Roommates

From Max Apple, the witty and acclaimed writer of The Oranging of America and Free Agents, comes a true story unlike any you've ever read before. At its center is a young boy who grows into a man and his grandfather - irascible, scrappy Herman "Rocky" Goodstein - who takes over a troubled family at the age of 103 and shows them all how to survive, how to heal, and how to love.
Rocky seems to have been looking out for his grandson Max all his life. A Jewish immigrant from Lithuania, the five-feet-tall, 110 pound Rocky ends up as a baker in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has already been forced into semiretirement by the time Max is born. He is, however, no gentle old man. He argues with the men in the synagogue, screams daily at his fellow workers in the bakery, and explodes in anger in his sleep, calling down curses in Yiddish on his enemies - everyone from the Bolsheviks to Richard Nixon.
Grandpa Rocky and Max share a house, a heritage, an extended family and eventually a special bond as the fiery old man shapes and guides a little boy's growth into manhood. But neither quite expects to end up together as roommates during the turbulent 1960s when Max goes to the University of Michigan and Rocky is a hale and hearty 93. And neither could foresee how their lives would continue to be intertwined in years to come.
In these times of radical change, it is old-fashioned love that causes the most trouble. Debby, a feisty and bright young woman, immediately steals Max's heart and arouses Rocky's instant dislike, winning him over only after becoming Max's wife and the mother of his two children.
Then tragedy strikes; Max helplessly watches his world fall apart; and a very old man whose own thoughts are finally turning toward death discovers he has a new job. Grandpa Rocky, 103, takes over running a family with all the strength of character and wisdom about the sorrows and joys of living that more than a century has taught him. And in doing so, he touches and inspires us all, no matter what our age, in this tough-and-tender true story of an American family.

Max Apple is a Professor of English at Rice University.