In the Shadow of the Greenbrier is a work of fiction that uses real facts and places. The Greenbrier Resort in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia is a golf resort and National Historic Landmark that is still operating after more than one hundred years. The most noteworthy part of its history is its bunker, a massive underground dormitory built to protect members of Congress in the event of a nuclear attack by Russia. Emily Matchar tells the story of this quintessentially American institution and four generations of a Jewish family in the heart of non-Jewish West Virginia.
The narrative unfolds through the viewpoint of one family member from each generation. The main character is Sylvia, a refugee from cosmopolitan Łódź who is a fish out of water in rural White Sulphur Springs in the 1940s and 1950s. Angry and bitter, she could have come across as one-dimensional, but in fact she is the most relatable character in the book. Her European Jewishness clashes constantly with American assimilation and antisemitism, both of which are pervasive at the Greenbrier Resort. Sylvia’s destiny is built around a secret — just like White Sulphur Springs itself, which tries to keep up the appearance of American innocence. Several characters have something to hide, but the biggest secret of all is the bunker. It feels somewhat anticlimactic when that secret is finally revealed; the bunker is a relatively inoffensive project in light of other Cold War intrigues.
Matchar does a good job of pairing the superficial good cheer and cultural barrenness of White Sulphur Springs with the harsh beauty of the sunless mountain valley on which it sits. She paints a believable picture of the resort, which serves as a character itself and an artifact of twentieth-century America.
Beth Dwoskin is a retired librarian with expertise in Yiddish literature and Jewish folk music.
