Trust (Pulitzer Prize Winner)

I did not enjoy this book but rather endured it hoping it would get better since it won a Pulitzer Prize. Parts I & II, the first almost 200 pages, were boring, not well written, could have been shortened by half with the same effect! Part III was more engrossing and some might say since this is written somewhat as puzzle the first two parts were necessary, but the puzzle wasn't all that surprising and just the actual interactions of Ida, her father, and Bevel in Part III are the heart of the book. I'm from the world of Finance but didn't find that of tremendous interest or to be too overdone in detail. There was enough plausibility knowing what I do of the Markets of that era.

A long, uninteresting book about relationships and finance. I was completely uninterested in the characters and the plot.

I know, it won the Pulitzer, but this book just didn't work for me. Maybe financial / stock market people get more out of it, and things went over my head. However, I did love the book that shared the Pulitzer with this book (Demon Copperhead).

I wanted to give this 5 stars because "a book that stays with you" is one that is a great book. I admit I did not see what happened between Bonds and the Autobiography. I was confused....and it took Ida to help me understand the two. I had to go back and reread Bonds. Reading other reviews below, I am increasingly interested in the writing and the construction of this book...and the story that goes beyond and deeper that Helen and Mildred, Andrew and Benjamin. The word Trust means so much....but really what does it mean? Mr. Diaz asks us to think about that.

This book is structurally complex and layered. Four parts, each with a different point of view.

Part I tells the story of the Rask family and wasn't that interesting. Melodramatic, no dialogue. Part II is the unfinished autobiography of a real financier, Andrew Bevel, and his wife, Mildred. But wait...it's the same story...sort of.

By Part III we learn what is going on. Andrew Bevel is incensed at the successful novel, Bonds, which everyone believes is written about him and his wife. He wants to set the record straight by publishing his memoir. He hires a young woman, Ida, to type and refine his story. She narrates Part III, which is very interesting and brings the first two parts into their proper perspectives. Part IV are the journals of Mildred Bevel. And where we learn the truth.

Well written, with the structure really working to create tension. By Part III, I couldn't put it down. I was a little disappointed in the surprise reveal in the journals...to me, it wasn't all that surprising at all.

The writing is amazing. The fictional novel, isn't well written...the author manages to write in a completely different way from his own writing style, which starts to show fully in part three. Part III not only brings the story together, it gives a wonderful portrait of life in the 1920s and 1930s in New York.

Even through the roar and effervescence of the 1920s, everyone in New York has heard of Benjamin and Helen Rask. He is a legendary Wall Street tycoon; she is the daughter of eccentric aristocrats. Together, they have risen to the very top of a world of seemingly endless wealth—all as a decade of excess and speculation draws to an end. But at what cost have they acquired their immense fortune? This is the mystery at the center of Bonds, a successful 1937 novel that all of New York seems to have read. Yet there are other versions of this tale of privilege and deceit.

Hernan Diaz’s TRUST elegantly puts these competing narratives into conversation with one another—and in tension with the perspective of one woman bent on disentangling fact from fiction. The result is a novel that spans over a century and becomes more exhilarating with each new revelation.

At once an immersive story and a brilliant literary puzzle, TRUST engages the reader in a quest for the truth while confronting the deceptions that often live at the heart of personal relationships, the reality-warping force of capital, and the ease with which power can manipulate facts

The first half of this book was dry and I considered not finishing. The second half picks up considerably and makes up for the first half. The Italian American woman has a far more interesting life than the main couple discussed. I wish there were more details on her. I found myself rolling my eyes over the financial discussion. Anyone who has bothered investing knows that the market cannot be timed. For a book that's supposed to be empowering about the relationship between women and money it's not super empowering at all.

I can appreciate a novel that is mostly just an exercise in style. However, I cannot rate this higher than 2 stars based on the enjoyment of reading. Even so, I found the main characters intriguing, which suggests a good writer behind this mess. That is quite an achievement when I take into account my personal disgust for the world of finance and billionaires. If I take this novel simply on the metafictional level; how we tell our stories, how our stories are told by others and why, what is the actual truth - then it just about barely works.

