A sometimes-engaging polemical story rooted in the realities of authoritarianism and activism.
In Gale’s debut novel, an American-British rabbi works to support refuseniks in the 1980s.
Even in its later decades, the Soviet Union was an extremely oppressive place for Jews to live. They were subjected to constant casual prejudice and systemic discrimination in employment and education and were forbidden to learn Hebrew or engage in any religious practices. Still, many engaged in those practices clandestinely and requested exit visas so they could immigrate to Israel or the West. Some families were permitted to leave, but most were refused. These refuseniks, as they came to be known, were not only denied the freedom to leave the country, but were often fired from their jobs, violently harassed, and even imprisoned. As Jewish communities in North America and Western Europe became conscious of the plight of their coreligionists, they began organizing to support them. Gale’s novel is essentially a vehicle to relate this specific history. In the early 1980s, Gale’s protagonist, Rabbi Levin—like Gale, an American-born Reform rabbi—is the leader of a congregation in the East End of London. Many members of the synagogue and broader community are active in working to support the refuseniks. Strategies range from “twinning” British Hebrew School students with Soviet peers so that the latter could be bar- or bat mitzvahed in absentia to writing letters to actually visiting the USSR to show support and deliver Jewish texts and ritual objects. Despite his hesitations, Levin feels called to join a mission to the Soviet Union—an experience which brings him and his congregants closer to their Soviet counterparts. The parts of the book about Levin’s own life are monotonous; readers do not need to know so much about the logistics of the character’s High Holiday services, for example. There is also little distinction between Levin’s personal dialogue and his sermons. On the other hand, the sections drawn from the real-life experiences of the refuseniks are nuanced, historically accurate, and often fascinating. Through Levin’s observations, readers will gain insight into the realities of religious persecution and the complexities of providing aid.
A sometimes-engaging polemical story rooted in the realities of authoritarianism and activism.Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-68213-143-5
Page Count: 262
Publisher: Page Publishing
Review Posted Online: Jan. 31, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.
Four men who meet as college roommates move to New York and spend the next three decades gaining renown in their professions—as an architect, painter, actor and lawyer—and struggling with demons in their intertwined personal lives.
Yanagihara (The People in the Trees, 2013) takes the still-bold leap of writing about characters who don’t share her background; in addition to being male, JB is African-American, Malcolm has a black father and white mother, Willem is white, and “Jude’s race was undetermined”—deserted at birth, he was raised in a monastery and had an unspeakably traumatic childhood that’s revealed slowly over the course of the book. Two of them are gay, one straight and one bisexual. There isn’t a single significant female character, and for a long novel, there isn’t much plot. There aren’t even many markers of what’s happening in the outside world; Jude moves to a loft in SoHo as a young man, but we don’t see the neighborhood change from gritty artists’ enclave to glitzy tourist destination. What we get instead is an intensely interior look at the friends’ psyches and relationships, and it’s utterly enthralling. The four men think about work and creativity and success and failure; they cook for each other, compete with each other and jostle for each other’s affection. JB bases his entire artistic career on painting portraits of his friends, while Malcolm takes care of them by designing their apartments and houses. When Jude, as an adult, is adopted by his favorite Harvard law professor, his friends join him for Thanksgiving in Cambridge every year. And when Willem becomes a movie star, they all bask in his glow. Eventually, the tone darkens and the story narrows to focus on Jude as the pain of his past cuts deep into his carefully constructed life.
The phrase “tour de force” could have been invented for this audacious novel.Pub Date: March 10, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-385-53925-8
Page Count: 720
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Dec. 21, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
PROFILES
PERSPECTIVES
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.
Life lessons.
Angie Malone, the youngest of a big, warm Italian-American family, returns to her Pacific Northwest hometown to wrestle with various midlife disappointments: her divorce, