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Product Details
Scribner, April 2009
Hardcover, 416 pages
ISBN-10: 1416590773
ISBN-13: 9781416590774
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Chapter 1
Description
Instantly compelling and immensely satisfying, A Fortunate Age details the lives of a group of Oberlin graduates whose ambitions and friendships threaten to unravel as they chase their dreams, shed their youth, and build their lives in Brooklyn during the late 1990s. There’s Lil, a would-be scholar whose wedding brings the group back together; Beth, who struggles to let go of her old beau Dave, a onetime piano prodigy trapped by his own insecurity; and Emily, an actor perpetually on the verge of success— and starvation—who grapples with her jealousy of Tal, whose acting career has taken off. At the center of their orbit is wry, charismatic Sadie Peregrine, who coolly observes her friends’ mistakes but can’t quite manage to avoid making her own. As they begin their careers, marry, and have children, they must navigate the shifting dynamics of their friendships and of the world around them—from the decadent age of dot-com millionaires to the sobering post–September 2001 landscape. Smith Rakoff’s deeply affecting characters capture a generation.
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"A wonderful, funny and spot-on portrait of my clumsy generation that brings to mind such hallmarks as Mary McCarthy's The Group, Jay McInerney's Brightness Falls, and Claire Messud's The Emperor's Children."
-- Gary Shteyngart, author of Absurdistan and The Russian Debutante's Handbook
"Joanna Smith Rakoff has cast a brilliant and glittering spell with this fierce debut. Her social observations are not only spot-on but often wickedly funny...She has captured both a generation and a landscape, and I'm still marveling at how she managed to pull off this page-turning cocktail of intelligence and desire."
-- Joanna Hershon, author of The German Bride
"Rakoff's mesmerizing debut opens with a wedding and closes with a funeral. In between, the novel provides a pitch perfect portrait of the generation that came of age in the 1990s. If this smart, thoroughly absorbing novel recalls The Group, it also recalls the seminal work of Anne Beattie in the seventies and Jay McInerney in the eighties. Like them, Rakoff captures a certain time and place with heartbreaking clarity."
-- Booklist (starred)
"I'm in awe: at the assurance of Joanna Smith Rakoff's writing, the richness of her language, and the enthralling grip of this story. I'm excited the way you can only be excited by a big, thick novel you want to hibernate away with and not come out until you're done."
-- Thisbe Nissen, author of The Good People of New York and Osprey Island
"An entertaining, updated look at artistic-minded young people progressing toward adulthood in New York. As they experience marriage, children, dot-com busts, infidelities, alcohol abuse, personal tragedies, professional successes, and other common experiences of twentysomethings in the mid-1990s, Rakoff objectively and deftly chronicles all of it."
-- Library Journal
"The liberal-arts grads coming of age in Smith Rakoff's...New York City are indeed a fortunate bunch...the story lines...are compellingly drawn."
-- Entertainment Weekly
"[A] delight....Writing with seamless transparency and intelligence, Rakoff has a light and witty touch...a dead-on psychological and social page-turner."
-- Publishers Weekly Galley Talk
"Rakoff's mesmerizing debut opens with a wedding and closes with a funeral. In between, the novel provides a pitch perfect portrait of the generation that came of age in the 1990s. If this smart, thoroughly absorbing novel recalls The Group, it also recalls the seminal work of Anne Beattie in the seventies and Jay McInerney in the eighties. Like them, Rakoff captures a certain time and place with heartbreaking clarity."
-- Booklist (starred)
"A wonderful, funny and spot-on portrait of my clumsy generation that brings to mind such hallmarks as Mary McCarthy's The Group, Jay McInerney's Brightness Falls, and Claire Messud's The Emperor's Children."
-- Gary Shteyngart, author of Absurdistan and The Russian Debutante's Handbook
"Joanna Smith Rakoff has cast a brilliant and glittering spell with this fierce debut. Her social observations are not only spot-on but often wickedly funny...She has captured both a generation and a landscape, and I'm still marveling at how she managed to pull off this page-turning cocktail of intelligence and desire."
-- Joanna Hershon, author of The German Bride
"I'm in awe: at the assurance of Joanna Smith Rakoff's writing, the richness of her language, and the enthralling grip of this story. I'm excited the way you can only be excited by a big, thick novel you want to hibernate away with and not come out until you're done."
-- Thisbe Nissen, author of The Good People of New York and Osprey Island
"An entertaining, updated look at artistic-minded young people progressing toward adulthood in New York. As they experience marriage, children, dot-com busts, infidelities, alcohol abuse, personal tragedies, professional successes, and other common experiences of twentysomethings in the mid-1990s, Rakoff objectively and deftly chronicles all of it."
-- Library Journal
New York Times, October 16, 2009
...in my garret with the blinds down. What have you been reading or recommending lately? I vastly enjoyed Joanna Smith Rakoff’s “Fortunate Age,” which was smart and fleet and kept just enough surprise by not overstaying its welcome with ...
MountainXpress, September 3, 2009
...Curtis Sittenfeld?s Prep, Valerie Ann Leff?s Better Homes & Husbands or Elise Blackwell?s Grub, then Joanna Smith Rakoff?s debut novel, A Fortunate Age (Scribner, 2009) is your kind of book. Inspired by Mary McCarthy?s 1962 bestseller, The ...
Palo Alto Online, July 2, 2009
...Tomorrow (July 2) at 7:30 p.m., Joanna Smith Rakoff speaks about her first book, 'A Fortunate Age: A Novel' at Kepler's Books and Magazines at 1010 El Camino Real in Menlo Park. Set in Brooklyn, the ...
Newsday, May 6, 2009
...A FORTUNATE AGE, by Joanna Smith Rakoff. Scribner, 402 pp., $26. I've never met Joanna Smith Rakoff, but I would like to. Reading her debut novel, 'A Fortunate Age,' I became ...
USA Today, May 4, 2009
...A Fortunate Age By Joanna Smith Rakoff Scribner, 401 pp. $26 Rakoff's debut novel, A Fortunate Age, is an homage of sorts to another member of that cerebral chick-lit clique: Mary ...
Los Angeles Times, April 17, 2009
...A Fortunate Age A Novel Joanna Smith Rakoff Scribner: 402 pp., $26 I've never met Joanna Smith Rakoff, but I would like to. Reading her debut novel, 'A Fortunate Age,' I ...
New York Times, April 10, 2009
...This week: Arthur Phillips on his new novel, ?The Song is You?; Liesl Schillinger on Joanna Smith Rakoff?s ?A Fortunate Age?; Motoko Rich with Notes From the Field; and Jennifer Schuessler with best-seller news. Charles McGrath is the host, ...
Daily Candy, April 7, 2009
...see: acting/music/academia). c) moved to a gritty, underdeveloped neighborhood in Brooklyn. Or, as the six main characters in Joanna Smith Rakoff?s exquisite debut novel, A Fortunate Age, d) all of the above. Which is why following the co-ed ...
Marie Claire, March 28, 2009
...conflicts, but it's anchored by the persistent hope that tomorrow will bring relief. Katie Charles ** A FORTUNATE AGE BY JOANNA SMITH RAKOFF (SCRIBNER) Remember how in college you thought that by 35, you'd have your act together? Then you'll ...
Marie Claire, March 26, 2009
...conflicts, but it's anchored by the persistent hope that tomorrow will bring relief. -Katie Charles ** A FORTUNATE AGE BY JOANNA SMITH RAKOFF (SCRIBNER) Remember how in college you thought that by 35, you'd have your act together? Then ...
