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A Novel
A tender, powerful, and big-hearted novel about love in the face of loss, from the award-winning author of The World Without You and Matrimony.
When Ohio-born Pru Steiner arrives in New York in 1976 after graduating from Yale, she follows in a long tradition of young people determined to take the city by storm. But when she falls in love with 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. One day, feeling particularly 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, about what endures when life turns out differently from what we thought we signed up for.
First published in hardcover/ebook in June 2021. Paperback release, May 2022.
You can see the full discussion in our legacy forum here. This discussion will contain spoilers!
Some of the recent comments posted about Morningside Heights:
Although Pru is no longer observant, she still practices some of her religion's rites and rituals. Why do you suppose this is? Are there rites or rituals you engage in, religious or otherwise?
The rituals she keeps probably give her a connection to something good in her past or bring her joy. We all probably continue some rituals from our past that connect us to good memories. - job
Are you someone who avoids discussions about death, or are you more likely to engage in them?
I don’t mind talking about death. As I have gotten older, I find I’m at peace with dying when it comes. I’m doing all I can to live well. My parents are approaching 90 and we haven’t talked about their wishes. Neither they... - job
Crenshaw the book store cat
I did wonder if there was a connection to the Crenshaw book, which I haven't read but am aware of. I think Arlo didn't reveal he was allergic to cats because of his need to belong somewhere. And I think he doesn't want to disappoint ... - scottishrose
Did anyone connect the novel Flowers for Algernon with Arlo and his experimental drug?
That is an interesting question. Until I read the question, I did not make any connections between Arlo and Flowers for Algernon. Perhaps one reason for that is having read Flowers for Algernon so long ago! - djcminor
Do you believe their father's illness affects Sarah and Arlo's life choices? Do you think either harbors regrets? Are there any relationships that have set your life on a specific path?
Sarah and Arlo made their life choices before Spence's illness was even known, so I don't think that it affected the choices that they made. They each regretted, however, that they could not help to the extent they wished that they could, ... - lorrained
#1 Indie Next Pick for June
The New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice Book
One of 2021's Most Highly Anticipated New Books—Newsweek
"Joshua Henkin's novel is a richly textured family portrait that feels deeply familiar yet profoundly moving and illuminating. As in the best fiction, you come away from Morningside Heights reluctantly—attached to its characters and with new understanding of what it is to be a feeling person dealing with life's unpredictability ... His book succeeds not by dint of dazzling language or narrative sleight of hand, but by his unwavering empathy, which leads him to create remarkably real, complex characters."—Heller McAlpin, The Wall Street Journal
"An intimate portrait of a marriage...A literary examination of love in later life, Morningside Heights highlights the complexities of monogamy, family, and love."—Zibby Owens, Good Morning America
"In the sheer pleasure of reading Joshua Henkin's new novel—of following its swift narrative movements, getting to know its all-too-human characters, inhabiting its detail-perfect settings, its relentlessly accurate portrayals—of marriage and parenthood and siblinghood—we can almost forget, for moments on end, that its subject is one of the most painful imaginable: the loss of a self, of a marriage, of a shared life. But the real magic of Morningside Heights is the way it lifts us up, reminding us that ordinary people undertake extraordinary acts of survival every day."—Julie Orringer
"Reading Morningside Heights is an emotional experience. How much can befall a marriage, and what extraordinary demands must sometimes be met for loved ones to endure. But it is a delightful read as well, because the people here are such thoroughly engaging company. So much that happens in this book is unexpected that it reads at the pace of a suspense novel, but its greatest achievement is to make us feel that we are in the presence of real people, living out their joys and sorrows and making their way in the real world."—Sigrid Nunez
"What does it really mean: in sickness and in health, till death do us part? Morningside Heights knows the answer. In this tender, wise, and unflinching novel, Joshua Henkin traces the bittersweet arc of a lifelong love, with all its joy and pain."—Tom Perrotta
"You know a novel is good when the thought of leaving the world it creates and the people who live there fills you with sadness and a profound sense of loss. Joshua Henkin's Morningside Heights is just such a novel."—Richard Russo
"Henkin brilliantly conveys the complexities of a New York City family in this humane, compulsively readable tale...This is a stunning achievement."—Publishers Weekly, starred review
"Henkin treats the complications of a complicated disease with insight, honesty, and humanity, in a style that is as readable as it is consummately literate."—Library Journal
This information about Morningside Heights was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: Matthew Polis
Joshua Henkin is the author of the novels Matrimony, a New York Times Notable Book, and Swimming Across the Hudson, a Los Angeles Times Notable Book and The World Without You, winner of the 2012 Edward Lewis Wallant Award for Jewish American Fiction and a Finalist for the 2012 National Jewish Book Award. His short stories have been published widely, cited for distinction in Best American Short Stories, and broadcast on NPR's "Selected Shorts." His fourth novel is Morningside Heights (June 2021). He lives in Brooklyn, NY, and directs the MFA program in Fiction Writing at Brooklyn College.
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