Book of the week: The Hole We’re In by Gabrielle Zevin

(Black Cat/Grove/Atlantic)

Much has been written about the hopelessness of families caught in a downdraft of debt, but “no novel has truly captured that struggle until now,” said Tina Jordan in Entertainment Weekly. Gabrielle Zevin’s The Hole We’re In chronicles the financial and familial woes of the Pomeroy clan—beginning with the dawning of easy credit in the early 1990s and picking up again in 2006, just as the bubble begins to burst. Like many Americans, the Pomeroys are victims of their own optimism, said Malena Watrous in The New York Times. When Roger Pomeroy quits his job to pursue a Ph.D., he and wife Georgia max out their credit cards, cash in their retirement savings, and dip into their kids’ college funds, all the while consuming “to the point of numbness.” While their plight may be depressing, Zevin crafts an entertaining and enlightening read. Just don’t expect the Pomeroys to have any financial epiphanies. “In this novel, as in life, bad deeds often go unpunished.”

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