5⭐️ 𝚁𝚎𝚟𝚒𝚎𝚠: (Thanks to @LittleBrown #gifted.) Why? Why? Why have I seen almost nothing here on Bookstagram about 𝗪𝗢𝗟𝗙 𝗔𝗧 𝗧𝗛𝗘 𝗧𝗔𝗕𝗟𝗘 by Adam Rapp? This book is everything I love in a dysfunctional family novel. Its characters are interesting, unusual, and deep. They hold secrets big and small, and others very, very dark. It’s those darkest secrets that so unflinchingly propel this family drama.⁣⁣
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At its heart are the Larkins, a strict Catholic family made up of an overbearing mother, a quiet father, four sisters, and two brothers. Beginning in 1951 in Elmira, NY, the chapters alternate telling between members of the family, with Myra, the eldest daughter (loosely based on the author’s mother) taking on a large role. This is a family who often live in the space of love/hate relationships amongst themselves. Some are deeply flawed, even scary. The story spans almost 60 years, so there is time for much to develop and come to light.⁣⁣
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From the opening pages we understand that this is a family touched by danger, by evil, though what that evil is remains unclear for a very long time. Instead, there exists a disconcerting anticipation that was beautifully crafted by Rapp. Darkness was always on the edges of their lives, often more of a feeling than anything else. Rapp hinted at it, rather than flaying it open. I loved how he did this, enticing me to read page after page, always wanting to know more.⁣⁣
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Rapp’s words in his letter to readers sums his inspiration up well: “I wanted to honor my mother’s life, and I wanted to examine how a seemingly normal family - a good, hardworking, lower-middle-class family - can be in a relationship to this very scary part of America.” This is EXACTLY what he accomplished and I loved it! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Adam Rapp's WOLF AT THE TABLE is exquisite. Given the subject matter of the novel, I wasn't sure what to expect in terms of the actual storytelling. I've been a fan of Adam Rapp for some time, so I should not have been surprised by his nuanced approach. The writing is sublime in its descriptions and unparalleled in terms of the tension in its scenes. The scene with Myra and the "young man she believes to be Mickey Mantle" in his car made my skin crawl; I was terrified by Myra. She was so unaware of the danger she'd put herself in and it was not clear from moment-to-moment what "Mickey Mantle" was going to do or say to Myra. The character of Myra was so well written; it was fantastic to follow her through so many years.

I also loved Rapp's portrayal of Alec; he wasn't softened with some heartbreaking backstory. Instead, he was human and Rapp wrote Alec as a complex, at times frustrating character, that I was grateful to read.

This book is a master class in character development and tension. I can't wait to share it with my creative writing students.

This book had me Griffin every minute.You never knew it was gonna happen. It starts out in Elma, New York.
In the 50s.. Mya is the oldest girl. W
d Who's raised in a catholic family. One day when she was thirteen when she went to the diner she met mickey mantle. She went for a ride with him in his car. Things were very tense when she got home because the baby brother was very sick. Everybody had a different perspective at this time. She had 2 sisters.One was very bright and the other one named flora was the Very rebellious. Alex the brotherhood a lot of problems too. They had a triple murder one night in their neighborhood. Things were going along really well. Meyer became a nurse. Flora seemed to drift around and part of the counter culture of the 60s.
Alex was very messed up in the head because he was abused by the priest in the neighborhood.
Parish Flora used to take a lot of money from her family and her sister. And alex did the same thing. M y r a was friends with the nurses killed in the sixties in chicago. Death seemed to follow her all around.. She met a man named dave but he was deranged in the head. She did not realize this and still married him. They had a son name. R o n n. You had a lot of mental problems and you finally left the family. M y a was working in the prison when they killed gary the other serial killer. Alex did the same thing across many states.He would send postcards to his mother.Hello in goodbye. You had a trouble passed and you never seemed to get over it. You can see the conflict how in this book everybody had problems. As Ryan got older, he had the same problems as his father and he also married and had a son, but he worked out his problems. The ending is quite.
Interesting as well and you're really enjoying it

Thank you to Netgalley for this ARC. First, this is an incredible book. When I read that it was considered a bit of a mix of Franzen’s, The Corrections (I’ve not read, but have read other books by him) and Shriver’s, We Need to Talk About Kevin (one of my all-time favorite books), I knew I had to read it. It was hard to put down. It alternates between characters, dates, and cities, beginning in the 1950s to current day. This story centers around the Larkin family. The switch between characters and dates works incredibly well to tell the story. It’s obvious that not all is well with some of the characters, most especially one in particular. If you enjoy family sagas, grab this book. I loved the preface from the author, Adam Rapp, at the beginning of the novel as to why he wrote this novel. I highly recommend this book!