As a reader, I am tired of overly ambitious novels that feel unedited. I get how you can get charmed by the idea behind this, but it is a struggle to read this (even if it is done so on purpose) mostly without any reward. It takes a certain type to really like this, and I'm not it.

2.5

I enjoyed how this book is told in sections, and loved the section where the typist is recording the life story of Bevel, the wealthy tho hated man at the center of this. I like the parallels between investment terms and relationship terms - futures, bonds, trusts, etc. I wanted this to go a little further in each narrative, but it was overall satisfying and definitely well written.

2023 winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Hernan Diaz's Trust was an unusual but interesting reading experience. There are four sections to the piece: a novel, an outline of an autobiography, a memoir, and a journal.
First we read a novel written by Harold Vanner called Bonds.
We are introduced to the peculiar man Benjamin Rask, son of a wealthy tobacco producer, a shy reticent boy with no inclination toward social friendships. The death of both parents leaves him with a vast empire which he begins to grow based on his found talent when it comes to investing. "he discovered a hunger at his core he did not know existed until it was given a bait big enough to stir it to life.....If asked, Benjamin would probably have found it hard to explain what drew him to the world of finance. It was the complexity of it, yes, but also the fact that he viewed capital as an antiseptically living thing. It moves, eats, grows, breeds, falls ill, and may die. But it is clean."
He takes on valuable assistants as needed, and seems to build his wealth into an even bigger empire without so much as being connected to anything but the growth of money. When He does decide it might be time to marry, he meets a woman introduced to him by his associate, Mr. Sheldon.
Helen Brevoort, raised unconventionally by her parents Catherine and her eccentric father, travels across Europe, amazing people with her ability in languages and culture. She happens to meet Mr. Shelton who takes it upon himself to rescue their family from the perils of impending World War I. He safely returns them back to New York, where he gives them a place to stay in Madison Avenue right next to his employer, Mr. Benjamin Rask. Helen meets Mr. Rask at a party, held at his spacious and tastefully decorated house, and she decides maybe because of his loneliness and his silence that she will marry him. They are happy in their pursuit of independent passions :his money, hers, the arts. But Helen begins having episodes of mania and scratches at her eczema until Benjamin seeks help in a sanatorium in Switzerland. Her condition worsens. Shortly after the sad conclusion of this short novel, a new section introduces us to Andrew Bevel whose outline of his own autobiography tells a very similar story with drastic detail changes. We come to realize that this is his attempt to refute the novel written about his life with his beloved wife Mildred. The third section is a memoir written by Ida Pretenza detailing her time working for Bevel and helping him construct his autobiography and paint a generous, kind portrait of his life and love of Mildred. Ida, now in her 70's, uncovers the personal correspondence of Mildred who was suffering from cancer in a Swiss hospital. Needless to say each section makes the reader question the truth of the one before. The word Trust in the title may refer to the bond created between writer and reader to supply us with a satisfying character study, or a historical portrait of the old money icons of the early 20th century, and though this unusual structure may break that trust, trust me- this is a remarkable reading experience.

Lines:
he was an inept athlete, an apathetic clubman, an unenthusiastic drinker, an indifferent gambler, a lukewarm lover. He, who owed his fortune to tobacco, did not even smoke. Those who accused him of being excessively frugal failed to understand that, in truth, he had no appetites to repress.

It was only in hindsight that she saw that all this prying had driven her to create a quiet, unassuming character, a role she performed with flawless consistency around her parents and their friends—inconspicuously polite, never speaking if it could be helped, responding with nods and monosyllables whenever possible,

Intimacy can be an unbearable burden for those who, first experiencing it after a lifetime of proud self-sufficiency, suddenly realize it makes their world complete. Finding bliss becomes one with the fear of losing it.

Her face was a desolate ruin. A thing broken and abandoned, exhausted of being. Her eyes did not look at Benjamin but seemed to be there only so that he could peer into the rubble within.

