Customer Reviews

The GoodLife

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Every one or two years, I find a book that I read in one sitting. This was one of those rare finds. I bought it for no reason other than I liked the look of it and thought that the subject matter referenced on the cover copy sounded interesting. 267 or so pages later, I put the book down and sat there for a minute in awe. This book is such a great commentary on the disease of "get rich quick" mentality of this country. Colleen actually manages to justify her motives and parallel the potential future gains of the crime with hard work and social climbing. Stona (I agree that the name is annoying) and his mental anguish and physical ordeal was absolutely terrifying. I have always had a fear of confined spaces....

What a great book.

This is a diturbing and powerful book -- a real condemnation of these shallow times -- and yet it is moving, too. I hope we see more from this young writer.

Keith Scribner has written both a psychological drama and a suspense thriller in his first novel. The Goodlife, based on an actual event, begins with the kidnapping of a chemical company executive and follows the crime over a three day period. The plot unfolds through the points of view of the five main characters, moving the story forward, from different directions, to it's completion. This is a very complex, yet readable, compelling story. The writing is gritty, riveting and true to life and Mr. Scribner has a real talent for dialogue. The characters are painstakingly drawn and developed and the scenes so vivid they almost jump off the page. A tight, suspenseful, fast-paced page turner. Keith Scribner doesn't disappoint.

I was impressed by the intricacy of the plot and the wonderfully drawn characters, each unique in their pathos. Kidnapping is nothing to laugh about, but Scribner's prose is so pointed and at times, wicked, I couldn't help myself. This book is a page-turner on many levels. From his arch observations to the riveting dialog, Scribner's writing is superb. I think this debut novel is the beginning of an impressive career.

This book deserves to be on everyone's "must read" list, including Oprah's. Keith Scribner begins with an ordinary middle-aged suburban couple, Theo and Colleen, who are full of baby-boomer dreams and reality failures. Then he has them perform a most extraordinary act - kidnapping a petrochemical executive in order to get what they have always rightfully deserved, an $18.5 million ransom. The story is told from five points of view. This would normally unhinge any narrative, except that this plot is so riveting, so compelling in its forward thrust, that it keeps the diverse views all hanging together in its wake. As a result, we are given insight into five different moral universes. Theo, consumed by the angry detritus of failure and the need to measure up, has gone morally bankrupt. Colleen, his wife and co-conspirator, has taken moral relativism to its fantasy extreme, while instinctively trying to cover up the vacuum with acts of caring. Malcolm, Theo's father, has a moral goodness so assured that it makes him an unwitting critic, then a meddler and, ultimately, a betrayer. Stona, the innocent victim, is given the opportunity to reflect on a life of moral compromises, as a personal manipulator, as a hardened businessman, and possibly even as an abettor to murder. Nunny, Stona's wife, is a moral puritan, loyal and true, yet inside a poseur harboring deep resentments. (Dot, Malcolm's wife and implicit sixth viewpoint, is a moral cipher but just about the only "normal" person around.) As the kidnapping collapses like a California earthquake, the reader is left with his moral firmament firmly shaken, uncertain as to how to walk the straight-and-narrow and wondering how the hell we are all going to put our priorities back together again. Highly recommended, including the set-piece in which Colleen arouses herself with GoodLife (read Amway) products while fantasizing sex with the tan, blue-eyed GoodLife motivational guru - worthy of comparison with Meg Ryan's deli scene in "When Harry Met Sally."

Keith Scribner, in his debut novel "The Good Life", does an admirable job with his entry into the American anthology of fictionalized true crime. It's a risky undertaking, attempting to lift sordid truth into inspiring fiction, but Scribner has firm control over his subjects, and injects his ready made plot with keen insight and incisive social commentary.

"The Good Life" is based on a New Jersey kidnapping case from the 1990s, in which a middle aged couple, in a stunning and tremendously incompetent caper, kidapped a highly placed executive at a Fortune 500 firm. It was a cautionary tale of the times, pitting the disappointment and rage of those in American society whose dreams far outstripped their talents, against the smugness and arrogance of those the system rewards.

In Scribner's novel, Theo and Coleen Wolkoviak's lives have evolved into a catalogue of failures. They're unemployed, overdrawn, and living with his father, realizing all the time that they are aging into irrelevance at forty five. The one thing neither of them ever seems short on is fantasy. They've applied their talent for hyperbole and outright fabrication to a great variety of entreprenurial efforts, all to the end of achieving the things that are owed to them. What they "deserve."

Stona Brown is everything they aspire to be. He has arrived in his career, in his marriage, in his own self image. His arrogance knows no bounds, and the sureness of his life, wealth and principles is inviolate. Until one day when his wife spies a strange woman in a pink jogging suit skulking around the foot of the driveway at an odd hour. The ordeal that follows becomes a battle for Stona Brown's life and soul.

The book is a real page turner. Some of the characterizations and language seem stilted and unreal, but as the book unfolds it seems that this is a canny calculation on the author's part--his characters are as bankrupt and empty as the language they think in. Scribner does a great job of buttressing his social exmamination by adopting a writing style which blends right into the lives and the environments he's describing.

Whether or not a reader is familiar with the case on which "A Good Life" is based, it will leave one with a new sense of what is valuable.

First, two questions: Why do some online reviewers insist on filling their spaces with a novel's entire plot? Why would anyone want to taint a novel as good as this one with the Oprah Book Club curse? A mystery to me. I was deeply involved with all the characters in this novel. I liked the symmetry between what was happening in the two marriages. The grandparents' relationship with their granddaughter was particularly fine. I would recommend it highly and think it will make a great movie.

I am impressed with Scribner's ability to capture the essence of such widely different personalities..to reveal their innermost thoughts in vivid detail. You feel as if you know these people. You certainly will not like all the characters: the "bad" husband and wife at the heart of the drama are shallow searchers for the American Dream corrupted. The "good" husband and wife are riveting. Add the supporting characters and you have a mix which proves that there are no easy answers to moral questions. If I have one quibble, (and I admit it is a tiny one!) it is with the name of the 'Petrochem' executive. Scribner has chosen 'Stona' as his first name, and every single time I read that name, it was a mental splinter. The character is so well-developed that he certainly didn't need such an odd (and unexplained) name to make him interesting. Okay...I did say it was a small quibble. Other than that: bravo!

With homage to "In Cold Blood" and "A Simple Plan" this first effort by Keith Scribner shows maturity and humor beyond its expected scope. Mr. Scribner merges dark humor with sharp social observation and spins a hilarious and chilling look at social dysfunction and ambition, while incorporating a backdrop story of family relationship gone awry. Extremely readable and intelligent, The Goodlife will leave you laughing and thinking. Read it, because you ARE better than other people...

I also enjoyed this book on one long rainy Sunday and thought that the character of Theo was especially well-developed - you could almost see him pouting at times! I will say that, like other readers here, I found the improbable names a distraction - I kept wondering what kind of names were "Stona" and "Nunny" and why would they have a daughter named "Jane"? Other than that, this was a fast read and very interesting. I am looking forward to his next book.