I married a communist by Philip Roth
One of the best books by Philip Roth that I have read - far better than “The human stain” and “Exit Ghost”. "His skull looked so fragile and small now. Yet within it were cradled ninety of the past. There was a great deal in there. All the dead were there, for one thing, their deeds and their misdeeds converging with all the unanswerable questions, those things about which you can never be sure ... to produce for him an exacting task: to reckon fairly, to tell his story without too much error." The book is narrated in the first person by the reclusive author Nathan Zuckerman who in turn hears a narration of a story by Murray Ringold his revered high school English teacher. But the central character of the story is Ira Ringold the younger brother of Murray who was to a large extent Nathan's adopted father. Nathan believed he was Ira's protégé but towards the end of the book he realizes it was the converse - it was Ira who was adopted by Nathan. "