Newspaper Article

Life in a New York suburb, from an idiosyncratic point of view

Reviewed by Meg Wolitzer, An author whose most recent novel is "This Is Your Life."

1991

Overview

The Moralist of the Alphabet Streets By Fabienne Marsh Algonquin Books, 238 pages, $17.95 An engaging cast of characters inhabits the \"Alphabet Streets\" of a New York suburb in Fabienne Marsh's second novel. This is a neighborhood in an old-fashioned sense; everyone is constantly colliding and interfering and learning each others' secrets. There's little privacy, but no one seems to mind. At the heart of both the neighborhood and the novel stands \"moralist\" Meredith Saunders, an 18-year-old redhead with a flair for describing everything and everyone in her midst: The novel takes place one summer when Meredith's parents are away in Paris on their second honeymoon, and her grandmother, her sisters and one of her sister's children come to stay. The absence of parents is a deft touch, and gives Meredith's household a satisfyingly anarchic feel. Grandmother Grace, 86 and possessed of strong opinions, says of her own sister, \"I hate Marietta with all my heart. . . . My red hair's made her jealous of me from the day I was born.\" And Meredith's sister Lenore has come home to recover from her marriage to a man whose \"family history is pickled in alcohol.\"

• Publisher: Tribune Publishing Company, LLC