Camp Jeff

In this barbed if uneven satire, Reich (Mother India) takes on the #MeToo movement and the contradictions of Orthodox Jews. In February 2020, 10 people facing sexual misconduct allegations arrive for rehabilitation at Camp Jeffrey Epstein, a former Catskills resort converted by the “good” Jeffrey Epstein, a businessman who wants to distinguish himself from his notorious namesake. Chief among the guests, of whom nine are men and seven are Jewish, is unrepentant “public intellectual” Gershon Gordon, who has taken to using a wheelchair to gain sympathy. At the camp, he abandons the manuscript he’s been attempting to finish for decades and sets out to write a nostalgic account of time spent in the company of the “bad” Jeffrey Epstein. Eventually, Gordon marries rehabilitator Hedy Nussbaum, a meek and masochistic Talmud scholar, after she’s fired for neglecting her duties, and conceives a plan to take down the camp. Reich’s critique loses focus as the novel eviscerates the moral failings and physical appearances of all the characters, but there are some inspired moments, such as the increasingly chaotic first meeting between the female rehabilitators and their recalcitrant charges. Fans of absurdist comedy ought to take a look. (Oct.)