Broken Fortune explores the unraveling of a wealthy, blended family forced to reconsider their future together as their world falls apart around them.
Elizabeth Sunderland—a forty-three-year-old wife and mother of two teenagers—is the oldest of five children in a blended family that never quite blended. The only thing that has held them together is the iron will of their wealthy parents: Benjamin Sunderland, a venture capitalist, and Kate Bernard, a partner of a hedge fund. Together, Benjamin and Kate create and rule over a Manhattan dynasty of which their children each bear their own unique scars.
Elizabeth has been trying to keep the family together since she was ten years old, hoping to convince everyone they have more in common than just their fortune. This stance will be put to the ultimate test when Kate dies with one final request: that the family travel together to the island of St. John and spread her ashes in the ocean. However, Kate’s plan to fix the family will involve more than just a family trip to the sea.
As the hidden secrets and quiet betrayals built up over thirty years begin to ripple and crash like the ocean surrounding the sinking family, Elizabeth not only faces each of her sibling’s personal inflection points—moments that could lead to reconciliation or ruin—but she has to face her own demons that have laid dormant. What happens next will shock Elizabeth into recognizing a reality she had no idea existed.
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“How much money did you get?” Paul drops in, trying not to seem as outright aggressive as my other siblings but still trying to ferret out the information.
“It was nothing,” I say, trying to shut this conversation down.
“Oh, it wasn’t nothing,” Benjamin says. “It was over five million dollars.”
Everyone at the table looks ready to either spill their drink, fall off their chair, or turn me upside down to try and shake the five million out of my pockets.
“Can I have some?” Winnie says, shifting her attention for the first time this evening from my father to me.
“No,” Benjamin says sternly to Winnie. “Your mother is giving that back.”
“What about,” Paul says, daring to get between Benjamin and his money, “if you give us all five million dollars, so Lizzie doesn’t feel so alone. I mean…I’m sure my mother left something for all of us and Lizzie’s just came through first.”
“No,” Benjamin says. “Lizzie won’t feel alone when I have it back. Because none of you are getting any extra money. Everything that was Kate’s is now mine. That’s what we decided. And upon my death—which should be noted, won’t be happening anytime soon—you will all receive the entire inheritance split into five.”
“Wait,” Paul says, clearly upset. “Wait. She’s our mother. Mine. I’m her son. I mean, no offense to your kids Benjamin, but me…and Julian, we should get something now. Not have to wait until you die. You’re not my father.”
Paul’s words visibly cut through Benjamin, like an unexpected knife in the back. Even I can’t help but wince on his behalf—considering he’s spent the last thirty-three years trying to convince Paul he’s a reasonable, viable father. Meanwhile, he’s made not one corresponding overture in my direction, relegating me to the status of just an afterthought that will always linger…
Aly Mennuti has always had two passions: philanthropy and literature. She satisfies one of those by being an executive at an international nonprofit consulting firm and has helped a diverse range of high-profile clients reach their philanthropic goals. However, she’s always had a desire to express herself creatively and carve out her own role as a writer in a writing family. Finally, in her forties (and with two children hitting their teens and deciding Mom is really uncool and not needed to hang out with anymore) she has the time and headspace to tell her own stories. She lives in Washington, DC, with her husband, Nicholas Mennuti, a novelist and screenwriter, their two children, Charlie and Lilly, and their eccentric Goldendoodle, Barry.
