Morningside Heights is tender, sad and somehow hopeful. The story follows the two main characters, Pru and Spence, through a courtship, marriage, and Spence’s eventual complete dependence on Pru as his Alzheimer’s disease worsens.
The two meet when Pru is a student in Spence’s Shakespeare seminar. Although Spence is just six years older, Pru is attracted to the dynamic lecturer and a whirlwind courtship ensues. Pru is from an observant Jewish home, and is trying to maintain her Jewish connections.
“On Saturday mornings, they would climb the hill to campus, Spence off to the library, Pru headed to shul. She would return from Kiddush with a piece of kichel, the driest, most tasteless biscuit in the world, but Spence liked kichel. She would hand him the kichel, swaddled in a napkin, and they would spend the next hour wandering around campus until it was time for him to return to the library.”