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May 29, 2009
New York in the bad old/good old days
We meet four generations of Italian and Italian-American women in Louise Shaffer’s moving and charming novel, “Serendipity” (Ballantine Books), but she manages to give us a story with the heft of an epic without back-breaking size — the writer takes us from pre-World War II New Haven to contemporary Manhattan in 327 pages.
The story begins in 2008 with 37-year-old Carrie Manning coping with the death of her philanthropic celebrity mother, Rose, who had access to lots of money, but gave most of it away in a limelight-shunning manner that, ironically, made her one of the most famous and respected women in the city.
Carrie grew up without knowing her grandmother Lu Lawson, a fabled star of Broadway musicals in the 1960s and ’70s. Rose broke off communication with her mother when Carrie was very young and would never discuss what caused the rift.
The warm and breezy opening chapters set in the city last year suggest that “Serendipity” is going to be an above-average chick lit novel, with Carrie stuck at a crossroads in life — in addition to just burying her mom, we learn that she has broken off her engagement to a seemingly perfect guy who still adores her.
Carrie has never been able to focus on a job long enough for it to become a career — she started a highly successful gourmet candy business with her best friend, Zoe, but soon lost interest and took a buy-out.
Zoe has been Carrie’s closest friend since they were New York City school girls — she keeps pushing Carrie to return to the candy business and reconsider her rejection of Mr. Right.
What changes the tone and structure of the book — as well as Carrie’s life — is the grieving daughter’s decision to find out why her mother and grandmother stopped speaking. Lu is still alive, but Carrie decides to start with one of her elderly uncles in Connecticut and then one of Lu’s retired Broadway collaborators.
Through her conversations with these two men, Carrie journeys back to the New Haven of the 1930s and the struggle between young Lu and her Italian immigrant mother Mifalda over the girl’s desire to have a career in show business and to be an independent young woman.
“Serendipity” is then off on a fascinating view of the struggle between Old World parents and their New World children, show business from the World War II era through the 1970s, and the unearthing of family secrets.
Each of the four women is fascinating, but the heart of the novel draws on Shaffer’s own background as a New York actress in the 1970s — any fan of the Broadway theater will get a big kick out of the behind-the-scenes look into a golden age of musical theater when a star like Lu could go from one show to another without ever thinking of TV or film jobs. For those of us who spent time in Manhattan during the 1970s, the book is a refreshing corrective to the widely held view that the city was unliveable in those days — Manhattan might have been a little gritty and rundown, but the theater was abuzz with landmark shows such as “A Chorus Line” and “Company.”
Shaffer’s novel is hard to categorize — it combines historical fiction with elements of romance novels and chick lit. There is also a large vein of mystery in Carrie trying to discover the real reason for the break between Lu and Rose.
Whatever you call it, “Serendipity” is a very satisfying reading experience.
Posted by Joe on May 29, 2009 3:23 PM
