36 - by Kate Katcher (Paperback)

About the Book

Summer, 1984: Maxine holds her family together-until her daughter returns to break her heart. Set against a Talmudic legend, 36 explores duty, love, and the cost of destiny.

Book Synopsis

"Unfolds like a legend, a spiritual origin story we may have dreamt or perhaps already lived." Anthony D'Aries, author of The Language of Men

It is the summer of 1984. Ronald Reagan is in the White House, the cellphone has yet to be invented, and the Weiss family operates like a well-oiled, three-ring circus.

At its center is Maxine-middle-aged, tireless, and in control-the ringleader who keeps everything in motion. She juggles the needs of everyone around her: a mother newly moved into the in-law apartment of her three-story home, a husband in need of new knees, and an ever-growing circle of friends and acquaintances who rely on her via a telephone that tethers her to the house with impossibly long cords. Above all, she cares for her most important responsibility-her intellectually challenged daughter, Shira, an innocent with a sweet disposition that leaves her vulnerable in a cruel world.

Maxine keeps all the plates spinning, certain that if one should fall, her eldest daughter, Shellie, will be there to catch it.

But when Shellie returns home, she comes with a mission of her own: to break her mother's heart.

Set against an ancient Talmudic legend of thirty-six people responsible for the survival of humankind, 36 is a powerful story of obligation versus choice-of embracing one's destiny or daring to escape it.

Review Quotes

"Kate Katcher's debut novel is a wild ride through one family's complex and layered history. In prose that is at times lyrical, heartbreaking, and hilarious, Katcher transports readers to 1980s Brooklyn, where we meet the Weiss Family, a cast of characters who are somehow fiercely independent and disturbingly intertwined. 36 unfolds like a legend, a spiritual origin story we may have dreamt or perhaps already lived." Anthony D'Aries, author of The Language of Men: A Memoir and director of Western Connecticut State University's MFA in Creative and Professional Writing.

"36 resonates with emotional truth as it explores complex family dynamics including autonomy, spirituality, and ancestor worship. Insightful, wryly funny, thought-provoking. A winner!" Jane K. Cleland, Agatha Award-winning author

"Kate Katcher writes family exactly like it is: sharp of tongue and endearing in its chaos. 36 reaches back through a family's history to see what obligation has to do with love... and to examine what we really mean when we talk about someone with a disability." Briana Una McGuckin, author of On Good Authority

"Kate Katcher's 36 is a poignant, powerful and moving story of a family, and ultimately, a novel of what family truly means. In this terrific debut, we become immersed deeply inside the Weiss family and each of its vividly drawn members. Katcher masterfully weaves this family's saga set in the 1980s with the tale of the previous generation immigrating to Brooklyn in the 1920s. All this is cast against the backdrop of a Talmudic legend, making 36 a book not to be missed thanks to the sharp insights and wonderful storytelling skills of Katcher." John Roche, Author, author of Bronx Bound, Associate Professor of Journalism, WCSU