Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism and has served as a CBS-affiliate news producer, public television producer, and creative director at production agencies within the Twin Cities. He and his wife live in Minneapolis and are the parents of two grown sons.
Miller's new novel is Doorman Wanted.
At Lit Hub he tagged five old and new titles which thoughtfully explore generational wealth and income inequality, including:
Kevin Kwan, Crazy Rich AsiansRead about the other entries on the list.
In Kevin Kwan’s Crazy Rich Asians, the matter of hiding one’s inheritance and family stature takes center stage. Kwan’s main character, Nick, hides from his family’s outrageous wealth by coming to America and joining the world of academia. It would be hard to imagine a more effective hiding place. So effective, in fact,that his professor girlfriend, Rachel, has no idea of his background or familial circumstances. This allows him to develop an authentic relationship with her based on love, not pocketbook.
But as the reader soon realizes, downplaying one’s financial standing does not necessarily mean that one is not obsessed by wealth and status. This fixation on social status is most effectively demonstrated through the character of Nick’s mother, Eleanor. Throughout the novel, Kwan explores various strata of social hierarchies, almost all based on variations of wealth and income, and, arguably, superficial.
Like [Buddenbrooks author Thomas] Mann’s writing of the previous century, Kwan effectively explores themes of conflict between commerce and intellectual or artistic pursuits.
Crazy Rich Asians is among Julia Fine's eight titles about friendships with wealth disparities and Joseph Finder's seven best books about dysfunctional rich families.
--Marshal Zeringue
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