East Side Story

by Louis Auchincloss

An engaging fictional history of the rise of a single New York family, the Carnochans, from their early arrival in America from Scotland, through their successful integration into New York's textile business during the Civil War, to their rise to prominence and wealth, recounting the lives and fortunes of diverse members of the family across generations.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, New York, Literature, Novels, Family, American

227 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Louis Stanton Auchincloss was an American novelist, historian, and essayist.

Among Auchincloss's best-known books are the multi-generational sagas The House of Five Talents, Portrait in Brownstone, and East Side Story. Other well-known novels include The Rector of Justin, the tale of a renowned headmaster of a school like Groton trying to deal with changing times, and The Embezzler, a look at white-collar crime. Auchincloss is known for his closely observed portraits of old New York and New England society.

Reviews

[Antigone · Rating 3 out of 5]

Louis Auchincloss was a prolific author whose work seems destined to fall just a slim degree north of the popular radar. This is due, in part, to his subject matter. His stories revolve almost exclusively around the American aristocracy. These are tales of families of wealth, frequently set in Manhattan, and spanning the first fifty years or so of the 1900s. It's fiction exploring the establishment of fortune, reputation and legacy - and it is dull in the way you might imagine it would be dull if what you're after is the exhilaration of a murder, a meteor or a sexy romantic romp. Auchincloss hewed to his own experience as a New England blue-blood, none of which appears to have included that sort of excitement. What it did include, however, was a magnificent stable of personalities fit for close character study.

In East Side Story Auchincloss takes on four generations of the Carnochan; a Scottish clan whose fortune was made in the textile industry and whose wealth of ambitious male progeny served as a guarantor of prominence. Behind those mansion doors, though, lay all the inevitable disillusionment and compromise inherent in the human travail. The politics of business, marriage, and the rarified society in which they live are illuminated from the vantage of eleven members of the family (seven men, four women) as they struggle to navigate the intransigence of the roles they bear.

What is so odd about the experience of reading Auchincloss is that none of it is memorable. The stories don't adhere in the mind that way. What they do, which may prove far more substantial, is confirm certain truths about life and the living of it. The glacial and impeding nature of a highly-buffered and structured existence is, I think, vital to recognize. So many aim for wealth, power and position, imagining this will lead to satisfaction and security. Not so, not so. And that's important to know.

[Ron Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can't decide whether this news spurs me to action or sends me back to the chaise longue with a bowl of cookie dough: At 87, Louis Auchincloss has just published his 60th book. To add insult to injury, it's really good.

Speaking to The Atlantic Monthly in 1997, Auchincloss explained his prolific output with a little Mary Poppins wisdom: "By mastering the ability to use five minutes here, 15 minutes there, I picked up a great deal of time that most people allow to drift away." And I bet the dishes never pile up in his sink, either.

If you're interested in using your time more wisely, try investing a few hours in "East Side Story," his latest graceful novel about an upper-class family in New York. It's the kind of book that Edith Wharton fans have been waiting for, but that description risks making him sound like some updated knockoff. If you enjoy Jane Austen, you'll love "Bridget Jones"! That's not what Auchincloss is up to.

In an elegant, unpretentious voice, he writes about moral values, not in the contemporary sense, as a code for homophobia and preemptive strikes, but in an older sense, as the struggle to live a decent life among the noble and trite demands of family, society, and one's own heart.

This is, of course, the concern of much literary fiction, but there are still thoughtful readers (yes, you, way in the back) who don't want detailed descriptions of sexual depravity in order to contemplate the dimensions of a moral life (à la Alan Hollinghurst or Tom Wolfe). For such readers, there is Auchincloss, and they're well served.

"East Side Story" follows the development of the Carnochan clan, which came to New York from Scotland before the Civil War. Each chapter focuses on a different family member, moving through six patrician generations. That structure suggests excessive weight and maddening complexity (Is Peter the second cousin or the ex-brother-in-law?), but Auchincloss glides through all this in just over 200 pages, and he's not interested in demanding the tedious detective work too many sagas require. There's a helpful family tree up front, and each chapter is plainly labeled.

The Carnochan fortune was originally based on the sale of thread, a fitting metaphor for the lines that run through this family for more than a century. The patriarch, David, "was a granite pillar of respectability ... a success at each of the few things he undertook." His son notes that he also "stripped life of every aspect of color and charm that it might have possessed," but that bitter characterization never appears in the official family history - not because it's shameful, but because it's irrelevant.

David's descendants, which included an advantageous number of males, "were all able either to make money or to marry it." By the late 20th century, an old maid who realizes just what an extraneous twig she's become on the family tree notes that "the Carnochans seemed dedicated to their own permanence." Each generation extends the founder's success, reacting to the variables of history - from the Civil War to the Vietnam War - in ways that increase their honor and fortune.

But within the granite mansions and exclusive clubs, we meet men who feel naggingly inadequate and women, often very witty women, who have relinquished love and passion for cool practicality and decorum. These American aristocrats aren't crying for our pity (unlike, say, Michael Ovitz, who recently complained in court that having to accept a $140 million severance package was like being "pushed out the sixth-floor window"). Members of the Carnochan clan want to do the right thing, but that's often not easy to do - or even to determine.

In a particularly incisive story, a prominent lawyer during World War II contemplates how to realign himself with America's new liberal ideals to improve business. Perhaps he should drop his German clients ... or defend those poor Japanese-Americans.... But nothing he tries brings him the respect he craves. "How was it possible that people somehow suspected that he did not give much of a hoot about Japanese internment?" he wonders. "Wasn't it the action and not the inner motivation - or inner fantasy (for that was what it often was) - that mattered? Evidently not."

The younger family members have their own challenges. Suspended between two modes of courting - for love or for social engineering - they constantly second-guess their own motives and the motives of everyone interested in them. Even the most successful marriage carries with it a vague sense of disappointment that the potential for romance has been somehow compromised by such unromantic self-consciousness.

A melancholy melody runs through these stories, the muted anguish of crushed hope, but Auchincloss knows how to vary that tune for both relief and depth. One sensitive brother who lives his whole life brooding in the shadow of a domineering sibling finds with his wife a degree of devotion and understanding that's surprisingly moving. And there's a wickedly funny story about a conniving woman whose future seems ruined when her husband gives up alcohol for God.

Part of the charm here is sociological, the chance to move with a sympathetic but critical guide through a powerful, largely hidden section of American culture. (The novel ends before very rich people wanted to humiliate themselves on TV.) But through all these tales, Auchincloss is also tracing the nation's character. There are other veins buried in the moral geology of America, of course, that would reveal entirely different features, but this one is followed with illuminating care. If you've been complaining that they don't write novels like they used to, here's proof that thoughtful, tasteful fiction is still alive and well.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/1207/p1...

[Elizabeth (Alaska) · Rating 3 out of 5]

The GR description gives a pretty overview of the subject matter for this book. This is the story of a family. The males of the Carnochan family mostly attend a private prep school, go to Yale followed by Harvard Law. The Carnochan women have a harder time of it, but history tells me that education was less important, that they were to marry well and be leaders in Society.

I'm pretty sure I picked this up based on my liking of the author's The Rector of Justin. Mostly what I remember about that book is how much I appreciated the author's writing style and his ability to give us good characterizations. This book offers much the same.

However ... This novel is more on the line of inter-connected short stories. There are 12 chapters, each told from the point of view of a different descendant of the immigrant Carnochan who died just after the US Civil War. The book includes a descendant chart with the names capitalize for those who have a chapter. For more than the first half I felt this didn't really hang together because I was expecting a more traditional novel. By the end, I came to appreciate that the author presented this family in 5 generations in fewer than 250 pages. The chapters were really characterizations and there was hardly a breath of plot.

Although I thought several times that this is truly what I wanted to be reading just now, I can't give it more than 3 stars. To do so would look as if I was recommending it. No, you have to want exactly what it is and not pretend to think it should be more.

[Manray9 · Rating 4 out of 5]

I knew of Louis Auchincloss. I was aware of his prodigious literary production (60 books!), his writing career paralleling that of a successful trust and estate attorney to New York City's upper crust families, and the fact he was cousin to Jackie Kennedy. I didn't know he was so good. Browsing my usual book websites, I stumbled across Auchincloss on www.Neglectedbooks.com -- a favorite stop and a great Internet source for lovers of fiction written before yesterday and featuring not a single vampire, wizard, gnome or toothsome female detective. The article's writer commended Auchincloss and sparked an interest which led to East Side Story.

East Side Story is not a conventional novel. It is a series of individual sketches tracing the history of the fictional Carnochans, one of New York's wealthy and socially-prominent families, from the 1860s through the 1960s. The sketches are deftly-rendered. Each is written with wit, wry humor, an eye for detail, and the techniques of finely-crafted characterization. The article at www.NeglectedBooks.com included the judgment: “And if the character sketch was what Auchincloss was best at, then he truly had few peers.” I agree and consider East Side Story deserving of Four Stars.

