The third novel from the author of Chang and Eng
and The Real McCoy
is an often satiric page-turner that tracks a Long Island family crisis. Josh Goldin is a happily married TV airtime salesman with an eight-month-old son. When baby Zack is treated twice for mysterious and life-threatening symptoms, the head of a pediatric ICU, Dr. Darlene Stokes, tells Child Protective Services that she thinks Josh’s wife, Dori, suffers from Munchausen syndrome, whereby the afflicted injure their children deliberately to draw attention to themselves. The Goldins’ ensuing battle to keep Zack provides grist for public debate about issues ranging from parents’ rights to race (Dr. Stokes is black, the Goldins Jewish). Strauss takes delight in skewering a world in which everything (news coverage, legal representation, hospital beds) is for sale, sometimes digressively, always amusingly. The stereotypes are intentionally heavy-handed: Josh’s perceptions almost always register through race and class-related fear and disgust. But the heart of the story—the unraveling of Josh’s life and the steady erosion of his faith that ignorance can be a virtue and happiness a choice—is riveting. (June)
