Pineapple Street

If you know NYC and Brooklyn you will feel right at home reading this novel. If you know the area of the fruit streets even better.  Author, Jenny Jackson has beautifully described the world of the ultra wealthy and how they see the world.  Also how others perceive them from the other side of the tracks.

This is the story of the Stockton family, which even the name sounds stuffy and sounds like old money and the family originally came over on the Mayflower.  The parents, Chip and Tilda have moved out of the family home on Pineapple Street and moved into a smaller home on Orange Street.  The three children who are now adults grew up in the family home and now the son, Cord brings his new wife, Sasha to live there.  Cord's sisters have also left the house and his sister Darcy is married to Malcolm, and their are parents to Poppy and Hatcher.  The youngest Stockton is Georgiana, still single and working in a not for profit to help solve world hunger.  Cord is working with his father in the family real estate business and Darcy is a stay at home mom, with Malcom working in finance.

Darcy describes herself as an orange, a tough outer shell to protect the sweet though vulnerable fruit on the inside.  Her sister was always the Cranberry, a little sour, and Cord was the Pineapple, fun, thrilled to be the center of attention and always made a gathering more festive. 

As the family closes rank to protect itself from the outside world, each family member needs to learn how to welcome in the new spouses and not shut them out.  There are so many secrets that each member of the family is keeping to maintain face that it gets to be too overwhelming.

Also it is current day and these one percenters are struggling with having so much at the expense of others having so little.  How to balance your wealth, live a happy life and share with others is a theme throughout.  So many series topics in what seems on the surface to be a lighthearted entertainment.