The Garden Party

May 28, 2018
In this witty novel from Mazur (Trespass), two very different families assemble in the garden of a house in Brookline, Mass., for a rehearsal dinner. The house belongs to the Cohens, an eccentric Jewish clan. Father Pindar, an expert on ancient cultures, is doing research for a book on Babylonian cooking. Daughter Sara is dating a Jesuit priest, Dennis Lombroso. Sara’s sister, fragile Naomi, has to be coaxed out of her bedroom to attend the dinner for her brother, Adam, a poet, engaged to Eliza Barlow, whose WASPy family members are mostly attorneys. Battle lines are drawn early as Celia, Pindar’s wife, a literary critic, frets over the seating chart, and Eliza’s father, Stephen, likens the house to a third world country because there is no Wall Street Journal on the front hall table. As the party gets underway, Pindar’s 91-year-old mother recalls the Paris of her youth, Eliza’s brother hits on Naomi, the Barlow grandchildren go native at a nearby pond, and Adam and Eliza decide that an elopement might be the best course of action. Although the Barlows are barely differentiated, readers will be charmed by this stylish ensemble novel, which expertly dissects family dynamics over the course of one fateful day.

Narrator Bernadette Dunne has 19 adults and 6 children to differentiate in this ambitious homage to MRS. DALLOWAY, all without benefit of the seating plan with character notes that print readers can turn to when confusion strikes. The organizing principle is the day and evening of a rehearsal dinner that brings two very different families together. Lacking a centrifugal character like Mrs. Dalloway, this is more a jumble of unrelated dilemmas and mismatched personalities briefly juxtaposed than a coherently plotted novel, yet it offers many pleasures. Dunne's performance is full of color, intelligence, and asperity. Mazur fails to clear the very high bar she has set for herself, but wonderful writing makes it well worthwhile to watch her, and Dunne, fling themselves at it. B.G. � AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine