FATHER'S DAY

An out-of-work cameraman spends a revealing couple of days with his reticent father in this novel.

New Yorker Andy Silver’s 30th birthday won’t likely go on record as his favorite. His wife, Georgette, is leaving him, and his father, Al, wants Andy to chauffeur him around Manhattan for “important matters.” It’s been more than a year since Andy has spoken to Al, who lives in Florida, and he’s surprised at the airport to see that his father looks unwell. One item on Al’s agenda is for his business, which is primarily servicing water tanks. But nearly everything else is a shocking revelation for his son, including what Al is carrying in his attaché case and what he has in a safe deposit box. Al hasn’t exactly been an open book; Andy knows very little about his father’s tours in Vietnam. And now Al has a bevy of secrets, and many, like his extramarital affairs, are not necessarily things Andy wants to know. Meanwhile, the men’s spouses appear in concurrent narratives. Georgette returns to her home country of France for a less-than-happy reunion with her estranged mother. Al’s wife, Ruth, who claims she’s at a spa, is actually with a group of activists in New York state. They’re protesting about a treatment plant that is reputedly dumping fracking wastewater, and rather than merely picket, some opt for an act of civil disobedience—chaining themselves to a gate. Even as the main characters’ lives ultimately reconnect, there may still be emotional distances to overcome.

Baran’s tale is a potent character study. While Andy is taken aback by what he learns about his father, readers discover even more about the four central characters via backstories. For example, Georgette is a model who spent six months at a rehab center for drugs and may also suffer a sex addiction. These fairly somber backstories make for a bleak narrative, made even more so by their plausibility. Every character is flawed, and none of Al’s revelations are absurd or far-fetched. In fact, perhaps the most stunning secret is one Andy has known and harbored for a long time. Dry humor does offer a bit of relief, such as Al’s tendency to offend people. After watching a woman pick up after her dog, he pointlessly remarks: “Great exercise.” At the same time, the author doesn’t entirely saturate his novel in hopelessness. In the case of Andy and Georgette’s split, it’s apparent there’s still love between them and that a reconciliation is a possibility. The final act spins off into a touch of violence and legal trouble, though Baran’s gradual introduction of certain narrative elements (for example, Ruth’s protesting plan and someone’s handgun) makes these seem inevitable. The author’s prose is unadorned but concise, especially character descriptions. At one point, Al meets a woman in Italy: “Susan divorced a starter husband and married a rich widower for whom she worked. They had two children. After he died, she decided that no man would ever control her again.”

An absorbing, sometimes grim look at a family’s darker side.