Mrs. Brevoort was exuberant in her grief, exploring all the social possibilities of mourning. She found unsuspected radiance in the deepest shades of black and made sure to surround herself with particularly plaintive and misty-eyed friends so that she could highlight her arrogant form of sorrow,

the trials of her tender years and her always delicate health had given her the innocent yet profound wisdom of those who, like young children or the elderly, are close to the edges of existence.

A selfish hand has a short reach.

Every single one of our acts is ruled by the laws of economy. When we first wake up in the morning we trade rest for profit. When we go to bed at night we give up potentially profitable hours to renew our strength. And throughout our day we engage in countless transactions. Each time we find a way to minimize our effort and increase our gain we are making a business deal, even if it is with ourselves.

Money is a fantastic commodity. You can't eat or wear money, but it represents all the food and clothes in the world. This is why it's a fiction. ... Stocks, shares, bonds. Do you think any of these things those bandits across the river buy and sell represent any real, concrete value? No. ... That's what all these criminals trade in: fiction

My job is about being right. Always. If I’m ever wrong, I must make use of all my means and resources to bend and align reality according to my mistake so that it ceases to be a mistake.”

The more people partake in your everyday life, the more entitled they feel to spread stories about you. I’ve always found this baffling. You’d think closeness would engender trust.” “Are you saying even your friends spread rumors about you and your wife?” “Mainly my friends. That’s what they think friendship means: the freedom to turn you into a topic of conversation.”

We cared for each other, but care’s demanding. Did our best to fulfil what we imagined the other’s expectations were, repressed our frustration when we failed, and never allowed ourselves to be pleased when we were the recipients of those same efforts.

For I’ve come to think one is truly married only when one is more committed to one’s vows than the person they refer to.

God is the most uninteresting answer to the most interesting questions.

“Imagine the relief of finding out that one is not the one one thought one was”

In and out of sleep. Like a needle coming out from under a black cloth and then vanishing again. Unthreaded.

GREAT BOOK! Well written. Dont know why the name TRUST?

Trust is a story of a wall street financier and his wife from the late 1800s to 1929 and a bit beyond. The story is told four times, by four different people, with four different intentions. It highlights how much an author can change and facts, twist the tone, alter the characters. It also illustrates how women were simply written out of history, minimized to supporting characters at best. I thought it was an excellent book though some of the long-winded details about financial markets were dull (easily skimmed through though.) I enjoyed the 3rd part the best. Since that author of Part 3 was an actual writer it gave Diaz an opportunity to show his skill with words.

This novel is an interesting blend of different genres, spanning historical fiction, autobiography, and critical memoir. In addition to facing the lies that frequently lie at the core of interpersonal relationships, the imagined might of capitalism, and the ease with which power may corrupt facts, Trust is part an engrossing story and part an attempt to construct a literary puzzle.

I found the first two sections interesting reading, especially as they read like a fantasy of a superman of finance. However, the final sections did not impress. With the unsatisfying sections just hanging on to the somewhat dull but interesting first two parts, the whole was ultimately unconvincing as a modernist literary construct.

I read an amazing story recently. Initially, I was unsure about the story's direction, but the beautiful prose convinced me to continue reading. One sentence that particularly stood out to me was "And for a moment, there was no struggle and all was at rest, because time seemed to have arrived at its destination." It created a vivid and powerful image in my mind. The author uses captivating language throughout the novel, such as "It was my first time reading something that existed in a vague space between the intellectual and the emotional." The words and word pictures were so engrossing that I lost track of time while reading. I am definitely interested in reading more works by this author.

In the age of “fake news” and a constant barrage of lies, both big and small, Diaz gives us a remarkable examination of truth and the extent to which it can be trusted. There are three parts to his story: a fictional work loosely based on the life of a prominent financier, the financier’s plot to clear his name by writing an authorized biography designed to tell the true story of his life, and an investigation by his ghost writer to discover which of the two versions is closer to reality.

TRUST starts out seeming to be a book about a book but takes an astonishing turn of events. The successful financier is offended by what he sees as inaccuracies in the fictional biography based on his life. He is particularly bothered by how his wife is depicted in the novel. This latter element foreshadows events that will weigh heavily on our understanding of the plot.

