“Berger excels at showing her characters to be people who were raised in old-fashioned homes who are now confronting unconventional, risky life choices—and dealing with the stresses and absurdities that follow their decisions. A smart, nuanced novel about open marriage . . .”—Kirkus Reviews“Sande Boritz Berger sets a 1970s Jersey housewife on a provocative collision course in Split-Level, a sharp … collision course in Split-Level, a sharp portrait of female empowerment. Through sensitive insights, a woman finds an honest version of herself after realizing that her ideas on the nuclear family have made her erase vital parts of her identity.”
—Foreword Reviews
In Split-Level, set as the nation recoils from Nixon, Alex Pearl is about to commit the first major transgression of her life. But why shouldn’t she remain an officially contented, soon-to-turn-thirty wife? She’s got a lovely home in an upscale Jersey suburb, two precocious daughters, and a charming husband, Donny. But Alex can no longer deny she craves more—some infusion of passion into the cul-de-sac world she inhabits.
After she receives a phone call from her babysitter’s mother reporting that Donny took the teen for a midnight ride, promising he’d teach her how to drive, Alex insists they attend Marriage Mountain, the quintessential 1970s “healing couples sanctuary.” Donny accedes—but soon becomes obsessed with the manifesto A Different Proposition and its vision of how multiple couples can live together in spouse-swapping bliss. At first Alex scoffs, but soon she gives Donny much more than he bargained for. After he targets the perfect couple to collude in his fantasy, Alex discovers her desire for love escalating to new heights—along with a willingness to risk everything. Split-Level evokes a pivotal moment in the story of American matrimony, a time when it seemed as if an open marriage might open hearts as well.
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Anyone who lived through the early 1970s in a new marriage will recognize the upheaval in the cultural view of marriage, and the burgeoning shift in women’s roles in and out of the home that forms the backdrop of Sande Boritz-Berger’s novel Split-Level. With sometimes painful accuracy, Berger recreates the confusion, the malaise, the dreaminess and alternating insight and cluelessness of 30 year-old Alex Pearl as she unwittingly sets the stage for a spouse-swapping, family-wrecking encounter. She learns, as so many did, that the free love and drug energized emancipation from constraining morays of that time were not necessarily freeing, often destructive, and inevitably complicated. Berger’s gift is her fine evocation of that tumultuous time and her depiction of the imperfect characters who blundered through it.
In Split-Level, author Sande Boritz Berger offers a beautifully realized world of 1970s suburbia and concomitant angst. There are no easy answers for the main character, Alex Pearl, nor for any of the other characters. I appreciated the depiction of a time in our history when women were beginning to escape stifling marriages in order to regain a sense of identity, vitality and creativity. This book is smart and funny, and kept me engaged because it’s not a soap opera, but rather, a poignant study of one marriage and one woman. Very well done.
First, I would like to thank She Writes Press and NetGalley for providing me with a free Kindle ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review.
Reading the synopsis, I imagined that this book would be edgy and push the limits of matrimonial morality. I imagined overwhelming lust and emotion, edge-of-your-seat passion and discord, and controversial sexual freedom pushing back against the patriarchal and traditional nuclear family. Instead, I was dealt immeasurable boredom and exhaustive accounts of Alex’s passive aggression. Her inability to handle confrontations in an adult manner was off-putting. Despite the fact that she indulges in the foursquare tryst, for example, Alex spitefully buries her husband’s adored swingers’ manifesto in the neighbor’s garbage can. Alex is completely incapable of accepting responsibility for ANYTHING and blames Donny for EVERYTHING, even though she is equally culpable for the events that occur. She is also entirely indecisive. She pushes away anyone who would show her attention and although she recognizes the impact of her behavior on her children, she fails to act in a constructive manner to repair what she has damaged. The plot was predictable, and the characters were devoid of depth, so the only thing redeeming this book is its beautiful writing style. If you read this book for no other reason, read it for the writing style. I felt as though there was no true climax, no real conflict, no finite resolution. The ending leaves you questioning what Alex decides and there is nothing worse than a vague conclusion.
#netgalley #split-level
The author starts out with showing us the world of young wife Alex, just about to turn 30 and disillusioned with her life, but not sure why. She has followed the path laid out for women of that time – married well, nice house in the suburbs, stay at home mom of two lovely young daughters. She should be happy. But she isn’t. And apparently neither is her husband. They seem to be like a couple of kids playing house and not sure what to do next. They are headed for their parents lives, and those lives are not worth emulating. The author tells a story of how Alex tries to make sense of what she sees others doing, as she is slowly and methodically lured into a situation that both tempts her and repulses her. I felt the story started out slow, but as I got farther into it, I became immersed in the story and totally drawn in. It was interesting to watch the shift in Alex as she goes through her transitions.
