Current reading: The Great Stork Derby, by Ann S. Epstein

The Great Stork Derby, by Ann S. Epstein, Vine Leaves Press, 2021 is set in 1976, with flashbacks to the 1920s and ‘30s. Although it's an historical novel in that it  originates from an historical event, and shows life in the 20th century, it's really about an uninvolved father who, in his old age,  finally gets to know his children. 

The fictional father in the story, who was born in 1901, is Emm Benbow, a retired salesman who swears by Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends and Influence People. In 1926, Emm convinced his wife, Izora, to get involved in a competition that might make their fortune.  That year,  a wealthy Toronto real estate investor and lawyer, died, leaving a will that provided $100,000 to be paid to the Toronto woman who gave birth to the greatest number of children (registered births and living children) in the decade between 1926 and 1936.  This was a fabulous amount of money in those days.  The benefactor, a single, childless man, was fond of schemes that showed the mercenary side of human nature.

As the novel opens, in 1976, seventy-five year old Emm, who has high blood pressure and other illnesses of old age, is in hospital recovering from a fall in his house. He’s told that he can’t live alone in his house any more.  His options are a retirement residence or staying with one of his seven children.

Emm supported his children financially when they were growing up, but left it to his wife and his domineering mother to raise them, and never spent much time getting to know them.  He was proud of his eldest son, Arvil, who was handsome, charming and smart, and who was killed overseas in World War II.  As for the others, he didn’t pay them much attention.  His wife died when the youngest  was eight.

His children have a variety of problems and lifestyles.  None is eager to take him on and all blame him to an extent for their mother’s early death and for his indifference toward them.  His eldest daughter, Bruna, for example, an elementary school teacher, resents having had to take over as mother to her siblings when her own mother died. Middle aged and single, with no children, she hosts family get-togethers and takes a keen interest in her young nieces and nephews.

None of the grown children agree with Emm’s feeling that his eldest child, Arvil, was a saint, but depict him as a bully and a con-artist.  Several of the adult children have lifestyles that  unfamiliar to Emm.  His daughter, Elissa, who has a lot of artistic talent, makes him welcome in her public housing apartment. Elissa, however, is a recovering addict and when she loses her minimum wage job, she ends up using again, and has to go to rehab.

One of Emm's sons is “slow”, and lives in a group home. At first Emm finds him annoying, but, in time, appreciates his affectionate nature and childlike love. He admires the way another of his sons, who is physically frail and suffers from allergies, has befriended his slow brother. Having the slow brother over to the house on weekly visits, along with having Emm there as well is too much for Emm’s daughter-in-law, so Emm moves out. Unlike Emm’s wife, the daughter-in-law stands up for herself.

Another son is a successful graphic designer and part-time community theatre director, who welcomes Emm to his trendy apartment. In time, they come to a friendly parting of the ways because Emm likes comfort foods and finds his son's parties too noisy.

Emm’s youngest and seventh child, a nurse, also welcomes her father, and they get along well. The daughter is seeing an older man who frequently stands her up, and Emm worries that his failure to give her extra attention when her mother died has led her into this relationship. He also wonders why none of his daughters has married.

Emm gains a great many insights while getting to know his children, and, like Scrooge in A Christmas Carol, resolves to be better in the future.  Sadly, Emm can't make amends to his late wife. When they met, she was  a pretty, light-hearted flapper girl, but by turning her into a baby machine he wore out her body and spirit.  The novel concludes with a Christmas celebration, leaving Emm looking forward to spending more time with his family, but it isn't exactly  a Hallmark Movie happy ending.