Troika: Three Generations, Three Days, and a Very American Road Trip

by Irena Smith

In this lyrical and unconventional memoir, a road trip to California's Central Coast becomes an epic journey through family history, loss, and connection.

When three generations of women—a middle-aged narrator, her seventy-seven-year-old mother, and her twenty-two-year-old Gen Z daughter—set out for a quick trip to California's Central Coast, their road trip transforms into something far a modern-day Odyssey. Over the course of three days, they brave a severe winter storm, encounter terrifying ostriches, walk through an enchanted light exhibit, binge-watch White Lotus, hunt for coffee with plant-based milk, bicker, reconcile, and share stories.

Troika braids the story of a three-day road trip with the longer strands of migration, memory, and motherhood, creating a layered meditation on distance traveled—geographic, generational, and emotional. It’s a kaleidoscopic journey that traverses the landscapes of identity and family history and stretches from the horrors of the second world war and an escape from Soviet Russia to adolescence and motherhood in the suburbs of Silicon Valley. As the narrative swerves from heartbreak to hilarity, from Homeric detours and Russian proverbs to internet memes, the strands weave together an intimate, poignant, and darkly funny meditation on how we get from where we were to where we are—and what we carry with us along the way.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Book Club, Biography Memoir, Jewish

Audible Audio

Published April 7, 2026

About the author

Irena Smith is the author of the award-winning memoir, The Golden Ticket: A Life in College Admissions Essays and the forthcoming Troika: Three Generations, Three Days, and a Very American Road Trip. Her obsession with how words work began early (as a child growing up in Soviet Russia, she was known to occasionally stand on furniture and recite Pushkin poems). After emigrating to the United States with her parents and swearing up and down that she would never learn to speak English, she went on to earn a PhD in Comparative Literature and taught literature and writing at UCLA and Stanford before transitioning to college admissions work and writing.

Irena currently writes two Substacks—Personal Statements and The Curmudgeon’s Guide to College Admissions—and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she enjoys eavesdropping on conversations in public places, complaining about traffic, and championing the Oxford comma at every opportunity.

Reviews

[Shelby Lehman · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s not just a story of a 3 day road trip. It contains short stories of Irena’s and her family’s path to get to where they are now. Fascinating history of Russian Jewish refugees to the 80’s Silicon Valley boom to present day. So interesting. Irena’s snark, wit, and love of languages and words oozes out of every short story.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5

[Renee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed reading this book. The writing style was different from books I have read and I appreciated the short chapters (journal entries). I could relate to many of the stories and experiences in this memoir! Just shows you how similar we all really are to each other! I have always told my children that life is a journey there are no straight paths and no right or wrong paths! So I encourage them to enjoy the journey they are on! Thanks for sharing your story!

[Mary Kay · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved Troika and the dynamic between the three generations of women bonding on a journey. From such difficult beginnings overcome and still overcoming life’s twists and turns. Just read my friend a passage that spoke to me as I continue to raise my own children. “ the families I worked with were unraveling too, just in different ways. Sleep-deprived students full of self-doubt, parents anguished over the possibility that their child might not get into the right schools, worrying that they hadn’t done enough, or that they had done too much, or that whatever they did wasn’t good enough.” Irena Smith I was touched by your note accompanying my book. Thank you for sharing your journey.

[Kirsten Mickelwait · Rating 5 out of 5]

Troika is a wise and witty memoir about mothers and daughters, life as an immigrant, a California coastal road trip, and personal obsessions like "The White Lotus" and nut milk. Smith—a Russian immigrant with a Ph.D. in comparative literature—is such a skilled writer, so funny and poignant, that I could read anything she wrote (also check out her first memoir, The Golden Ticket). Do yourself a favor and buy this book. You'll probably whiz through it like I did, laughing aloud.

[Teri · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful collection of vignettes written to cover a memorable three-day road trip that Irena Smith took with her mother and her daughter. Some of the essays covered the trip and others described parts of Irena's life that came to mind as she was taking the trip. Overall, just a lovely read.

