Joshua Henkin Books

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Book • When Ohio-born Pru Steiner arrives in New York in 1976, she follows in a long tradition of young people determined to take the city by storm. But when she falls in love with and marries Spence Robin, her hotshot young Shakespeare professor, her life takes a turn she couldn’t have anticipated. Thirty years later, something is wrong with Spence. The Great Man can’t concentrate; he falls asleep reading The New York Review of Books. With their daughter, Sarah, away at medical school, Pru must struggle on her own to care for him. One day, feeling especially isolated, Pru meets a man, and the possibility of new romance blooms. Meanwhile, Spence’s estranged son from his first marriage has come back into their lives. Arlo, a wealthy entrepreneur who invests in biotech, may be his father’s last, best hope. Morningside Heights is a sweeping and compassionate novel about a marriage surviving hardship. It’s about the love between women and men, and children and parents; about the things we give up in the face of adversity; and about how to survive when life turns out differently from what we thought we signed up for.

As a child, Ben Suskind wonders about his family's origins and what life would have been like had he not been adopted by Jews. Together with his brother Jonathan, they fantasize about alternate identities, making blood pacts and switching names, all while searching for a sense of belonging. As teenagers, even amidst the comforts of their Manhattan home, their dreams are intertwined with these deep-seated concerns. Now thirty and living in San Francisco with his girlfriend Jenny and her daughter, Ben still grapples with these questions, often lost in thought until Jenny brings him back to reality. When he receives a letter from a woman claiming to be his birth mother, he is thrown into a whirlwind of panic and curiosity. After confiding in his adoptive parents, they reveal a long-held secret about his past, shaking Ben's world. Without informing anyone, he embarks on a journey to uncover the truth about his identity, risking his relationships with Jenny, Jonathan, and his parents. As he delves into his family's history, Ben confronts the complexities of truth and the consequences of the lies told in the name of good intentions.