The rich are always crying poverty when it comes time to pay a ransom: “Net worth and liquidity are not the same thing!” Across cinema, the moneyed and their auxiliaries question the kidnappers’ math. In the film “Fargo,” the wealthy father of Jean Lundegaard (of wood-chipper infamy) grumbles, “A million dollars is a lot of damn money.” In the action thriller “Rush Hour,” the men who kidnapped the daughter of a Chinese diplomat call to demand fifty million dollars, to which the L.A.P.D. detective James Carter (Chris Tucker) exclaims, “Fifty million dollars?! Who you think you kidnapped, Chelsea Clinton?” The real-life haggling can get just as protracted. In 1973, the oil tycoon J. Paul Getty did not agree to pay his grandson’s kidnappers until several months after the initial ransom letter, when a bloody ear turned up. Even then, Getty paid only the maximum he could claim as a tax write-off.
Not so with the Fletchers, the “extraordinarily, absurdly, kidnappably rich” family at the heart of “Long Island Compromise” (Random House), by Taffy Brodesser-Akner. When Carl Fletcher is abducted outside his estate, in 1980, his family quickly coughs up the cash; Carl’s wife, Ruth, withdraws two hundred and fifty thousand dollars from the bank like she’s getting a coffee to go. (She is married to the heir to a Styrofoam fortune, after all.) She delivers a briefcase with the money to a baggage carrousel at J.F.K. Airport, and, within minutes, Carl is dropped outside a Mobil bathroom, drenched in piss, vomit, and relief.
هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة July 08, 2024 من The New Yorker.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
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هذه القصة مأخوذة من طبعة July 08, 2024 من The New Yorker.
ابدأ النسخة التجريبية المجانية من Magzter GOLD لمدة 7 أيام للوصول إلى آلاف القصص المتميزة المنسقة وأكثر من 9,000 مجلة وصحيفة.
بالفعل مشترك? تسجيل الدخول
ANTIHERO
“The Boys,” on Prime Video.
HOW THE WEST WAS LONG
“Horizon: An American Saga—Chapter 1.”
WHEEL OF FORTUNE
Taffy Brodesser-Akner weighs the cost of generational wealth.
TWICE-TOLD TALES
The seditious writers who unravel their own stories.
CASTING A LINE
The hard-bitten genius of Norman Maclean.
TEARDROPS ON MY GUITAR
Four years ago, when Ivan Cornejo was a junior in high school, he had a meeting with his family to announce that he was dropping out. His parents were alarmed, of course, but his older sister, Pamela, had a more sympathetic reaction, because she also happened to be his manager, and she knew that he wasn’t bluffing when he said that he had to focus on his career.
THE HADAL ZONE
Arwen Rasmont waits hours at Keflavík International for his flight; they call it as he leaves the men’s room. He walks past the mirrored wall and is assaulted, as usual, by his dead father’s handsome image: high-arched nose, yellow hair.
OPENING THEORY
Ivan is standing on his own in the corner while the men from the chess club move the chairs and tables around.
THE LAST RAVE
Remembering a summer of estrangement.
КАНО
I’ve dated all kinds of women in my life,” the man said, “but I have to say I’ve never seen one as ugly as you.”
