The Agnostics

Rawlings (Come Back Irish) follows the Wirth family from 1960s Long Island through a generation of transformations and shattered expectations. Bev ""Binky"" Cohen, a Jewish beauty a la Natalie Wood, marries high-school classmate Stephen Wirth, a mechanical engineer whose parents have a silent disdain for Jews. Bev cares for daughters Louise and Deborah, and gradually develops a career counseling women. As her body changes along with the times, Bev begins questioning gender and sex roles-with a predictable effect on the marriage-while Louise and Deborah have very different reactions to adolescence and beyond. Stephen's attempts to bring religion to what has been a Switzerland-like familial agnosticism marks the novel's turning point. Rawlings writes with vivid sensuousness and a palpable sense of purpose in throwing curveballs at her familiar characters. The result is a probing investigation into the unbearable lovelessness of modern life, and an attendant search for certainty.