Seating Arrangements

The trope of the wedding weekend, with its contrived conviviality hastened by the joining of disparate but soon-to-be-connected tribes of families and friends, is zestfully yet acerbically parsed in Shipstead's crackerjack first novel. A seriocomic romp in a Meet the Fockers vein, Shipstead's satire follows the presumptive merging of the über-WASP Van Meter and Duff clans on the occasion of the marriage of seven-months-pregnant Daphne to steadfast Greyson. The ensemble of petulant sisters and stalwart mothers, tipsy aunts and boorish brothers is led in all its hauteur and debauchery by Daphne's father, Winn, a crusty Boston banker more concerned with his unsuccessful bid for membership in the Pequod Club than with his family's happiness on this vital weekend. As he seeks to assuage the affront with an ill-timed dalliance with Daphne's bridesmaid, past wrongs, present slights, and future injustices coalesce in a stew of zany proportions. Yet for all its madcap quirkiness, Shipstead's adroit escapade artfully delivers a poignant reflection on the enduring if frustrating nature of love, hope, and family.
—Haggas, Carol