A Book A Week

How do you follow up a hit novel? Jean Hanff Korelitz is no stranger to success. She's on the heels of last year's hit book The Plot and an HBO miniseries based on her novel You Should Have Known. I was eager to read whatever she came up with next, and I was lucky that her publisher sent me a copy of her latest novel The Latecomer. Hanff Korelitz didn't write another thriller this time. She's gone about as far in the opposite direction as you could possibly go, electing to write a searing family drama that sprawls multiple generations. Having not read a synopsis before diving in, I was caught a bit off guard by the genre and content, but I pressed on nonetheless. 

The Oppenheimer family of New York is one of those wealthy established clans representing society's pinnacle during the 1970s. Like other prominent Jewish families of the time, they have found the perfect balance between running a family-owned business and socializing with others in their class. This generation aspires to leave their children better off than they are, and the Oppenheimer family is doing just that. Their son Salo is primed to take over everything and ensure a proper future for the Oppenheimer name. 

Salo Oppenheimer's ascent to being the head of the family saw the young man carve his own path. He married Johanna, but instead of buying a home in Manhattan, moved to the neighborhood of Brooklyn Heights. While maintaining the family business, Salo grew fascinated with collecting "outsider art". As this hobby flourished, he eventually purchased a warehouse in Brooklyn to house his collection. 

With her husband spending much of his free time away from the home, young Johanna Oppenheimer longed for the companionship that comes with a family. There was only one problem. Johanna was unable to conceive a child. Desperate to have children of her own, Johanna turned to the relatively new practice of in-vitro fertilization. Three eggs were used with a fourth frozen away as a last-ditch effort should she be unable to carry the child herself. To both the Oppenheimer's and their doctor's surprise, the process was a huge success with each of the three eggs successfully coming to term. 

The three Oppenheimer children were siblings in name and blood only. Harrison, Lewyn, and Sally really couldn't have been more different if they tried. As they grew into adulthood, Johanna saw her dream of one big happy family drifting further and further away. Her husband continued to spend his time with his art, and the children, now destined for college, took up their own interests away from each other. In a desperate attempt for one final shot at a family, Johanna decided to use that final forgotten egg to have a fourth child. This 'latecomer' would be born into a fragmented family and be burdened with the duty to try and bring them each together. 

I was blinded by my own expectations when I started reading this book. I couldn't help but compare this quiet family drama with the fast-paced thriller that the author presented only last year. So let's get this out of the way. The Latecomer is a vastly different novel from The Plot. As I slowly overcame those expectations and allowed myself to be enveloped by the time, place, and characters that Hanff Korelitz conjured, I began to appreciate the depth of the novel I was reading. This is a multigenerational family drama with plenty of dry humor and social commentary peppered in. At nearly 500 pages, Hanff Korelitz gives herself ample room to explore themes on family, marriage, race, sexuality, religion, and politics. While I found each of these elements worthy of the time devoted to them, I don't feel that there was a cohesive narrative thread tying them all together. This resulted in an ending that to me didn't exactly deliver on everything that came before it. That being said, I was so invested in the entire saga of the Oppenheimer family that I just had to see it all the way through. The Latecomer is a daring character study from a prominent author that will likely pay off in different ways depending on your tastes and the expectations you place upon it. 

For more information visit the author's website, Amazon, and Goodreads. 

(2022, 23)