A title that really sets the stage. The author weaves an intricate tale around a heroine who is split in so many ways, especially from her true self and real wants and needs. The novel is prefaced by the wonderful Anais Nin quote about how love “dies of blindness and errors and betrayals,” and Split Level is packed with all three. With a backdrop of scandals — from nuclear to political to sexual — she comes to terms with herself and her life as she evolves from one level of existence to another. An important read for all women.
I was given the opportunity to review Split-Level by Sande Boritz Berger and found the description to be interesting as I was newly married in the early ’70s. I did not live in a split-level house but I know the kind of house it is. It is the kind of house that Alex Pearl and her family live in in the New Jersey suburbs.
Alex feels that she is missing passion in her life and marriage, she is happily married though with two daughters and a charming husband. She receives a call from her babysitter’s mom that Donny has taken her daughter on a midnight ride. Alex is upset by this even though Donny says he was teaching the girl how to drive. Not sure whether to believe him or not she insists that they go to Marriage Mountain, a couples healing sanctuary.
Donny at first is reluctant but once they started going but learns the ‘manifesto’ a spouse-swapping idea that at first Alex does not want to do but eventually capitulates and they meet a couple that they do the ‘swap’ with. As you can imagine, this is not always what it is cracked up to be. Problems emerge that can put their marriage at risk.
Like I said, I was newly married in the early ’70s and among the free love and smoking pot, a lot of things happened that probably would not happen today. I am sure that there are still couples that ‘swap’ but you just don’t hear about it. This book was not only about marriage but of a woman coming into her own, finding out what she wanted out of life and a dull marriage was not one of the things. She finally came to realize what she wanted and went after it.
At first, I thought I would be bored with the story but that was not the case. I totally enjoyed it. Something a bit different from what I typically read and I really liked it. The author’s writing was easy to follow, writing about an open marriage I imagine can be challenging!
Split-Level by Sande Boritz Berger is my first encounter with this author. I was drawn to this book because I grew up in the 70’s and this book intrigued me. I enjoyed this book but did not fall in love with the characters, it was well written the storyline was very interesting, the characters though immature were realistic. This was a fun, quick and easy read.
Split-Level (She Writes Press May 7, 2019), byr Sande Boritz Berger, is a bold, beautiful, shimmery novel, full of longing, wit, and insight, at once both sad and hopeful, ultimately uplifting, sometimes funny, and always entertaining. Written with care and obvious talent, Split-Level is the story of a marriage on the ropes and a woman struggling to dig her way out of a staid, suburban life and reclaim her talents and her identity.
This is a book that should be read slow and savored. Sande Boritz Berger proved just how great a writer she is in her debut novel, The Sweetness (She Writes Press 2014), of which Booklist wrote: “[A] stirring debut novel of Holocaust survivor guilt–guilt about being safe. Told with candor and tenderness …”
With Split-Level, Berger offers readers another chance to savor her talents, wit, and insights. And, if you doubt for one moment that Split-Level is a great book worthy of your time to read, let the words of Joyce Carol Oats, surely one of the most talented and acclaimed writers of our time, convince you. Of Split-Level, Oats wrote: “How impressive Split-Level is: wonderfully rich with details, fluent and fluid, with an inevitable-yet-unexpected ending, inspired throughout is its portrait of a woman whose essential life is an unconscious double-ness/split-ness.”―Joyce Carol Oates, author of We Were the Mulvaneys and
As a child of the 70’s, I jumped at the chance to read Split-Level. What happens when a married couple decide to have an “open” marriage and become swingers? I have often wondered how marriages can survive without monogamy. Sande Boritz Berger gave me a though provoking glimpse into a life style completely different than my own. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this captivating novel!
Linda’s Book Obsession Reviews “Split Level” by Sande Boritz Berger, She Writes Press, May 2019
Sande Boritz Berger , Author of “Split-Level” has written a unique, thought-provoking and entertaining novel. The Genres for this Novel are Fiction and Women’s Fiction. The timeline for this story is in the 1970s after Nixon was President. The story takes place mostly in an affluent community in New Jersey. The author describes her dysfunctional cast of characters as complex and complicated.
This is a Novel that questions what marriage should be. Alex Pearl will soon be thirty, has two young children, is very artistic, and seems to have it all. She has a family, a beautiful house, yet there are certain questions that are bothering her. Somehow, she has doubts about her husband Donny. After a certain incident, Alex insists that she and Donny go to a Marriage Encounter of sorts. It appears that Donny is obsessed with the idea of more of an open marriage. Alex is conflicted what she wants.
I appreciate that the author discusses the concept of marriage, communication, honesty. family, friends, love, and hope. The author also mentions the use of alcohol and drugs, which seems to play a part in decision-making. When is it time to grow up and take responsibility? What happens if you try to change tradition? I would recommend this novel to readers who enjoy a though-provoking novel.