The novel builds slowly. It is filled with arcane facts about finance and money. The financier’s backstory is characterized by wealth and entitlement, while his future wife comes from more modest means but displays an uncanny level of intelligence. Her father, a man who struggles with mental illness, fosters her intellectual development.

The novel takes off when the young woman hired to write the financier’s autobiography begins to question what she is being told by the financier about his wife. Using the writer's backstory, Diaz folds in a subplot about the struggle between entitled wealthy and working classes. Hubris, delusion, greed, corruption, and power also appear as thematic elements. The climax is subtle, but surprising and totally satisfying.

Such an interesting style and story. Teaching this amidst the chaos that is 2022, I found this book soothing.

A truly brilliant novel, the story is structured in four segments. It opens with a novella by Harold Vanner about Benjamin Rask a rich financier who has taken his father's wealth and grown it to unimaginable scope by his ingenious manipulation of equities in the financial market. Rask is introduced to Helen Brevoort, the daughter of an old Albany family, social lions who have fallen into gentile poverty. Helen's father is a polymath who tutors Helen who possesses a scintillating intellect. Father's mental state deteriorates as he becomes delusionaal, entrapped into occult and esoteric doctrines until he is admitted into a sanitarium in Switzerland. After a few years making the rounds in Europe, living off the generosity of expatriate acquaintances, Mrs. Brevoot and Helen return to America where she marries Benjamin. Helen begins to show signs of severe mental deterioration ultimately finding herself in the same sanitarium once holding her father. Benjamin goes to extreme lengths to find a cure for Helen until an unproven experimental treatment causes her death. In the novella, Benjamin is criticized for his market manipulation tactics.

The second portion of the book is a first draft of the autobiography of Andrew Bevel, a financier who, he angrily believes, is a roman a clef in Vanner's novella. He is outraged by Vanner's depiction of his business practices and, particulary, by Vanner's vile distortion of his late wife, Mildred. He is determined to erase all copies of Vanner's book and subsitute his life story to present the real Mildred. Unlike Helen's death in her madness, Mildred died of cancer despite his dutiful ministrations to her. He is quite adament in rejecting all criticism of his role in the financial collapse of 1929 portraying instead his view that he was the savior of the economy. Mildred, in contrast to Helen, was kind and gentle, a supporter of philanthropic causes, an angel.

The third portion is told by Ida Partenza many years after Andrew Bevel's death. Ida is the daughter of an Italian immigrant father, an anarchist doing small-time printing work in Brooklyn. Andrew hires Ida as his amanuensis to assist him in finishing his autobiography. Here again we see Andrew's intent to portray himself as a hero of the capitalist financial system, decrying government intervention, especially the Federal Reserve. Andrew distorts the facts of his life and Mildred's quite liberally, even asking Ida to come up with descriptions that aren't real. The story is nearly finished when Andrew dies from a heart attack and the book never emerges. She tells her story from decades later when the Bevel mansion is finally opened to the public permitting access to Andrew's and Mildred's papers. She doesn't find much about Mildred until she discovers a journal kept by Mildred while she was a dying patient in Switzerland.

The final part of the book is Ida's transcripton of Mildred's journal. From her journal, we learn that Mildred, far from a docile angelic philanthropist, a dilettante, was a financial genius. She relates how her insights into the workings of financial markets led to actions that protected and enhanced Andrew's wealth, measures about which he had no conception until she brought them to him. She, for example, discovered how to utilize the delays between orders made and postings on the ticker tape to create windfall arbitrage opportunities. She correctly foresaw the impending market collapse and devised liquidation and shorting strategies that protected Bevel's holdings.

As well as "Trust", this marvelous book might have been titled, "Truth". If market can be manipulated, so can the truth by the self-justifying, self-aggrandizing motives of Bevel to place himself on an heroic moral plane far from what the truth would entitle him. Ironically, instead of exalting the life of his wife, he has cruelly and selfishly demeaned her.

This book is interesting in that it is four books in one, none of which have a necessarily reliable narrator. I thought that it was a neat idea, but it always seemed to be missing something. It was like some of the characters weren't quite human or something. That is the best way that I can describe it.