[Jane Seibel · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book came highly recommended and after the first few chapters I became hooked. I love a memoir and this was a fun and creative way to tell your story. I related to many of the themes around emigration, family, parenting, and the connections between generations. The author tells the story as someone around my current age so timely for my life experiences and current thoughts. As someone who moved as a teenager to the US, a lot of the author's experiences resonated with me. An enjoyable read overall.

[holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good memoir by the author of The golden Ticket. Mothers and daughters in a car for three days and all the comes with it

[Audrey Hagen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book. I randomly picked it out at the library from the new book shelf. The writing ie beautiful.

[Ruth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Weaving 21st century un-classical culture (tv, plant-based milk, LED light shows), with 20th century antisemitic horror, laced with Russian linguistic expressiveness, and adding classical Homeric storytelling, the classics rise as the universal lesson or guide through the life of 3 generations of women on a 3-day car trip. Thoroughly enjoyable read of relationships, family history and the drama of modern American life among the Haves of Silicon Valley. It doesn’t hit you over the head, but pokes you in the ribs so you can laugh at our foibles. Odysseus was an imperfect hero, but so are the survivors of pogroms and the Final Solution, and so are we, the spoiled beneficiaries of abundance who must tackle age-old human problems.

[Ginny · Rating 5 out of 5]

I ADORED Troika. It only took me a day and a half to read because I didn't want to put it down. It’s the story of a roadtrip taken by Smith, her mother, and her twenty-two-year-old daughter to California’s Central Coast, a journey which happens to begin during an atmospheric river event that turns the freeway into an ocean. As Smith and her fellow travelers navigate the torrential rain and other hazards, they also navigate the choppy waves of parenthood, daughterhood, cultural identity, and family legacy. The result is an utterly unique and captivating book.

I’ve read Smith’s excellent memoir The Golden Ticket, and it was such a treat to lose myself in her writing again. Some moments are laugh-out-loud funny and others are so raw in their honesty and vulnerability. Although the short (and compulsively readable) chapters weave back and forth in time, Smith is such a nimble narrator that the reader follows effortlessly along. Another thing I loved about this book was its description of California’s Central Coast, including towns like Paso Robles, Los Olivos (made famous in the movie Sideways) and Solvang. But although the physical stops on this journey are memorably drawn, it’s the emotional stops that stay with me. Every person on this trip is changed by the end of it … and the reader is, too.

Many thanks to the publisher for an advance reader copy. This is a gem of a book.

[Theresa Donovan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Weaving the Generational Threads
Threads appear often in this heartfelt memoir that is at once hyper-intellectual and salt-of-the-earth approachable. The very easily mundane setup of three women with a propensity to bicker on a California roadtrip is lofted by Smith into a warm, funny, relatable exploration of the journey that is motherhood and life. As we travel, we are accompanied by Odysseus, Ariadne, and a host of unsung Greek classical heroes. We navigate the treachery of the gods, of world wars, and of genocide. We are treated to a peculiarly Russian blend of humor and melancholy. Our guide is a woman bewildered by the way everyday cracks in a life suddenly widen into chasms, and yet who is so deeply in touch with her own humanity, the humanity of others, and art that celebrates that humanity (especially The White Lotus series) that she weaves a cocoon of love around her family, present and past.
Prepare yourself for a thrilling ride through the deep, gorgeous forests of metaphor, English and Russian. Prepare yourself to forgive a kid’s messy habits. Prepare yourself to let go of all that stuff you thought you should strive for. Prepare yourself to drive out into the tempest for no other reason than that you can arrive back home, safe.
I listened to Smith delightfully narrate her own story. Whether you listen or read, grab this book and your day, and maybe even your life, will feel better.

