Tell Me How This Ends Well

The Jewish book club I'm trying to get rolling remains really small. At last month's meeting, there were only 3 of us - and a guest. (Thanks, Martha!) When it came time to pick a book for our next meeting in July, I was told by the other two members, who had already read David Samuel Levinson's Tell Me How This Ends Well, that we didn't have to read this book but that it had a really crazy ending. "Let's find another book to read." I hadn't read it yet.

An important premise of the novel is that Israel has been annihilated by three Arab neighbors and there is an influx of Israeli refugees living in the United States and in Europe. Antisemitism was on the rise. That's important, but that's not what the story was about.

The story revolves around the Jacobson family. The Jacobson mom has been given a poor health diagnosis. The three adult children decide that they should spend their mom's final Passover together at the home of the older brother in California. Jacob travels from German, Edith travels from Atlanta, and the parents travel from Texas. They kids plan to celebrate Passover with a family seder - which is part of a reality TV show - and then kill their abusive dad. Yes, you read that right! Kill their abusive dad.

(As an aside, the seder was on a Saturday night, the Saturday after Good Friday. I wonder why the author chose to have what seemed to be the first seder on a Saturday night. The way the Jewish calendar works, first seders never fall on Saturday nights.)

This book, in parts, is comical. The story is told from the perspective of all the children and then from the mom's perspective. In some parts it's dark humor. In other parts, it's laugh out loud funny.  It also gives us a dark vision of what might be in the future of American Jews. That part is frightening. It's hard to really categorize this novel - religious commentary, dysfunctional family, crime drama, and I wonder if that was the author's intention.

While the religious commentary was downright scary and the crime drama was where a good part of the humor came into play, what intrigued me was why the mom, Roz, stayed with the dad, Julian, for all those years if he was so abusive. First thought was that perhaps "in those days" it was difficult for a woman to consider getting a divorce. Then I realized that Roz was only 8 years older than I was, that she contemplated getting a divorced in 1996 - which is exactly when I was in the middle of getting a divorce! Would my family life have fallen apart the way the Jacobsons did had I stayed married? That gave me a lot to think about!

I read this novel while I was on vacation. I guess because it was lighter than what I normally read it might be considered a beach read! I decided that this book is chockablock full of things to discuss. I think it will make the perfect book for a Jewish book club, even though I don't think you have to be Jewish to enjoy it. Now to convince enough other people that this is a worthwhile read so that we can have a larger attendance at our next book club meeting.