Boiling the plot down to the simplest terms, this is the story of a fabulously successful New York financier, Andrew Bevel, at the turn of the century: his ancestors, his childhood and extraordinary marriage, his rising prestige and wealth, his role in exploiting (manipulating?) the roiling financial markets of the 1920s, his eccentricities, his legacy. Along the way, Diaz explores the relationship between capitalism, civic responsibility, and self-interest (echoes of Gordon Gekko's "greed is good"); the complicated forms of co-dependence that bind parents and children, husbands and wives; and - most of all - the many ways that wealth and power can be used to distort truth.

But this summary scarcely does justice to the deceptively twisty tale that is reworked - by the time the book is over - three times over. The first section, "Bonds," recounts the tale from the perspective of a novelist who has transformed the outlines of Bevel's life into a critically acclaimed novelization. The second section, "My Life," is composed of excerpts from Bevel's never-completed autobiography. The third section "A Memoir, Remembered," is recounted by Bevel's ghostwriter - it's in this section that you begin to appreciate the web that Diaz has been subtly weaving. Then in the fourth/last section, "Futures" - composed of excerpts from the diary of the Bevel's extraordinary wife - Diaz pulls the rug out entirely, challenging readers to reassess all the simple/easy/convenient assumptions they've spent the prior 300 pages forming.

Diaz is a gloriously gifted storyteller. His characters are deeply complex and original, his prose eloquent and smart, his insights into human nature grippingly authentic. This is one of the most original works I've read in a long time. "Trust" me - you won't regret the time you spend on this engrossing, inventive, highly human tale of pride, perspective, and power.

Winner of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize
Longlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize

4.5⭐

"Most of us prefer to believe we are the active subjects of our victories but only the passive objects of our defeats. We triumph, but it is not really we who fail—we are ruined by forces beyond our control."

I’ll admit that I had put this book aside when I first received it a month ago. The subject matter- financial markets, Wall Street tycoon, the crash of 1929- wasn’t pulling me in. But eventually, my curiosity got the better of me and I finally cracked it open three days ago and I have been immersed in it ever since. This is a book that takes time and patience. I did put it down a few times – not because I lost interest but because I needed to take a pause and absorb what I was reading. In general, I enjoy meta fiction when it is done right and Hernan Diaz takes meta fiction to a different level altogether with “Trust”.

It is hard to summarise this book without giving too much away. The plot revolves around a successful financier (and his wife) who not only survived the crash of 1929 but thrived and added to their wealth through well-timed investment decisions. He attributes his success to his strong intuitive capabilities, intense research and his acute understanding of the financial world. Needless to say, reaping profits in an era wherein the economy collapsed and investors and businesses lost substantial amounts of money, does invite questions and conjecture directed toward his investment practices, even inspiring fiction based on the life and times of said person with distorted facts and whole a lot of speculation. Now how does one protect his image and manage public perception? Who is he trying to convince? – Those in his close circle? Business associates? Family members? Himself?

“Trust” is a complex, layered novel divided into four parts- four distinct narrative styles in four distinct voices. This novel is composed of four intricately woven novels/segments - each presenting a different perspective on the events center to the plot - a work of fiction inspired by the main character and his wife, an incomplete draft of an autobiography written by the egotistical protagonist, a memoir written by the young woman hired by the main character as his biographer and the final segment is a part of the diary of the financier’s late wife. As the narrative progresses, and the line between fact and fiction gets blurred, which version of the events and the people involved rings true? Whose version can you trust?

With its unique structure, elegant writing, interesting characters (even the immensely unlikable protagonist) and the 1920s setting, Hernan Diaz’s Trust is a sharp, compelling and creative work of fiction. The first part of the novel does not quite give the reader an idea of the complexity and the intrigue of the plot that lies ahead. The final two parts of the novel were my favorite and the most absorbing part(s) of the book. I will definitely be looking out for more from this author.

“Every life is organized around a small number of events that either propel us or bring us to a grinding halt. We spend the years between these episodes benefiting or suffering from their consequences until the arrival of the next forceful moment.”

