For more than thirty years, Edie and Richard Middlestein
shared a solid family life together in the suburbs of Chicago. But now things
are splintering apart, for one reason, it seems: Edie’s enormous girth. She’s
obsessed with food—thinking about it, eating it—and if she doesn’t stop, she
won’t have much longer to live.
When Richard abandons his wife, it is up to the next
generation to take control. Robin, their schoolteacher daughter, is determined to
see her father pay for leaving Edie. Benny, an easy-going, pot-smoking family
man, just wants to smooth things over. And Rachelle, a whippet-thin
perfectionist is intent on saving her mother-in-law’s life, but this task
proves even bigger than planning her twin children’s spectacular b’nai mitzvah
party. Through it all, they wonder: do Edie’s devastating choices rest on her
shoulders alone, or are others at fault, too?
With pitch-perfect prose, huge compassion, and sly humor,
Jami Attenberg has given us an epic story of marriage, family, and obsession. The
Middlesteins explores the hopes and heartbreaks of new and old love, the
yearnings of Midwestern America, and our devastating, fascinating preoccupation
with food.
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