Growing Up at Grossinger's

By Tania Grossinger

Book Overview

"To be devoured in one non-stop gulp...fascinating reading."--The New York Post From 1919 to 1986, Grossinger's Catskill Resort Hotel provided a summer retreat from the city heat for New York's Jews, and entertained the great, the near-great, and the not so great, Jews and Gentiles alike. A melting pot of the Borscht Belt, sports, and show-biz worlds, loyal visitors included Red Buttons, Rocky Marciano, Eddie Fisher, and Jackie Robinson. Tania Grossinger grew up there. In her fascinating insider's account of life in the hospitality industry, she sheds light on how hotel children keep up with the frenetic pace of life, and how they come to grips with the outside world (which intrudes now and again), sex (happening in every room), and, occasionally, their intellectual interests. Growing Up at Grossinger's is both a wonderful coming-of-age story and a sentimental reading of a chapter of the Jewish experience in America that has now closed. 25 b/w photographs.

Skyhorse Publishing, along with our Arcade, Good Books, Sports Publishing, and Yucca imprints, is proud to publish a broad range of biographies, autobiographies, and memoirs. Our list includes biographies on well-known historical figures like Benjamin Franklin, Nelson Mandela, and Alexander Graham Bell, as well as villains from history, such as Heinrich Himmler, John Wayne Gacy, and O. J. Simpson. We have also published survivor stories of World War II, memoirs about overcoming adversity, first-hand tales of adventure, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1602392056
• ISBN13: 9781602392052
• Release Date: June 2008
• Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.90 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.6" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Tania Rules! A Terrific, Terrific Book!

From her smart rhetoric to her personal story, Tania Grossinger is clearly a force to be reckoned with -- and she proves it chapter after chapter in this quick-read of an autobiography. The book also serves as a nostalgic memory peg for anyone who spent their summers vacationing at the Catskills' most celebrated resort during the 1950s & '60s, and a fun history lesson (packed with insider celebrity scuttlebutt) for anyone who didn't. Kudos to Ms. Grossinger for her candor and skill. I loved it and have been talking it up to everyone I know!

Everyone has a story, but not everyone can turn it into art

I have been a high school English teacher for thirty years, and am always interested and arguing with students about books they like and why. We have often talked about a good story, and the "art" of telling it well. Tania's book reveals to us that she has both. Not only has she delivered an authentic,witty, touching, coming-of-age memoir, but she has crafted it with the gift of a writer with a capital W. Everyone does indeed have a story, but unfortunately, many have the mistaken idea that anyone can put words onto a page and be an author. I beg to differ; it is clear to me that not everyone can tell their tale in a reader-friendly, carefully articulated and intelligent way that keeps the reader unwilling to put it down. Tania has done just that. I spent every summer of my childhood in Grossingers and, therefore, wanted to read Tania's book. Through her memoire, she has not only opened the floodgates of a hundred forgotten people and places, she has given herself to the reader as only an artist can.

Fantastic!

I now appreciate why Grossinger's was a place that so many remember as where they had the best times of their lives. But of course it is the experience of Tania living there as a girl that gives it the depth of a memoir by the insider that is still on the outside. This terrific book is one everyone will enjoy.

finished this bookin two hours.

this book was great!!! I did not put this book down for a minute. Tania Grossinger writes like you are in her living room and you are a real part of her family. If you have been a part of " the Catskills" or the " Borscht Belt ", or wish you had been, do not miss reading this book. rose m.

Home Sweet Hotel

As a child, I wanted to live at Grossinger's. Tania Grossinger actually did. It wasn't all jokes and pickled herring. Along with the celebrity anecdotes and childhood pranks, she tells the tale of a Catskills Grande Dame, Jennie Grossinger, whose idea of providing a home for Tania and her aloof widowed mother, the hotel's social director, was to cram them into a room that often housed a guest, too. Despite (or because of) these glimpses into the dark side of growing up as a Borscht Belt brat, this sprightly, irreverent, delightful memoir had this effect: I still want to live at Grossinger's! Martha Mendelsohn