[Caroline · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Troika, Smith goes, with her mother and grown daughter, from Palo Alto to Paso Robles and back, a meandering 175-miles or so each way. But she also goes from the terror of the pogroms to the pressures of the pandemic and Palo Alto High School. She goes from the oceans and mazes of The Odyssey to the beaches and cliffs of Sicily in White Lotus. She shows that it doesn’t take a long or arduous (although arguably any multigenerational family road trip is arduous in its way) journey to write a good road trip story. She so deftly explores and intertwines her family history, pop culture, and mythology, that you are accompanying them on this journey, too, invested in their search for delicious baked goods and properly-made coffee drinks, and even more in her family story, the earlier migrations that reverberate unpredictably into the present day. Troika’s chapters unfurl, propulsive and wry and poignant, keeping you reading like you’re on the best road trip, eager to discover what’s around the corner.

[Jennifer Summers · Rating 5 out of 5]

Irena Smith has written a beautiful layered memoir with many intricate threads, fascinating to explore in their complexity. Mother, daughter, and grandmother do the unthinkable and take off on a three-day road trip in a pounding rainstorm, defying common sense to stay home and be safe. As they travel from Palo Alto to Solvang to Paso Robles and back, the narrator takes us on a much deeper journey through her past: exploring her family’s history and their emigration from Russia to the U.S., her marriage and putting down roots in the Silicon Valley of “must-haves,” parenting three children who will take a detour from expectations and carve out their own paths, and the ways Greek mythology and the TV show, “The White Lotus,” intersect with all these threads. The whole time, we are invested in this road trip of twists and turns, both on the road and through the tunnels of memory. A well-written, delightful adventure worth taking!

[Amanda Banner · Rating 5 out of 5]

This won’t be for everyone but I really enjoyed it. All of our own personal histories are never linear but instead best shared and experienced as tapestries of multiple threads. Some that go way back and some that are just being woven in.

Earlier this year I read Jenny Lewis’ book ‘How to be Okay’ which also amounts to a collection of whatever comes to mind about her personal story that she wanted to write. Both books keep you moving forward, but also ping pong around.

For me personally, I’ve been feeling nostalgic for my own childhood years growing up in Los Altos, so I was delighted for all the details about her own life in Silicon Valley. I’ve also recently met a new acquaintance who also immigrated from Russia as a child, so it’s been good to get Irena’s point of view on her journey. Plus, The Odyssey is very much in the air right now, so it was fun to have that peppered in too. However, the book will spoil the second season of White Lotus, so be warned.

[Gretchen Staebler · Rating 5 out of 5]

A delightful read! "Troika" is a brilliant braid of the present, the past, the farther past. (Along with other strands.) All woven while on a three-generation road trip. I enjoyed it as thoroughly as I did the author's previous book, "The Golden Ticket." "...the past rolls in and the car fills with clamorous ghosts. The ghosts want to be part of the story. If I don't let them in, the story becomes a travelogue." It is so very much more.

[Theivanai P · Rating 3 out of 5]

A slice of local life - neighborhood school, drives, landmarks. Life seems perfect, straight, planned - until it’s not. A road trip bond - food, drink, binge watching a series. References that don’t translate across generations. Analogies to Odysseus, white lotus mixed in to a meandering view into 3 meaningful days

[Victoria · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really wanted to love this book but it was partially too professorial and literary vs storytelling from her own life. I also related to it obviously as an immigrant to this country from the Ukraine in 1979 and it was rich in Palo Alto history that I didn’t have. I wish it was more relationship driven than Odyssey driven.

[Jennie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating story told by a middle-aged woman of a road trip with her mother and young adult daughter. Smith weaves in stories of the trip with memories from her family's experience as Soviet Jewish emigres to the US and references to Henry James, Nabokov, and the Odyssey. Smith is a brilliant and honest observer and writer. I loved it all.

[Nancy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Almost DNF but slogged thru. The melange of topics...the author's immigration and the adjustments she went thru; autism, marital issues and family dynamics waged thru were just too many issues to deal with in one book. Add on to that was the road trip which was rather anti-climatic.

[Robin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved. Listened on Audible, read by author.

[Judie Larabee · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.25 🌟s 🤩 ☺️

[Margo]

MMD Book Club September 2026

[Pacific Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

Memoir told in an interesting way, time jumps and generational stories wrapped in one.