Twelve Rooms with a View

March 22, 2010
Playwright and novelist Rebeck (Three Girls and Their Brother
) takes a lighthearted look at the often dark world of New York City real estate. Spunky 32-year-old narrator Tina Finn is at her mother's funeral when she learns of her possible inheritance of an $11-million Central Park West palace. While she's been slogging it out as a trailer-dwelling cleaning lady, her somewhat estranged mother has gone from blue collar to living in eccentric splendor with her new husband, Bill. Tina's unbelievably unpleasant sisters push her into moving into the apartment before their mother's cold in the ground. Enter Bill's sons, who want possession of the apartment, which is, after all where they grew up. Soon, a full-on real estate war erupts, and the building's quirky residents take sides. Throw in a possible ghost and romantic interludes, and the plot jogs along, if slowed by the occasional drawn-out scene. This should find a nice slot on the cozier end of the Manhattan real estate fiction canon.

April 1, 2010
A young woman is recruited by her sisters to"squat" in a high-priced Manhattan co-op while they settle their inheritance claim, in playwright Rebeck's second novel (Three Girls and Their Brother, 2008).

Rebeck's background as a dramatist is immediately apparent in her trenchant dialogue and in the monologue-ready ruminations of her first-person narrator, Tina Finn. Tina, whose immediate past featured a trailer, a junkyard boyfriend and several arrests, learns at her mother's funeral that she and her sisters Lucy and Alison are about to inherit the Livingston Mansion, Apt. 8A, a palatial slice of Central Park West real estate. Her late stepfather, Bill Drinan, an ailing, alcoholic recluse, had apparently inherited 8A from his first wife, Sophia. Bill left 8A to his second wife, former housecleaner Olivia, the Finn girls' mother, whom he preceded in death by only a few months. Olivia and Bill had occupied the smallest, shabbiest rooms in 8A, and had, judging from cases of expensive red wine and vodka left behind, literally drunk themselves to death. The apartment's formal kitchen is lined with moss cultivated by Len, the weird botanist neighbor. The apartment's showiest rooms have stunning views but no furniture. In the wee hours, Tina is awakened from her own drunken stupor by other claimants to the property: Pete and Doug Drinan, Sophia and Bill's sons, who grew up in 8A, have barged in to remind her that she has no legal right to occupancy. As the estate battles escalate, Tina is urged by the oh-so-controlling, tightly wound Lucy to ingratiate herself with the co-op board, who are hostile toward the interlopers, not least because Bill was (gasp!) Irish. A storeroom of poignant memorabilia, a secret passage between apartments and a ghost whose voice echoes behind the walls amp up the whimsy.

Although the scenes are impeccably handled and laughs abound, the ending seems arbitrary and abrupt. This would make a great play.

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May 1, 2010
Playwright Rebeck's second novel (after "Three Girls and Their Brother") revolves around the crazy world of Manhattan real estate. Hours after her mother's funeral, cash-strapped Tina Finn finds herself installed as the new tenant in the 12-room apartment her mother shared with her second husband, Bill, also recently deceased. Tina's sisters, both sharks, realize they stand to inherit this fabulously expensive Upper West Side residence. Loser Tina is elected to stay and live in the apartment to strengthen their legal claim...except no one wants her there. The building's residents, especially the co-op board, hate the lowbrow Tina and her sisters. And then there are Bill's sons, who vehemently contest the Finn sisters' rights to the space. VERDICT This dark comedy is wildly uneven, although not without its bright spots. Urban libraries might find more interest.Andrea Young Griffith, Loma Linda Univ. Lib., CA

Copyright 2010 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

May 15, 2010
Playwright Rebecks second novel, after Three Girls and Their Brother (2008), offers a supremely entertaining look at a dysfunctional family squabbling over real estate in New York City. When Tina Finn, who has been working as a cleaning lady in a trailer park in Delaware, learns that her mother has left her and her two sisters an $11 million apartment in Central Park West, shes shocked. Her greedy sisters insist she move into the sprawling residence, whose architecturally stunning rooms contain no furniture. They are trying to forestall efforts by their stepfathers sons, Pete and Doug Drinan, who grew up in the apartment, to contest the will. Tina soon realizes she will need the support of the buildings blue-blooded residents, including an eccentric botanist who has turned the kitchen into a mossery, if they are to successfully lay claim to their inheritance. Rebeck creates some of the sharpest dialogue going, from the backbiting interplay between the three sisters to the witty repartee between Tina and Pete. And Tina herself, alternately feisty and funny, proves to be the perfect guide to inheritance wars among the privileged.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association.)