in sunlight and in shadow by mark helprin

So, one night, rescuing, by pure coincidence, someone who he thinks is just fellow ex-soldier, James Vanderlyn, from the aftermath of a boat accident, he discovers that Vanderlyn is in exactly the right position to help him get rid of his Mafia problem: namely, getting rid of the bad guys giving him trouble, including their leader, a brutal thug named Verderamé. The second is that the Mafia is strong arming Harry - to the point of almost beating him to death and murdering one one of his employees - into paying them so much to leave his business alone, that he’ll go bankrupt within a year, and his father’s business, which he’d promised to carry on, will go under. The first fly in the ointment is that Catherine is already engaged, and when Harry and Catherine’s love breaks up the engagement, her fiancé sets out to ruin Catherine’s career. In it, Helprin ( A Winter’s Tale and A Soldier of the Great War, among others) tells the story of two New Yorkers who fall in love at first sight in 1947, shortly after World War II: Harry Copeland - an ex-soldier, returning to run his deceased father’s leather company, and Catherine Hale - an enormously talented and beautiful Broadway singer, who comes from old money. The same can be said for this novel as a whole. It is a beautiful line, filled with truth. in the end the whole world is nothing more than what you remember and what you love, things fleeting and indefensible, light and beautiful, that were not supposed to last, echoing forever.” Written near the end of In Sunlight and In Shadow, there is one line that resonates as a theme of the novel from start to finish.

In sunlight and in shadow by mark helprin