The structure of this novel is clever. There is an opening short, disturbing biography that we learn might be more romans á clef and libelous, then an incomplete attempt at a "corrective" autobiography, then the memoir of the woman who ghostwrote the autobiography, then the found contents of the journal of the principal character. There is a final revelation. I expected Citizen Kane and got a simpler twist. It's hard for me to see exactly why, but the whole novel didn't move me much. It might be that the financier's self-deceptive philosophy is so transparent, and that his wife, who becomes somewhat clearer to us as the novel progresses, never seems like a real person.

I don't think I've read a book like this before. The first part was the story of 1920's New York financier Rask and his wife Helen. He's considered a genius, and makes his fortune in the stock market. His wife becomes a generous supporter of the arts, and then she gets sick and he takes her to a spa in Switzerland, but she dies. The second part of the book is an unfinished autobiography of Andrew Bevel, who is very much like Rask. The third part is centered on Ida, a young woman who we find out is ghost writing the autobiography. This part is partly contemporary with Rask and partly written in the voice of the much older Ida who returns to Bevel's mansion after it is turned into a museum and library. She is looking for the truth, since she knows Bevel was trying to shape his story through the autobiography she was working on. The final part of the book takes the form of Mildred Bevel's cryptic diary. All becomes clear. I liked this book quite a bit.

I initially gave this book 3 stars, it's good, a fairly easy read, but nothing special. Then as I thought more about it I found myself thinking "Really, this was short-listed for the Booker Prize and won the Pulitzer?" The book just isn't that worthy of all this attention.
It's becoming a bit of a trope now, but telling the same story from different perspectives has been done many time before and significantly better. I got to the final reveal chapter and my reaction wasn't so much as "wow, great ending" and more "well, d'uh"
Again, it was a quick read, I just don't get all the praise heaped upon it.

Oh, what a tangled Gilded Age web is woven here! The book includes four novels (or three novels and one lame attempt), with the essential connection between #1 and #2 frustratingly non-obvious until it comes into focus. #1, by fiction writer Harold Vanner, is a non--authorized fictional biography misrepresenting the source of financier Andrew Bevel's successful manipulation of Wall St during the Crash, and also includes the premise of wife Mildred’s horrifying death in Switzerland by primitive electro-shock treatment ordered by her husband. #2 is Bevel’s lame attempt to redeem the virtue of Mildred, but he gives up and hires ghostwriter Ida Partenza to create #3. Ida is the daughter of a struggling anarchist Italian immigrant father, whom she idolizes until she realizes how his political beliefs limit them to a life of abject penury. The unnamed father is one of the strongest characters, admirable in his steadfast adherence to his politics but unconscious of his mistreatment of, dependence upon, and complete lack of appreciation for Ida. This theme that carries through the entire plot and is also manifested in the Bevel family by Andrew, the Gilded Age husband and by Mildred’s mother, a manipulator dependent on wealthy friends to marry off her daughter and keep herself socially prominent. Book #4, finally, holds the truth.

This is a difficult and ultimately rewarding tale, worthy of a second reading and of the Booker Prize awarded the novel in 2022.

Quotes: "Most men smoked cigars so they could talk to other men."

"God is the most uninteresting answer to the most interesting questions."