This is a novel that spans sixty years and four generations of a large Catholic family, the Larkins. As with many large families, the offspring have a wide range of personalities and levels of success. There is also one child who has an intellectual disability, one who marries into a family with, unbeknownst to her, a history of schizophrenia, and one who was abused by local priests as a child and develops an antisocial personality disorder (commonly known as a “psychopath”). This true cross section of America is revealed through snapshots of family members at different points in time, particularly focusing on two of them who quite disparate in their temperaments.

Well written, the narrative in this character driven novel is rather objective; Rapp didn’t exploit the emotionalism of the antisocial behaviors and family difficulties. He touches on serial killers, with passages involving Richard Speck, John Wayne Gacy, and, of course, the Larkin sibling who is a serial killer and we see how family can be complicit or ignorant. There is an undercurrent of danger, perhaps even evil throughout the story.

I couldn’t engage with any of the characters Often I read a family saga such as this and, although it may be dark, am left with some feelings of hope. After this one, which was mesmerizing, a generalized bleak feeling remained.

I didn’t find this story very interesting, possibly because it was full of events yet devoid of expressed feelings - maybe that was the author’s intent. This character-driven family saga follows the Larkin family. Myra, the main character, is the eldest of 6 children in a strict Catholic family when we meet her at 13. Myra has 3 sisters and 2 brothers, one of whom died as an infant from rheumatic fever. Myra takes on a lot of parental responsibility at a young age and continues to do so later in life, caring for and supporting her younger siblings well into adulthood. Her brother Alec, a former altar boy, was a thief by age 10 (and a victim of sexual assault from several priests). Stealing church funds at age 18 got him kicked out of the family home, and he spent his young adult years roaming the country doing odd jobs, hanging out with criminals who kill at will, and calling Myra for financial assistance or just a shoulder to cry on when he was too drunk. The underlying theme is that mental illness, deviance, and violence are always nearby, and no one can be trusted, not even your siblings or your spouse.

It is curious that the last two books I have read developed from a seed in the authors' past. Each author had physical memories passed down to them, giving one the entire history of the family and the other snatches of memories in a shoebox delivered over two decades later.

I enjoyed these brilliant family sagas, Wolf at the Table by Adam Rapp and This Strange Eventful History by Claire Messud. After reading these incredible novels, I thought that much of the literature I've read recently by older authors telling family stories might be a catalyst for creating a new genre: Aging Adult Fiction (alternative adjectives could include Old, Older, Personal Long History). I like the categorization, and I love the books. The first one for me was Elizabeth Strout, who wrote about fleeing New York with her ex-husband at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in Lucy by the Sea. Then there was Ian McEwan in Lessons.

These literary giants wrote about what life looks like when viewed from the prism of what was on offer at the beginning of life and how things played out for all the familial characters. Rapp's large family in Elmira, New York, shook me to the core with hints of horrific events happening close to what seemed like a typical lower middle-class family with four sisters and two brothers. Myra, the oldest daughter, told the main POV chapters, followed by the mother and the brother. As time passed and children were born into this family, Ronin became my hero. Folks, this is not a gentle stroll down memory lane. But it was worth every minute I spent reading this brilliant novel.

On the other side of Aging Adult Fiction is the brilliant global journey Claire Messud creates with Gaston and Lucienne Cassar. The Cassars, deeply in love, find separation from each other painful as Gaston is in the French Navy and Lucienne is trying to parent her children in Algeria. The Cassar family story takes us worldwide, moving for almost a century. They become a family without an actual, natural home to comfort them. The family and their offspring make the best of each situation, but home is an elusive fantasy that will forever elude them. I felt particularly stirred by this story as it contains personal elements.

