The novel portrays a family, the wealth of the ‘80s, and examines the repercussions of trauma. It is set in the past, specifically around March 12, 1983, and the near present, illustrating the events’ repercussions. It primarily takes place in Long Island, New York, within a wealthy Jewish community, with brief scenes in Los Angeles and New York City. Carl Fletcher, the head of the family, is a wealthy businessman who has inherited a plastics factory on Long Island. He lives in a large oceanfront house with his wife Ruth and their two children, Nathan (8) and Bernard (3). On the day in question, Carl is kidnapped on his way to the factory and is held captive for an entire week.
Carl’s mother, Phyllis, lives on a nearby estate. A widow active in the local Jewish community, she is intelligent, organized, and domineering. Phyllis quickly uses the family’s connections to help solve the case. Ruth, from a more humble background, realizes that the kidnapping will change everything within the Fletcher family. Pregnant, she is immediately frightened by the idea of losing the baby from stress.
Nathan, the elder son, is anxious and quickly senses the household’s fear and tension. Bernard, known as ‘Beamer,’ is an attention-seeking toddler prone to tantrums. Ruth has no choice but to take him along during the kidnapping events, including the drive to the bank to collect the ransom.
We do not see Carl during his captivity, but Ruth is told that he has been taken by a ‘Palestinian freedom fighters’ group. In reality, he was held in the basement of one of the factory’s outbuildings. Two Black factory employees were charged and found guilty of the kidnapping, despite their lack of means or intelligence to plan such a crime.
Near the book’s end, it’s revealed that the perpetrator was Carl’s foreman and close ally, Ira, who resented Carl’s inherited wealth. During the week Carl is missing, the police are stymied. When the ransom request is made, Ruth delivers it, and Carl is dumped by the roadside, traumatized and emotionally damaged. Ruth spends the rest of his life supporting him and maintaining the image of a functioning Carl, though the family knows he is not the same. Arthur, Phyllis’s nephew and the family lawyer, helps Ruth through this time, providing the emotional support she needs. Carl returns to the factory, but as outsourcing becomes common, it’s clear the factory must be sold. A private equity firm offers to buy it, intending to acquire the land, a messy business underway when the novel catches up to the present.
In the near present, Nathan is a lawyer, married to his college sweetheart with children. Still nervous and lacking confidence, he has never been promoted past associate in his law firm and has little drive. When he screws up a larger project, he expects to be fired. The main narrative around Nathan involves his wife, Alyssa, wanting an elaborate bar mitzvah for their twin sons, a turning point at the novel’s end.
Bernard, the younger son, is a successful screenwriter who collaborated on a trilogy of action films with his childhood friend Charlie. However, Bernard has not matched that success, while Charlie has become a well-known producer. Bernard, supported by a trust fund, is married to Noelle, a former swimsuit model, with two children. Secretly, he is addicted to drugs and visits a dominatrix to ritualistically reenact his father’s kidnapping. Near a mental breakdown, he indeed suffers one at the book’s end.
Jenny, the youngest, was born after Carl was ransomed. She was an outstanding student and talented musician but became a loner in college. After earning a Master’s in Art History, she became radicalized, joining the faculty union as a full-time organizer. Her actions criticize her family’s wealth, though she fails to recognize her own entitlement. Her boyfriend is shocked by her family’s vast wealth.
When Phyllis dies, Bernard refuses to take his mother’s calls, instead seeing his dominatrix and avoiding family responsibilities. His wife, Noelle, is on the verge of leaving him, and their therapist has quit after an outburst by Bernard. He finally takes Jenny’s call and agrees to attend the funeral, which ends in disaster as Marjorie, Phyllis’s daughter, criticizes her mother during the service. Nathan, who manages the trust fund, has bankrupted it through bad investments. Jenny, the first to notice something amiss, moves into the family’s unused New York brownstone.
The bar mitzvah goes well but triggers a memory for Beamer, Nathan, and Jenny that Carl and Ruth were absent from Nathan’s bar mitzvah, which Ruth denies. Ruth has maintained the family through denial and willpower. At the after-party, Carl collapses and dies, communing with his grandfather in his final moments and receiving forgiveness. His captivity, involving torture and humiliation, is revealed.
Ruth advises Marjorie to fight for her share of the estate, but Marjorie, hallucinating, burns down the family factory. The insurance collected pays fines, readying the property for development. Fate seems to favor the Fletchers despite their flaws.
Beamer’s drug addiction, marital issues, and work problems culminate in a drug binge and hallucinations, causing him to miss his daughter’s recital and ending his marriage. He enters rehab, where Jenny visits him. Nathan, fearing the family’s collapse, confesses the truth to his wife, Alyssa, who seeks help from Ruth and Arthur. Arthur reveals that Carl’s grandfather buried diamonds for a ‘rainy day,’ now needed. The diamonds are liquidated, and the money invested in reliable trusts. Nathan learns to manage his money better, Bernard reconciles with his wife, and Jenny starts a serious relationship with her high school sweetheart. The narrator concludes that the wealthy always land on their feet.