Trust
This is a very compelling story about a fictional tycoon during the early 1920s New York.
What makes the story so fascinating is that it involves 4 story lines about the same man, Andrew Bevel but told from 4 points of view.
Version one is a novel about Benjamin Rask by Harold Vanner. Its subject is a brilliant mathematician endowed with superb gifts of analysis, planning and intuition who builds a financial empire based on stocks, bonds and other financial instruments while taking advantage of loose or nonexistent federal regulations. He is a reclusive loner whose wife Helen, something of a mathematical savant, creates endowments for orchestras, libraries and musicians until she goes mad and is institutionalize at a spa in Switzerland.
Version 2 is an autobiography of Andrew Bevel a financial tycoon who made a fortune in the 1920s before the crash and in his mind, he saved the economic future of America with his brilliant schemes. If only the Federal Reserve had not existed…This version is to set the story straight about Bevel and Mildred. She is portrayed as a lovely, kind, generous woman who created the Mildred Bevel Foundation to support the arts and humanities. She became quite ill and her life ands in a Swiss sanitarium.
The third story is about Ida Partenza, a young unemployed woman hired by Bevel to write his autobiography, parts of which are section 2. She lives with her widowed father in a tenement and they exist hand to mouth. He is an Italian immigrant and anarchist who refuses to adapt his typesetting skills to modern technology. He is domineering, opinionated and relies heavily on Ida to keep the home running. He is always right and petulant when Ida questions his opinions. She manages to get the job with Andrew Bezel and she follows his precise instructions on his autobiography.
Ida has difficulty reading Mildred’s handwriting in her notebooks and timetables so has great difficulty getting to the real Mildred.
The fourth story is based on the notebook that Ida discovers in one of the boxes she goes through after Bevel dies. It’s the true story of the brains behind Bevel’s success.
Wonderful story, great characters and a fulfilling finale.

This book essentially tells the same story 4 times. The first time is a straightforward, if dry, historical fiction novel about a wealthy man whose uncanny ability to predict the stock market makes him a vast fortune, which grows even more vast when he takes advantage of the stock market crash that leads to the Great Depression. He is deeply in love with his wife, even if he cannot express his affection in conventional ways. She uses his wealth for philanthropy, especially sponsoring music and hosting concerts. When she becomes mentally ill, she insists on going to a sanitarium in Switzerland, the same place where her mentally unstable father died.

The second section of the book is basically the same story... but this time, it is an unfinished draft of an autobiography written by a wealthy man, clearly trying to justify his accumulation of wealth when the rest of the country was struggling under the Great Depression.

The third section of the book is narrated by a second generation Italian immigrant woman, who has been hired by an immensely wealthy man to ghost-write his autobiography - it becomes clear that she is writing the autobiography of the previous section.

The final section is a collection of journal entries by the wealthy man's wife, written from the sanitarium.

Each iteration of the story gives it new depth, and by the fourth version, it has become a completely different story. The "trust" of the title is partly a financial term, but also encourages the reader to think about trust, and which version of the story is the most trustworthy: ultimately, the reader has to construct their own interpretation of the events.

Diaz's writing is very good, and the four different sections of the book require four different styles. The story itself isn't quite compelling enough to be worth reading four times, but ultimately I'm glad I read the book.

Very interesting work of fiction based around the 1920's stock market, crash and fallout. Pretty much need a dictionary to read this book if your vocabulary is not quite up to the caliber of the writer's! The separate versions were all uniquely interesting. It wasn't till the beginning of the 4th that things really dawned on me. Excellent writer, interesting premise and structure. Best line: "God is the most uninteresting answer to the most interesting questions"

I'm not necessarily sorry that I spent the time reading this book, but I don't feel like there was any "story" involved in it. The most interesting aspect of this book to me is the construction of it. The four parts tell the same story from different perspectives and each part gave me a little more of the truth about the accomplishments and relationships of the characters.
The focus on the financial brilliance and manipulation of the stock market by Andrew Bevel (and his wife) overwhelmed any sense of the history of the time period for me. The characters weren't affected by the financial disaster that affected the entire world. Rather, Andrew suffered solely from the loss of his reputation as a financial genius.

Not my usual fare, but very interesting: four different stories intertwine. The first is a novella about a capitalist who rises from family wealth to unimaginable wealth in the Gilded Age and through the Great Depression and then loses his wife to some kind of mental illness and the treatment he inflicts on her. The second is a half-outlined retelling, ostensibly by the man for whom the first book was a roman à clef, in which he is better (by his own lights). The third is a memoir by the woman who wrote it for him, and the fourth is diary entries from the wife. Each retelling raises new questions about how money works in America and the previous narrative, as well as the nature of narration generally (trust, get it?). I enjoyed it though it doesn’t leave me wanting to read more general fiction.

I chose this because it made so many best of 2022 lists and a friend's recommendation. I found it dry and superficial.