The heft of Wolf at the Table and This Strange Eventful History gave me so much to reflect on, consider, and learn from. I am in awe of these authors and their work.

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the advanced copy of these books.

Wolf at the Table was published on March 19, 2024, by Little, Brown, and Company.


This Strange Eventful History will be published on May 14, 2024, by W. W. Norton & Company.

This novel is a saga of three generations of Catholic family from upstate New York beginning in 1951 and ending in 2010. Each of them is touched in various ways by murder and the dysfunction of their relationships with one another. The tale is murky, gloomy and violent but I found the story and characters, as well as the well-crafted prose to be a compelling read.

** spoiler alert ** Thank you, NetGalley and the publisher, for providing an eARC in exchange for my honest review.

Wow, this book took me for a ride. It was not what I expected. It could also be named "The Larkin Family and all the psychopathic killers around them."
The book covers 60 years in the history of the Larkins, a middle-class family with six children. We see the kids grow up and go through life while dealing with some major challenges. Lots of character development, mental illness discussion, serial killings, and some pretty messed up stuff. (would you mail your mother your poop or all of your teeth? how about both?)
If you like true crime and serial killer lore, you will particularly enjoy it, but the book is not really about the crimes and criminals. I think it is more about what makes people do horrible things and how often ordinary citizens come in contact with killers and molesters without knowing it, and how the "ordinary citizens" sometimes end up being monsters.

Starting in the summer of 1951, this book follows the Larkin family through to today. The four siblings - Myra, Alec, Lexy and Fiona - take us through their lives as they take drastically different paths.

This is a long book that is in turn interesting and dull. The random "famous people" the siblings interact with felt comical to me at times and overall, I did not feel like it added anything to the story. The story itself had a lot of promise, but it just felt too long at times.

Thank you to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for providing me with an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Available March 19, 2024.

Wolf at the Table by Adam Rapp ⭐️⭐️💫

I’m pretty mixed on how I feel about this one. I oscillated between interested and bored/cringe. I struggled with the usage of some wording and cringed often even if it was true to the times. Think of every word or description that might’ve been used at one point that is not politically correct now and know that it’s in this book for seemingly no reason. I didn’t feel these instances provided any meaningful insight to plot or characters, and it was more distracting to me.

The description boasted this book as a “harrowing multigenerational saga about a family harboring a serial killer in their midst…” Because of this, I was expecting a more on the nose story about just that. However, this book was more nuanced; the author was more focused on the exploration of how close we all come to danger regularly.

This novel could’ve been edited down a lot and still got its point across. The author liked to over describe, which left this book feeling very character heavy without significant growth or plot points. I will give credit as every time I was getting really bored, the author would reign it back in and grab my attention again, which kept me reading.

If you like multigenerational sagas spanning several decades, heavy character driven novels, or books that are more nuanced, this might be a hit for you.

I loved this book. Multigenerational saga with serial killer in their midst. The characters were well developed and believable. A book that was hard to put down.

This story is definitely a stark and brutal tale of one family over the course of 50 years. This book is not going to give you the resolution you may love, or any sort at all actually. It will leave you with a never ending sense of ennui.
Now that being said I feel that I couldn’t have read this book if I had connected with and loved the characters. Something as brutally dark as this has to leave you without a deep emotion. At least for me it does.
This is 100 percent a certain style book which. Is targeted to a niche audience.
I received a ARC of this book, all opinions are my own.

Myra is the oldest of a large Catholic family in 1951 when she meets a man claiming to be Mickey Mantle. The event shapes her youth, as a triple homicide occurs later that night. As her siblings grow and also leave home, her brother Alex becomes more isolated.

If you’re a fan of character driven family sagas, this is one for you. It’s very long.. in my opinion, slightly longer than it needed to be, but once you get into all the characters you don’t mind. There’s some cameos by real life serial killers that you may pick up if you’re a true crime fan. Overall a very interesting character study and saga.

“It’s like a door rising out of the earth, the simplest of doors, wooden, with a tarnished brass knob. You either grab hold of it, turn the knob and walk through the f*cking thing, or you don’t.”

