The Prohibited

A family, their liquor store, and the clash of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Amendments in 1920s St. Paul

The Kaner brothers were getting by well enough running Kaner’s Fine Wine and Spirits in St. Paul, Minnesota, until Prohibition took effect in January 1920. With their liquor store shuttered, Red, Isaac, and Lewis are left to forge new livelihoods, their paths taking turns distinct as their personalities. All of the Kaners have secrets—from a clandestine lover to a joyless marriage to an entanglement with the mob—but when it comes down to it, the family will do just about anything for each other, and they’re going to have to prove it.

The Prohibited follows the Kaner family in the wake of the Eighteenth Amendment. Isaac finds unlikely means to stay close to the family trade, becoming a rabbi (or someone the Feds believe is a rabbi) to exploit a loophole that allows men of the cloth to sell sacramental wine. Lewis takes the opportunity to pursue his dream of being a playwright, managing to secure the funds to produce a staged reading of his new play, albeit from an unlikely source. And Red is happy to work in a haberdashery, though he resents his wife’s suffragist allegiance and resulting support of Prohibition. Meanwhile, Red’s children bring challenges of their own: tough, quick-thinking Rose is working odd jobs to send herself to medical school and trying to fix her brother’s mess with the mob, something carefree Willie can’t seem to grasp is deadly serious. Tangled up in the Kaners’ story is Pearl Holgersen. After a tragic event up north, she has finally found community in the Rondo neighborhood in St. Paul, but she has a score to settle with Red’s son, Willie, who was recently murdered. Or was he?

Based loosely on Matt Goldman’s family history, The Prohibited brings to life 1920s St. Paul, a haven for bootleggers, gangsters, and bank robbers, but also home to many ordinary folks navigating a remarkable new social order. With his signature wry wit, Goldman presents an engrossing character study of a family testing their bonds—and irrevocably changing their lives.