Just Jennifer

Golden Age by Jane Smiley

In the conclusion to her Langdon trilogy, Pulitzer Prize winner Jane Smiley takes the family, the grandchildren and great-grandchildren of Walter and Rosanna Langdon, through the world of the late 1980’s to present day to four years into the future as most of them leave the family farm in Iowa and face the modern world rife with political scandal, worldwide unrest and financial instability, all the while remembering what it is that gives meaning to everything---family.

Focusing on Frank and Andy’s twins Michael and Richie, readers see the financial world collapse and world events through the eyes of a congressman.  Lillian and Arthur’s children continue to face sad times as Joe and his son Jesse fight to save the family farm in Iowa.  Henry finds a place for himself in the modern world, a place he couldn’t have found in his parent’s time and Claire continues on quietly in the shadows of her older brothers and sisters.  Jane Smiley filters everyday events through this every family, not a perfect family, some members make good decisions, some make poor decisions, some are heroes, some are anti-heroes, but at their core, a family nonetheless.  A saga for the ages, this trilogy is a well-observed chronicle of the twentieth-century into the twenty-first as seen through the eyes of one family.