Tweet: Maggie Shipstead has delivered a wickedly witty, urbane, laugh-out-loud
delicious read.
The Van Meter family has gathered at their home on Waskeke (think Nantucket) to celebrate the wedding of daughter Daphne, seven months pregnant. Harvard educated patriarch Winn Van Meter , who organizes his life through club memberships and social niceties, finds himself unexpectedly lusting after bridesmaid Agnes. Daughter Livia is recovering from a romance gone sour, and Winn’s wife Biddy stoically propels the weekend forward while keeping her own fomenting emotions in check.
The Van Meter family has gathered at their home on Waskeke (think Nantucket) to celebrate the wedding of daughter Daphne, seven months pregnant. Harvard educated patriarch Winn Van Meter , who organizes his life through club memberships and social niceties, finds himself unexpectedly lusting after bridesmaid Agnes. Daughter Livia is recovering from a romance gone sour, and Winn’s wife Biddy stoically propels the weekend forward while keeping her own fomenting emotions in check.
Together with a wonderful cast of characters, the Van Meters
struggle to understand their relationships both within and outside of their
family. Ms. Shipstead wryly explores the
polarity of belonging and being an outcast, and how each character must
maneuver between the two. Seating
Arrangements is intelligent and wonderfully written, a thinking person’s
guilty pleasure.