[Pascale · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pleasantly old-fashioned, like the people it portrays. This book follows the fortunes of the Carnochan family over 5 generations. Each of the 12 chapters zooms in on one member of the clan. Most of them do well and hang on to their money, some become drunkards or cheat on their spouses, but none of them is gay or goes into a downward social spiral. Basically, they manage to retain their place within the class to which their emigrant ancestor put them. For all I know, this is more typical of the establishment than the history of, say the Kennedy clan, but it makes for slightly dull reading.

[Cathryn Conroy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This novel, which also doubles as a social history of the very, very wealthy, traces the history of the Carnochan family from their emigration from Scotland to Boston in 1829 through five generations to 1955 as they achieve the status of American aristocrats. It's fiction—but it's not.

Written by Louis Auchincloss, the book's chapters each feature a different member of the family, usually moving forward in time by a generation but sometimes moving sideways. Each story is different, but each one is grounded on one important factor: There is always money. Lots of it. The schools one attends, who one marries, the profession one chooses, and what one does with the money changes little from generation to generation, but the stories do change. And while some of the family members manage to live upright, good lives, there are also scandals alcoholism, adultery, and divorce.

The problem is that the characters feel two-dimensional, never breaking out of the mold or being wildly different—factors that would have made the novel so much better. I'm imaging this same book in the writerly hands of Taylor Caldwell or Irwin Shaw—marvels of the family saga—and I think the tale would have been far more riveting and juicier. Parts of it are fun to read, but enough of it is so excruciatingly boring that I'm only giving it three stars.

One piece of advice: Do bookmark on the Kindle or use a yellow sticky in a paper book to mark the "Pedigree Chart of the Carnochans." Each time a new chapter began, I checked the chart to figure out where the character fit into the family genealogy. Without this, I would have been totally lost!

[Buchdoktor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Louis Auchincloss erzählt über mehrere Generationen hinweg vom Familienclan der Carnochans, deren Stammvater aus Paisley/Schottland nach New York einwanderte und bis zum amerikanischen Bürgerkrieg als Tuchhändler erfolgreich war. Aus dem Stammbaum werden einzelne Familienmitglieder in einem jeweils eigenen Kapitel hervorgehoben und in der Familiengeschichte verortet. In der ersten in den USA geborenen Generation geht es noch darum, dass Unternehmern nicht nur Kinder geboren werden, sondern dass darunter auch ein männlicher Nachfolger für das Geschäft heranwachsen sollte. So werden in Peters Generation im Stammbaum „Töchter“ in einem Posten zusammen gefasst, ohne Namen und Geburtsdaten zu nennen. Schon im Amerikanischen Bürgerkrieg (1861-1865) spaltet das Thema Sklaverei die Familie, Vater und beide Söhne stellen sich mit ihrer Haltung dazu moralisch bloß. Douglas kauft sich vom Militärdienst frei und profitiert stattdessen geschäftlich vom Handel mit Uniformen; Peter zeigt weder Talent fürs Geschäft, noch zeugt er Erben, so dass sein Ast im Stammbaum vertrocknet. Douglas vollzieht den Übergang von der schuftenden Einwanderer-Generation zum Aufbau von Dynastien durch taktisch geschickte, vermögensbildende Eheschließungen. Frauen sollen nun nicht mehr nur Erben fürs Geschäft zur Welt bringen, sondern auch Töchter mit Köpfchen, aber bitte nicht zu viel, weil sonst anderen auffallen könnte, dass sie einen Einfaltspinsel geheiratet haben. Das Taktieren und Verhandeln auf dem Markt alter Namen und alten Geldes wirkt alles andere als romantisch.

Gordon und ein ganzer Trupp von Vettern stehen anschaulich für eine Generation, die durch das presbyterianische Erbe ihres Urahnen geprägt ist, ohne sich dieser Werte unbedingt bewusst zu sein. Wer würde beim Begriff Vettern hier an Vetternwirtschaft denken … Gordon heiratet als erster der Carnochans eine Frau mit Beruf. Seine Ochsentour auf der Karriereleiter einer großen Anwaltskanzlei zeigt, dass weder Geld noch Begabung allein eine Karriere garantieren, wenn beides nicht mit Beziehungen, Menschenkenntnis und einem gehörigen Maß an Raffinesse gekoppelt ist. Nicht nur nach oben kommen ist gefragt, sondern oben bleiben, und dafür müssen schon in der Schulzeit die Fäden geknüpft werden. Egal, ob eine teure Privatschule nichts taugt, Hauptsache, Vater und Onkel waren auch schon dort. Interessante Personen sind neben all den Karrieren und geplatzten Träumen James Tochter Estelle in der Rolle der unverheirateten „Tante“ ohne eigenes Leben und Wallaces Tochter Loulou, die vermutlich am besten von allen mit den gesellschaftlichen und finanziellen Umbrüchen der 50er Jahre umgehen kann.

