while suffering may be an inevitable part of life, we can choose not to let it define us.”

One of DiPietrantonio’s unique gifts is the ability to sum up a situation with eloquent, meaningful narration. For example, at the mother’s funeral, the narrator muses: “We looked at each other; not even the bass drum of the band had ever produced the din that our mother drew down from the sky at her funeral.” I instantly understood the emotion.

Fortunately the novel is short. I would have been hard pressed to deal with all the negative situations and pressured emotions if it had been longer. I do believe that A Sister’s Story helps describe complex family relationships. Be prepared to be moved.