Spanning three generations and the interconnected lives of multiple characters, The Door-Man is an intricately constructed and revelatory novel. At the heart of it are two possibly unbridgeable gaps: between the central character’s fragmented understanding of his family’s history and the truth, and between an ancestral cycle of tragedy and a potentially hopeful future.
The central character is the door-man of the title: Piedmont Livingston Kinsolver, who is employed at the St. Urban, an apartment building on Central Park West in New York City. Kinsolver’s job puts him in regular contact with residents of the St. Urban and any discord among them. These residents include Delano DeAngelus (a.k.a., Del) and a boy named Dante, the adopted son of two other St. Urban residents: Francesca Malatesta and O’Graéghall Van Pelt, a New York State senator. Dante seems to be closer to Del than he is to either of his adopted parents, and Kinsolver also looks out for the boy.
Trouble ensues when Van Pelt discovers that Francesca and Del have been sleeping together, and things get even more complicated when Del seems intent on rescuing Dante from what appears to be an unhappy home life. Joining forces with him is Trifina Lincoln, who works with Del at the Museum of Natural History, and who might have a closer connection to Dante than many had presumed. Trifina is romantically connected to Del and (to a lesser, and waning, extent) to Kinsolver.
As the novel progresses, we learn that Kinsolver, Del, Trifina, and Van Pelt share a deeper connection: one that can be traced back to the town of Gilboa in Upstate New York. In 1927, after being cleared of its inhabitants, the town was intentionally flooded with water from a local creek, the final step of establishing a reservoir that would supply New York City. (This actually happened, and here and elsewhere, the novel artfully blends fact and fiction.) In the years leading up to the flooding, Del’s grandfather, Gianni DeAngelus, worked as a stonecutter in Gilboa, helping to create the reservoir’s dam, and Trifina’s grandfather, Lincoln Lincoln, ran a mule team used for transport at the dam site.
For his part, Kinsolver has two connections to Gilboa. His grandmother, Winifred Goldring (based on a historical figure), was an accomplished paleontologist who in 1917 identified the origins of fossils discovered at the site of the reservoir. She determined that they were remnants of what came to be known as Gilboa Trees: large, fern-like plants of the Devonian Period. Significantly, they helped load up the atmosphere with oxygen, paving the way for human evolution. Unfortunately, when the reservoir was established, the fossils were flooded, along with the rest of the town.
Kinsolver’s second connection to Gilboa is his late paternal grandfather, Piedmont Kinsolver, who also worked near the dam site, transporting Winifred between her living quarters and the quarry where the fossils had been discovered. In the novel (but not in actual fact), he and Winifred became lovers. Yet their relationship was cut short by a tragedy: the 1924 disappearances (and presumed deaths) of Piedmont, Lincoln Lincoln, and Gianni DeAngelus.
Gilboa isn’t the only connection between Kinsolver, Del, and Trifina. They are also linked by blood. Del is Kinsolver’s second cousin, and Trifina is his first cousin once removed.
What, then, of Van Pelt’s connection to Gilboa, and to Kinsolver, Del, and Trifina? This becomes one of the core mysteries of the novel. We learn that as a senator, Van Pelt represents a district that includes the part of the reservoir-that-was-Gilboa. And he seems to want certain details about its past to remain as submerged as the town and Winifred’s fossils. But in time, Kinsolver’s sleuthing surfaces disturbing truths about Van Pelt and about the circumstances behind the disappearance of Piedmont, Lincoln, and Gianni.
This gets at one of the main pleasures of the novel: seeing Kinsolver transform from an observer (practically part of his job description as a door-man) into an active participant in the search for the truth about Gilboa’s, and his family’s, past.
Throughout the novel, Kinsolver seems haunted by the tragedies that have befallen his ancestors and others in their orbit. Some of those misfortunes hit very close to home. Kinsolver’s father died in the Second World War, in Kinsolver’s infancy, and later, his mother took her own life. Collectively, all of these tragedies appear to have unmoored him, and the sleuthing seems to offer him a welcome, and perhaps restorative, sense of direction, as well as new perspectives on himself and his family.
Del and Trifina are haunted by their own ancestral ghosts and, like Kinsolver, they are determined that Dante have a happier life than the one he’s been living with Francesca and Van Pelt. For Kinsolver, Dante represents hope for the future, and perhaps a way to break the cycle of misfortune that has befallen his, Del’s, and Trifina’s families. Yet the road to a better life for Dante is uncertain and fraught with hazards, one of which plays out in a suspenseful scene in Gilboa, where Dante has accompanied Kinsolver on his search for answers.
The mysteries at the heart of the novel, and Kinsolver’s efforts to get to the truth, are all compelling and thoughtfully portrayed. But there is much more to praise about this complex and inventive book. For one thing, Wheelwright moves deftly between time periods (mainly, between the 1920s and 1993, the year of the novel’s present-day action) and the various settings, conveying each of them with details that make us feel like witnesses to the actions and events of the book.
Also, the historical details of the novel are fascinating, especially those connected to the life of Winifred Goldring. In several scenes, Wheelwright immerses us in her world, capturing her determination to learn more about the Gilboa fossils and bring them into the public eye. In these efforts and others, Winifred is burdened by the prejudices of those who believe that she’s pursuing a career that is unsuitable for women.
Perhaps one of the most striking features of the novel is its exploration of time, both geologic and as it is perceived by humans, with our fleeting lives and experiences, and our imperfect memories. One of the most moving passages in this regard is this observation of Winifred’s, which Kinsolver discovers in one of her notebooks:
In closing, I should say that this review doesn’t capture the full scope of the novel, which examines several other twists and turns in the branches of Kinsolver’s family tree (and of a family tree adjacent to his). It also tells the stories of characters who, although unrelated to Kinsolver and his ancestors, had a significant influence on his family. In other words, the novel introduces more characters and subplots than I can cover here. What I will say, though, is that the stories behind all of these twists, turns, and characters add up to a nuanced exploration of how the choices (for good and ill) and misfortunes of one generation, and of those close to them, can have profound effects on future generations.
Would My Pick be Your Pick?
If you're interested in ________, the answer may be "Yes":￭ Historical fiction
￭ Multi-generational family sagas
￭ Mysteries
￭ Paleontology
