A rehearsal dinner brings together two disparate families in this sparkling, witty novel“This vital novel offers delicious echoes of Virginia Woolf and E. M. Forster, and a touch of A Midsummer Night’s Dream—but its magic is unique. The Garden Party is beautiful and full of life.”—Claire Messud, author of The Burning Girl and The Woman Upstairs The Cohens are wildly impractical … Upstairs
The Cohens are wildly impractical intellectuals—academics, activists, and artists. The Barlows are Wall Street Journal–reading lawyers steeped in trusts and copyrights, golf and tennis. The two families are reserved with and wary of each other, but tonight, the evening before the wedding that is supposed to unite them in marriage, they will attempt to set aside their differences over dinner in the garden.
As Celia Cohen, the eminent literary critic, sets the table, her husband, Pindar, would much rather be translating ancient recipes for his Babylonian cookbook than hosting this rehearsal dinner. Meanwhile, their son, Adam, the poet (and nervous groom), wonders if there is still time to simply elope. One of Adam’s sisters, Naomi, a passionate but fragile social activist, refuses to leave her room, while Sara, scorpion biologist turned folklore writer, sits up on the roof mourning an imminent breakup. And Pindar’s elderly mother, Leah, witnesses everything, weaving old memories into the present.
The lawyers are early: patriarch Stephen Barlow and his bespangled wife, Philippa, who specializes in estates, along with Philippa’s father, Nathan, hobbled by age and Lyme disease. Then come the Barlow sons William (war crimes), Cameron (intellectual property), and Barnes (the prosecutor), each with desperate wife and precocious offspring. How could their younger siblings—Eliza, the bride, an aspiring veterinarian, and her twin brother, Harry, recently expelled from divinity school—have issued from such a family?
Up and down the dinner table, with its twenty-four (or is it twenty-five?) guests, unions are forming and dissolving while Pindar is trying to figure out whether time is really shaped like baklava, and off in the surrounding forest with its ancient pond different sorts of mischief will lead to a complicated series of fiascoes and miracles before the party is over. Set over the course of a single day and night, Grace Dane Mazur’s brilliantly observed novel weaves an irresistible portrayal of miscommunication, secrets, and the power of love.
“Lyrical and charming, this comedy of errors is a delightful summer read.”—People
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I initially picked up this book because I was drawn by the gorgeous cover. Once I read the blurb, I was hooked and ready to crack the cover. I loved the idea of the story playing out over a summer evening with so many differing characters as players. Therein lies the charm and the problem. There are twenty-four people at the garden party, plus a cook and a butler. The author manages to juggle all of these personalities with skill. But although we get glimpses beneath the surface of each, the reader never experiences a deeper connection. Some appear as nothing more than sketches. Each, however—including the children—have a quirk or two that makes for a gathering of eccentrics.
Written in omniscient point-of-view, the book is divided into sections (Arrivals, Drinks, Dinner in the Garden, etc), rather than chapters. I was halfway through the second part before taking note of the structure as the story sucked me under from page one. It’s not a long book, just over 200 pages. Most of the scenes move rapidly but others are dense. I found much of the writing exquisite, appreciating the lyricism of descriptions and unique turns of phrase. Note this example:
Pindar had always felt that there was something fleeting about his daughter, even at twenty-four, as though she were a delicate contraption made of feathers and rubber bands and sails.
And this:
The stairs in the front hall creak as oaken floorboards talk to nails. Walls shift as the day’s warmth rushes out and coolness from the garden flows in to take its place. Couches exhale. In the attic, objects made of suede and velvet stir.
I finished the book in two days, finding myself reluctant to set it aside when other matters called. Were it not for the closing chapter, this would be a five-star read for me. But all the build-up, all the shuffling of players and personalities, lives knitted together, and others undone toppled into “WTH?” in the final section. I’m not sure why the author chose to end the book as she did. Without a doubt this is a novel to generate book club discussions. I’m not sorry I spent time with the story, only sorry the ending fell flat.
This is a wonderful book. Set at a wedding rehearsal dinner in a garden full of secrets, the story lets us watch time spilling out its chances on an intensely thoughtful cast of characters. And it leaves the reader with the remarkable sensation that happiness is not in contradiction with intelligence.
This vital novel offers delicious echoes of Virginia Woolf and E. M. Forster, and a touch of A Midsummer Night’s Dream — but its magic is unique. The Garden Party is beautiful and full of life.
The Garden Party is a beautiful and compelling story of love in all its prismatic colours. Grace Dane Mazur is that rare writer who makes domesticity alluring even as she brilliantly presents its dangers and complexity in sharp, tart language that is so enjoyable to read. Lightness, darkness, longing: all skillfully contained here. I loved this book, for it reminded me of the pleasure that reading a good book can bring and the sadness that comes over me when I am done.
The cover of the book caught my attention and the description made me think I would enjoy it. However, I had to force myself to keep turning the pages and enduring the banality of the story. I felt like the story just became so convoluted. And there were just too many characters that I didn’t like. It was a total waste of my time.
Though I appreciate NetGalley for providing an ARC in exchange for my honest review.
An overgrown garden, two families with nothing in common, six couples in various stages of love and dissolution, a bride and groom determined to disrupt their own wedding, a pond of giant fish. In this unique and absorbing novel, Grace Dane Mazur gives us that ‘essential thing’ Virginia Woolf taught us to look for in fiction, but we don’t often find.