MANHATTAN BEACH

The stunning new novel by Pulitzer Prize winner Jennifer Egan starts before the US was great, let alone yearning to be great again. In “the dregs of 1934”, union bagman Eddie Kerrigan is seeking a job with charming mobster Dexter Styles and takes his young daughter, Anna, along to their meeting at Styles’ home – an encounter that will shape all their lives. When the story resumes, in 1941, Styles is a nightclub kingpin, his fixer, Eddie, has disappeared, and Anna is working at the Brooklyn Naval Yards, scheming to become the Navy’s first female diver. Then comes her second encounter with Styles... Egan has grafted crime and thriller elements to a slice of US history, to create a story of two flawed men and a bold young woman who finally finds the truth about her lost father.