Wolf at the Table comes out 3/19.

Wolf at the Table is not light reading. For some reason, I thought it would be a thriller or more of a psychological suspense based on the description, but this is a dark, brutal look at violence and trauma. Rapp's characters suffer, and the space his novel occupies is not one to be entered into lightly. It deals extensively with murder, mental illness, sexual abuse, grooming, and more. The world Rapp built around the Larkin family is unforgiving in so many ways, and it's difficult to get through at times.

But it's also fascinating. Wolf at the Table is bleak, make no mistake, but it's compulsively readable. Myra is a wonder, the reliable sibling and child who shoulders the brunt of everyone's pain while constantly pushing away her own; she is an everyday hero and as the heart of the novel, she makes the journey into the darkness worth taking, exposing the more hopeful moments as the gifts they are and assuring that Rapp is not just hammering us over the head with devastation. His language is specific and moving, and his characters are full and actualized and real.

I will remember this book for a long while.

I expected Wolf at the Table by Adam Rapp to be dark, but the plot was not quite what I expected based on the description. The book peers into the lives of the Larkin family, including staunch matriarch Ava, quiet and damaged Donald, along with their children Myra, Alec, Fiona, Joan and Lexy. Their story is not a happy one; descriptors that come to mind include gritty, sad, harrowing and disturbing.

We get slices of their lives over the course of 50 years and told from mainly Myra's and Alec's points of view. There is a bit from Ava and Fiona, but I would have liked to hear more about Lexy, Fiona and Joan. The theme seems to be how close their lives are brushed with violence, but some members are closer than others. The strong writing carries the book as we visit the Larkins over the timeline. Although parts are difficult to read, I will call it 3.5 stars rounded up.

I will recommend this to readers who like dark family dramas.

Thank you to Little, Brown and Company and NetGalley for the digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I think this book suffers from its marketing. The synopsis promises a “harrowing multigenerational saga about a family harboring a serial killer in their midst” which sounds like my entire alley. Of course, if the marketing was truthful and billed it as the Forrest Gump of true crime, it probably wouldn’t sell as well.

I enjoyed aspects of this story, but it was entirely too long and needed a clearer focus. It felt like Rapp wrote this for himself, not the reader - the prose too dense and self-indulgent. Which may be great for him, but not so much for me.

I think a lot of these vignettes work as short stories, but they don’t add up cohesive narrative.

The story of the Larkin family of Elmira, NY. What a mess they are. Myra is the oldest and the most likeable but she just seems to go along with things. She is probably the most likeable. Her brother, Alec, is horrible and mean and leaves when he is 19. There is also Fiona, a failed actress, Joan who has a mental handicap and Lexy who seems to be the one that "makes it." Lexy and Fiona are barely mentioned and the story goes back and forth between Alex and Myra but there are years in between each chapter so you are meant to fill in the gaps. The story takes place from 1951 to 2010. A lot of places mentioned in NY were familiar to me so that made it interesting but there just didn't seem to be a lot of emotion or dialogue. At one point I thought a character was going to be killed and I was good with that. The author just didn't make me care enough.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Little, Brown and Co. for providing me with a digital copy.

I pushed myself to get to 46% before I finally stopped reading. just can't finish this one. I was really hoping the emotional void would be filled, but at hasn't been at this point. Rapp's writing is fantastic, but there has to be more depth for the impact that a story like this should have on me. It also felt extremely lengthy for the portion I read.

I do think this would be a good fit for someone who is interested in reading how close we are to evil at times, unaware, and about how siblings can differ wildly from one another.

Mixed emotions on this one. I alternated between being engrossed and uninterested. If only there had been more dialogue! I was surprised at the lack of it as the author is a play writer. I never skipped those parts because there was some action and consequence. The prose was endless and I was missing entire sections (particularly at the Alec and Ronan sections). Myra’s tale was the best particularly as it connected in to historical events and there was more dialogue in her sections. Way too long and frankly pretty depressing. Written like a memoir, it covered a rather uninspiring, dysfunctional family who happened to have a serial killer amongst them which they did nothing about.
Thanks Netgalley for the ARC.