A GATE AT THE STAIRS by Lorrie Moore

Lorrie Moore is one of the best of the contemporary American writers.  "A Gate at the Stairs" was chosen as on of the NY Times best books in 2014 and was also in contention for the Orange Prize and  the PEN/Faulkner Award.  By the time I had finished this book, I loved it and its main character.

Tassie Keltjin, a farm girl from the middle America, is possessed with a keen mind and sharp wit.  Her social graces aren't always on display; she is too honest for that.  Tassie's parents are sort of ex-hippies from out East.  They grow boutique potatoes that are in high demand by the artisanal restaurants which are springing up everywhere.  Tassie attends the local University in Troy which is the nearest town to their farm.  Somewhat naive, Tassie is just learning how to read people, and she makes mistakes along the way.  As the fall semester gets underway, Tassie's life becomes entwined with two people who have a profound effect on her growth and understanding.  She falls in love with Reynaldo, a Brazilian boy (or is he ???) she meets at school.  The more profound relationship is with Sarah Brink, who turns out to have a dark past that we don't find out until the climax of the book.

Tassie finds a job as a nanny with the Brinks, a couple about to adopt a mixed-race child. Even when the reader is first introduced to the Brinks, there is a sense of foreboding around them and a certain weirdness in their manner.

  Sarah Brink runs a boutique restaurant which serves up all kinds of pretentious dishes.  Naturally she serves the organic potatoes from the Keltjin farm.  It is the fall of 2001 and the destruction of the World Trade Center intrudes on the lives of our small town characters in ways they could not anticipate.  Before long the reader intuits that under the placid everyday life of our characters lurks secrets: racism, fear, and pretense.  Countries like Afghanistan and Iraq, which once seemed so far away, affect  Tassie and her family when her brother, Robert, joins the army. Tassie becomes very close to the child, Emmie, entrusted to her care as the Brinks are too busy to give her much attention.
As Tassie's awareness and wariness grows, so grows the reader's.

Moore writes gorgeous descriptions full of apt metaphors and similes.  Her character, Tassie, sees with honest eyes and exposes pretensions with humor.  The sometimes loneliness of a college student living alone is spot on.  The scenes which take place on the farm are grounded and real.  Tassie's relationship with her brother and what isn't said between them is heartbreaking.  Finally, Tassie's relationships with her family, Emmie and the Brinks, as well as Reynaldo, teach her about the tenuousness of life and reality hiding in plain sight.

I highly recommend this book to all readers for its insight, humor and good writing.