Description:
Set in Seattle, Emerald City follows Benison Behrenreich, the hearing son of deaf royalty. His father, CEO of a multimillion-dollar deaf access agency, has bribed Myriadal College officials for Benison's spot on their powerhouse basketball team, where he struggles to prove himself and compensate for his father's sins.
Julia Paolantonio has recently lost her father to a drug relapse. Her mother ships her off to live with her estranged granddad, Johnny Raciti, during the summer before her freshman year at Myriadal. Johnny offers her a deal: bring him Peter Fosch - tormented college dropout and the best drug runner west of the Cascades - and he'll give Julia's freshly widowed mother a board seat on his mobbed-up securities firm.
When Benison's father is arrested for defrauding government subsidies for the deaf, the Behrenreichs are left vulnerable to his company's ruthless backers - namely Johnny Raciti - forcing Julia and Peter to navigate the minefield left in the aftermath.
Brief description: Brian Birnbaum grew up thirty minutes west of Camden Yards in Baltimore, where at four years old he cried because the Yankees were losing. An MFA graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, his work has been published or is forthcoming in The Smart Set, The Collagist, Atticus Review, SLAM Magazine, Lit Hub, Political Animal, and more. Emerald City is his first novel. Brian is a child of Deaf adults (CODA) and works in development for the family sign language interpreting business. He lives in Harlem with the writer M.K. Rainey and their dog.
Review Quotes:
"Though this nimble and virtuosic novel tracks everything from the long shadow of addiction to the unique pressures of college athletics, Emerald City is, at its heart, an intensely moving story about family." - Gabe Habash, Author of Stephen Florida (Coffee House Press)
"In Emerald City, Brian Birnbaum expertly creates a kinetic but pained world. The result is an addictive blend of compelling discovery and desultory recognition. Above all, it's the authenticity of the work that most controls." - Sergio De La Pava, Author of A Naked Singularity (University of Chicago Press) and Lost Empress (Pantheon)
"A fiercely smart, intricately structured, riveting debut novel. It's a little unfair that Brian Birnbaum should possess so many gifts. Fortunately, Emerald City is our prize, not his." - David Hollander, Author of L.I.E. (Ballantine Books) and Anthropica (Forthcoming from Animal Riot Press)
"Melding basketball, trust funds, drug mules, and good ol' noirish intrigue, Brian Birnbaum's Dickensian portrayal of a hypercapitalistic Seattle's underbelly (and overbelly) must be read and savored to be believed." - Leland Cheuk, author of The Misadventures of Sulliver Pong (Chicago Center for Literature and Photography) and No Good Very Bad Asian (C&R Press)