Snider, Zachary (2011) The formulation of an author's 'other' in late postmodern fiction. Doctoral thesis, London Metropolitan University.
Legal Immigrants is a darkly comedic fiction novel incorporating real-life news stories and historical research about lucrative German organized crime in the United States and abroad. The novel also details the bizarre misadventures that unravel when three motley siblings launch cataclysmic revenge on their significant others, whom they've learned are leading secret naughty lives. Brigitte Schneider, the eldest sibling, is a vigorous lawyer in Boston who just found out her boyfriend of five years has been sleeping with other women. Nikolaus, her middle-born brother, is a celebrity entertainment news producer in Manhattan who supports his manipulative 'actor' boyfriend. Their younger brother, Josef, is a strapping soccer star failing most his college classes in Tampa, whose pregnancy-faking girlfriend has been stealing from him since freshman year. In privileged Dallas society, their father, Xavier, CEO of the Schneider Building Company (a homebuilding and real estate facade for his illegal activity), must decide to whom he will leave the family business, now that he has survived a heart attack. His boisterous but stem Texan wife, Sofia, busies herself by preparing for the upcoming family reunion in Bavaria. Together, the Schneider siblings finally embrace the power and opportunity of their family's organized crime legacy - through suspenseful scheming and jovial, often alcoholic fraternal-sororal bonding. Legal Immigrants fuses together a sardonically dysfunctional family saga spanning over two decades with never-before-published factual organized crime information and an enthralling travel journey throughout South Germany.
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