It is late in fall 1977 as Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney’s third novel, Lake Effect, opens. The newly divorced high school nurse Bess Pfeiffer brings copies of a well-known relationship advice book for each member of the Cambridge Road women’s group to discuss. They usually discuss their teenage children and being part of the Roman Catholic Church of suburban Rochester, New York, as they drink wine. But on this fateful night, they talk about what is normally considered taboo.
As the others tell their tales, Nina Larkin and Honey Finnegan say nothing about their lives, their marriages or their two children. Nina is married to Sam Larkin, who works in marketing for Xerox, and they have two high school age daughters, Clara and Bridie. Honey is married to Fintan “Finn” Finnegan, president of Finnegan Grocer’s, Rochester’s premiere supermarket. Honey and Finn have a son, Dune, and a daughter, Fern, who have grown up with Clara and Bridie. Each couple has everything they want, and both couples are very unhappy.
The Larkin and Finnegan marriages implode to the shock of spouses, children and neighbors. Sweeney examines what happens to the parents and their children over the years and the decades that follow. Each character drew me in. Sweeney writes beautifully and with humor. Her food descriptions are exceptional, as are her depictions of the 1970s. I loved it!
Maureen Millea Smith is a retired librarian and an award-winning novelist.
