The Golden Cup

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY SEP 1, 1986

Set in turn-of-the-century New York, Plain's latest is a stirring novel that focuses on irrepressible Hennie De Riveraaunt of Evergreen's Paul Wernerand her family. Hennie's stagnant existence ends when she begins dating Dan Roth, an impoverished science teacher and social reformer who despises the materialistic excesses of the rich. She weds Dan despite her middle-class family's objections and her knowledge of his earlier womanizing. The marriage is tested when Dan's activism alienates Hennie's wealthy brother-in-law, Walter Werner, whose father owns tenements, and when Hennie agrees to raise Leah, daughter of a dying factory worker. The girl matures into a shrewd, forceful woman who gravitates toward the Roths' exceptionally mild-mannered son, Freddy. While their relationship intensifies, Walter's son, Paul, weds affluent Mimi Mayer, yet he cannot dismiss his passion for Anna, his mother's winsome maid. Plain (Random Winds, Eden Burning invests her story with dignity and historical relevance while insightfully depicting the class consciousness of Progressive Era Americans. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club dual main selections; Reader's Digest Condensed Books selection.