by Jean Hanff Korelitz
Reviewed by Linda:
This very smart novel got under my skin, as I nervously read the what members of the long-suffering Oppenheimer family would do next to cause one another pain. What a relief the ending was, thanks to the youngest sibling, the latecomer. The older three siblings, triplets, were reared with every advantage: wealth, education, and the focused attention of one of their parents. But neither Harrison (the smart one), Lewyn (the weird one), nor Sally (the girl) suspected the devastating event that first set their family in motion, or understood how fully it had already formed them. Now, on the verge of their departure for college and their escape from one another at last, the triplets are forced to contend with an unexpected complication: a fourth Oppenheimer sibling, formerly a leftover embryo from their own long ago in vitro genesis, has just been born. Neither the triplets nor the reader can imagine the impact this unwanted latecomer will have on their lives.