Customer Reviews

The Grift: A Novel

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(3)
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When Marina Marks, the heroine of "The Grift", was five years old, her mother takes her to a seaside tarot card reader and fortune teller named Madame Z to have her fortune read. Madame Z goes into a sort of trance, trembles, and tells the mother that the girl "has the gift", and that she will be a psychic with real psychic powers. But the mother is neither impressed with the drama and the show of Madame Z, nor does she believe her. She grabs her daughter and leaves the psychic in a hurry, muttering: "This crazy freak doesn't know what she's talking about."
Nevertheless, she buys a deck of tarot cards for Marina, and the girl starts using the cards first as a hobby, and learns very quickly that she can earn a decent income if she takes up fortune telling as her profession.

Marina tells fortunes mainly based on her intuition, and acute observations of her client's physical attributes such as mannerisms and demeanor. She even manages to earn reputation as a good psychic. A few years after her mother dies, however, Marina relocates from Florida to San Diego. Then she is astonished one day to discover that she had suddenly developed true psychic powers, and that in her visions she could see her clients' past, present and future very clearly. But she doesn't realize that she should use her new-found psychic powers with care and that she should also use tact and diplomacy while telling a client's fortune. Instead, she starts telling fortunes rather bluntly, thereby scaring her clients away. And her business, which she had carefully built up over the years, begins to slide down and disintegrate.

The novel has several interesting, well-drawn and well-developed characters such as Cooper, a handsome gay man in love with a closeted psychiatrist, and Madeline, a young gold-digger married to an old but fabulously rich man. Madeline thinks she can save her marriage by conceiving a child of this tycoon with roving eyes. And there is Rosa, a sympathetic woman who operates a beach side stand selling coffee, pastries and cookies. All these characters ring true to life, and are believable.

Written in simple but elegant prose, the novel builds up momentum slowly at first, and then begins to grip the readers mind, becoming brighter and funnier as it progresses, and then dazzles:
"It wasn't her way, for example, to go for a big score with a client and then never see that client again. Hers was a slow build of confidence and a fostering of need. Many of her clients treated her with the same deference to authority that they showed their doctors. Marina had always believed that it took more skill to develop trust than inspire fear. It paid better in the long run, too, and was much less likely to end with angry clients feeling as though they'd been shafted."

This charming, funny and very witty novel is at heart a conundrum. Marina's newly acquired psychic power should have boosted her fortune telling business. It should have been a blessing; instead it acts like a curse. Written with deep insight into human psychology and behavior, Debra Ginsberg's "The Grift" is a true marvel.

of Debra Ginsberg's work, three non-fiction books about her family and two stand-alone novels. The plot of The G(r)ift is best described by other reviewers, but I will note that the plot, the characters, and the good writing add up to a very good, hard-to-put down novel.

The "tag" lines suggested by the review model give "psychics", "suspense" and other like words to describe this work. I suppose it's all of that, but basically Ginsberg's writing comes down to simply an interesting story about people.

A little girl with a neglectful, addicted mother meets a boardwalk gypsy who promptly tells the little girl she has "a gift." Fast forward 30 years, and we meet the little girl as a grown woman: Marina. Early in her life, Marina found that while the men her mom brought home might be tempted by a pretty little girl, a girl who was psychic frightened them. so she pretended -- and got so good at intuitively reading people that it became her career.

What happens when her Grift suddenly comes true, and she does indeed have the Gift? People don't want to know the truth. They want to hear that their dreams will come true. Her entire business is at risk, and the regulars she has worked with become hostile. This entire novel moves forward on this premise. This is not a mystery novel, but a novel about characters: their dreams, their motivations, their good traits and their bad.

This is an excellent book. Really surprisingly engaging. I recommend it without hesitation.

I found this book to be pretty terrific. It held my interest throughout and I could not put it down except when I had to. Marina Marks and a variety of others who flit in and out of her life are real, believable people. Debra Ginsberg is great at giving each character his/her own distinct voice. I was gripped all the way to the end. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did. It's definitely worth reading.

I really enjoyed this book. It was very different and well written. It had a strong beginning, never lagged in the middle, and I was very touched by the ending. The Grift had a strong central female character. I thought it would make a wonderful movie. They say that there are no good roles for women. With a well written screenplay, Marina would be a real gem. The secondary characters were also well written. I could really sympathize with some of them, on their hard earned road to self-discovery. Part mystery, part love story, part psychological study, The Grift, had something for everyone.

Marina Marks has never believed in the gift she claims to have. She has relied on her honed powers of observation to make her living as a psychic. Suddenly, however, her purported gift becomes real. Debra Ginsberg's The Grift charts the journey of Marina and a handful of her clients over a two year period in which all their lives undergo drastic changes. Ginsberg expertly weaves these threads together and shows how small the world really is, even in a city like San Diego.

Despite their many, many flaws, Ginsberg characters are likable. Their struggles are typical--fertility, adultery, sexuality--and their reactions, however unfortunate, are fairly typical as well. You can identify with them, and it keeps you engaged. As Marina comes closer to discovering her true gift, her clients begin to fall apart, and they all blame Marina. By the time tragedy strikes, anyone could be responsible. Ginsberg keeps the reader guessing throughout the novel. I was constantly wondering what would happen next as several mini-mysteries evolved and resolved throughout the narrative. I thoroughly enjoyed The Grift and recommend it highly to other readers.

This book really is a pleasant surprise. The backdrop of psychic powers haunts a reader throughout and it is fascinating to see Ginsberg understand the prevalence of psychic readers in 21st Century America. Moreover, the characters are extremely alive and well-drawn, making The Grift a satisfying read.

This novel was definitely suspenseful. It tells the story of Marina, a would-be psychic who suddenly becomes clairvoyant. She has specific visions of the future, and they are threatening to her and displeasing to her clients. As her visions become more and more disturbing, people's lives hang in the balance.

Although it was a page-turner, this book was lacking in some respects. The romance between Marina and her client's son felt choppy and inconclusive. Most of the characters were opportunistic, limited and unlikable.

The Grift is just that, a scam, or...is it really more of a gift (noting the dropped "r" in the title)? This is where the questions start, right from the beginning.

A woman who has been trained by her mother to be a fortuneteller since she was a child learns that telling people what they want to hear can be very profitable.

As an adult, she stumbles into actually being able to see what the future holds for her clients and she is compelled to tell them the truth, but suddenly they are not so eager for her advice. In fact, business becomes nearly non-existent, friends disappear and everything begins to fall apart around her.

There are multiple storylines going on throughout the book, following her clients lives, but they all revolve around thier psychic friend. Soon they are intermingled and when she becomes involved in the circumstances of a murder she must choose to use the gift that she has, but also her skills as a grifter.

Beyond the actual story, this is a great book that makes you think about the line between telling someone the whole truth or telling them what they want or need to hear. It raises interesting questions about the secrets that everyone keeps and what one would choose to do with the power of knowing the secrets of others.

I found it a very interesting and unique read. I would definitely recommend it as something truly different and thought provoking.

Did you notice how the 'r' is slightly dropped in the title?

The definitions that precede the beginning of the novel explain this.

"grift - n. a group of methods used for obtaining money falsely through the use of swindles, frauds, etc."
"gift - n. a special ability or capacity"

Intriguing...and even more so after the prologue. While out on the boardwalk with her junkie mother an old fortune teller identifies a young girl - Marina - as having the 'gift'. Her mother continues to exploit this ideas as Marina is growing up. Fast forward to the present and we find Marina making a living as a psychic, but as a grifter. She is very adept at reading someone's body language and small clues they provide to give them 'psychic' readings.

Marina has to leave Florida quickly and she opens a new shop in California, with a valuable ruby ring from her last client on a chain around her neck. While working at a party as a fortune teller, she meets Madeline - a spoiled rich woman, Cooper a confused gay man in love with Max, an even more confused psychiatrist. These introductions lead to more new clients whose lives are inextricably intertwined with each other's and with Marina's. And the ruby ring seems to be a part of all of it. Through a seemingly inevitable chain of events, Marina predicts a murder, but then becomes the prime suspect. But - she's not faking any longer- her psychic ability is actually real now. She just can't see the murderer's face.

Just released last month, The Grift defies categorizing for me. It's a mystery, it has some 'otherworldly' aspects but is also a love story and just a really good all round read. It doesn't descend into unbelievability despite the psychic theme but rather presents a 'what if' alternative.

Every character was distinctly drawn and came to life for me. Some are flawed, others lovable, some despicable but all come across as real. I found myself reading 'just one more chapter' to find out what would happen next. It's always a treat to find a 'new' ( for me) author like Debra Ginsberg.