In einer für die Epoche passenden, leicht verschnörkelten Sprache zeigt sich Louis Auchincloss als genauer Beobachter der US-Aristokratie und als bissiger Chronist. Er hat selbst als Anwalt gearbeitet und kennt das Milieu, über das er schreibt. Sein für eine Familiengeschichte sehr kurzer Roman ist dicht bepackt mit klassischen Typen und zeitlosen Konflikten, die ihn beinahe wie eine Schablone für Familienromane wirken lassen.

[Shawn Thrasher · Rating 2 out of 5]

Dry and sparse, probably on purpose in some literary way I don't understand. I was disappointed, because I liked Louis Auchincloss's nonfiction. But I just didn't get this one.

[Kathleen · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was not what I expecting. Instead of introducing characters and the story follow from there, each chapter was about a character and there was no consistent story line. I kept waiting for the story telling to start, but next thing I knew only had about 20% of the book left. I found it difficult to follow as the timelines moved along in each chapter, but did not move along as the book progressed. I probably should have given up on it, but the writing was good enough for me to continue - and I was also hoping all the storylines would be tied together in the last part of the book.

[Maura · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is the story of a family dynasty but told in a series of short stories. Each chapter is the tale of one family member. The family tree at the beginning of the book helps you keep track of their relationships to one another. Most of the chapters are independent of each other, but taken together they represent the whole family from its ordinary beginnings to its position of influence in the New York social scene. Although it held my attention, overall it seemed sort of bland; there were no shocking incidents, no characters that stood out as great villains or heroes.

[Patrick Barry · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well written story about several generations of an aristocratic family on th eUpper East Side of New York City. It documents the family from its arrival from Scotland in the 19th century to the turmoil of the 1960s. Each chapter is from the point of view of a different member of the family. My wife read it and says it reads like an Edith Wharton story, someone the author has written a biography of. If this is akin to Edith Wharton, I will have to give one of her novels a try.

[Barbara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Louis Auchincloss was a prolific writer, often detailing the people and fortunes of 20th-century upper-class New Yorkers. I'd not read any of his books prior to this one, but I think I will read more. His style is a sparse, but telling description of the lives of family members resembling? based on? those of his father's family. A family that did not come from old money, but kept their fortune alive by either making or marrying money.

[Marilyn Campbell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Family saga

Although this is far from the best of Auchincloss' novels of New York upper crust, it is quite satisfying. Through a series of interrelated chapters of successive generations, he tells the story of the Carnochan family. Along with saga are the notes on morality and civility that come from the observations.

[Hari Brandl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not an exciting book, no sex or violence, but entertaining In it’s way. Beautiful writing in the old fashioned style of, maybe a more modern Henry James.
Mostly told of the manners of a certain class of people in New York in the first half of the 20th century: how the men made their living and the women made their families.

[Elle · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a great little novel and a fantastic way to start the year. The structure, which I enjoyed greatly, did make it impossible to feel really close to any one character, but it was still beautifully written, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys family sagas or a bit of Whartonian gossip.

[Vincent Solomeno · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is my favorite book by Louis Auchincloss. Mr. Auchincloss was to WASP fiction what Julian Fellows is to British nobles on television. In this book, he weaves together the stories of different characters to create an account of life on New York City's Upper East Side.

[Debbie Shoulders · Rating 4 out of 5]

More a series of short stories, Auchincloss highlights the evolution of the Carnochan family. Beginning with David, referred to as the immigrant who came to New York from Scotland, the descendants were mainly successful in dealing with the mores and challenges of their times.

[John Uzzi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting approach but left me wanting more.

[Nate · Rating 4 out of 5]

The usual atmospheric setting, extremely flawed yet likable realistic characters

[Vanessa Donovan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don’t love short stories but these characters made it so easy to slide right into their lives. A great gilded age family saga!

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

An intriguing character study and a pleasure to read. Auchincloss is quickly becoming a favorite.

[Deb McConkey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Somewhat disturbingly believable. Brutal times under a thin veneer of civility.

[Thomas Rosenthal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not my cup of tea, but written in expressive language. A very personal type take on nineteenth century culture.

[Alisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting story - I wish I had been caught up in it, but it just sort of carried me along for the ride.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most enjoyable. A fascinating look into a multi-generational family dynamic. A little hard to keep characters straight at times.

[Peter Allum · Rating 4 out of 5]

Elegant, insightful, old-fashioned, brilliant.

Author of nearly 60 books - how did Auchincloss do it? A long life (92 years) certainly helped, and he was publishing to the end. While writing had to compete his profession as lawyer, his specialization in wills and trusts presumably provided insights into wealth and family dynamics that he could tap for his literary work. A Herculean life achievement, though.

As to his writing itself, views probably differ. Many will find him quintessentially "male, pale, and stale." For my part, after three novels, I'm still lapping it up. Certainly, he writes almost exclusively about old-money Manhattan elites, educated at prep schools then Yale or Harvard. Here, Auchincloss is writing what he knows, having attended St. Bernard's School, Groton School and Yale University. While his political inclinations were basically conservative, discomfort with America's growing class divide led him to vote for Bill Clinton in 1992. To this extent, in writing about the moneyed elite, he has his eyes open: he writes about both unsympathetic, venal businessmen as well as those from the elite who suffer ill health, heartbreak, or any of the many ways in which life can go wrong, even among the upper crust.

East Side Story describes four generations of the Carnochan family. It starts with the patriarch, David Carnochan, who emigrated from Scotland to establish a thread business in New York in the mid-19th century, passing down through key members of the family until the 1960s. Although described as a novel, it is essentially a series of sketches of a dozen individuals, exploring how the Carnochan family culture intersected with personal character, changing social rules, and the random events of life. On these topics, Auchincloss is an insightful observer: he notes, for example, that successful marriages are not always based on mutual love, and that privilege and skill do not guarantee a successful career.

Highly recommended.

[Anthony Morena · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's just so well written....it doesn't take more than a few pages (after reading some current fiction...) to see the difference.

[Edward · Rating 3 out of 5]

Louis Auchincloss died in January, 2010, at the age of 93, the author of 58 works, many fiction, but a good number of biographies as well. This is the second of his that I've read, the other being THE RECTOR OF JUSTIN. It's a fictional account of a wealthy and influential old New England family, the Carnochans, made of up eleven vignettes of family members, spanning nearly a century. For the most part, these are pretty ordinary people who delude themselves that they are somebody important only because of their wealth and connections.
Ironically, the last vignette is that of LouLou, a 65 year old woman who does not have much money or connections. But she has thought about the idea of a novel about the family and concluded with the question, "Was there even such a thing as a family? . . .Didn't she have to recognized that such impact as the Carnochans had made on the social scene had been largely through the multiplication of the name due to the preponderance of male births? Hadn't she been planning a species of novel with what at best a collection of short stories?" In other words, there is no dynasty, no continuity of a family tradition of worth and self-identity. Auchincloss explodes the myth of a powerful family.

[Peter · Rating 3 out of 5]

In 2004, the writer Louise Auchincloss published the East Side Story novel. The book has twelve chapters. Each chapter is from the point of view of eleven members of the Carnochans, a Scottish-American family. There are twelve chapters. The character of Gordan Carnochan received two chapters. The first chapter is from the point of view of Peter Carnochan. Peter is asked to write a history of the Carnochan family by his great nephew David to mark the New Year in 1904. Peter’s father, who died in 1869, emigrated from Scotland to New York City. Auchincloss writes, “Some of the family used to take pride in the fact David the emigrant came of a clan already established in business in the Old World rather than as an adventurous beggar or a refugee from religious persecution or even an ex-convict” (Auchincloss 2-3). Auchincloss’ novel is a history of an old wealthy family from the East Side of New York City. The novel follows the family up to the 1970s. The last chapter is from the point of view of Loulou Carnochan, a retired nurse, who decides to continue writing the family history of the Carnochans after traveling on a cruise of the Mediterranean Sea. I thought the novel by Louise Auchincloss was well written.

[Ginny · Rating 3 out of 5]

With a lineage chart at the beginning of the book, various family members tell the story, with a chapter provided by each one. Interestingly, it is not in chronological order, so each chapter is a piece of the puzzle of what makes a family and how its traditions/characteristics are carried to the next generation. The major emphasis being that this family has lots of money and the advantages that come with being wealthy. The story ends with LouLou who didn't marry a rich man or inherit a lot of money. She collected the family history and thought she could create something meaningful by writing a book, the history of her family. But her lung cancer returned and that job would go on to another family member.