A Long Island Story

By: Rick Gekoski

Narrated by: Kerry Shale

It is 1953, a heat wave is sweeping across America and the Grossmans - Ben, Addie and their two children - are moving their lives from the political heart of Washington, DC to suburban Long Island.

Benny was a successful lawyer in the Department of Justice, but all that has come tumbling down. With the McCarthy era of paranoia, persecution, and propaganda at its height, his past has come back to haunt him, forcing him to pack up his family and leave the capital behind. With their future uncertain, life in Long Island starts to open old wounds for Ben and Addie, and both start to wonder if they were meant for more, whether their future might look different than they planned and whether their marriage - their family - is worth fighting for....

A Long Island Story is a portrait of a marriage in crisis, of a unique and fascinating period in US history and of a seemingly perfect family fighting their demons behind closed doors.

©2018 Rick Gekoski (P)2018 Canongate Books Ltd

Critic reviews

In A Long Island Story Gekoski turns a forensic eye on the subtlest nuances of family life and, in the process, introduces us to the fears, desires, and compromises of a generation. This is a deeply honest portrait of life, the big and the small of it, the sorrows and the joys (REBECCA F. JOHN)

Staggeringly accomplished. Heartbreakingly true. A shockingly monumental first novel (JOHN NIVEN)

A wondrous book with two fathers, Kingsley Amis and Dante (SEBASTIAN BARRY)

PRAISE FOR DARKE: I couldn't stop reading. Gekoski puts words together with a sure touch and deep craftsmanship (PHILIP PULLMAN)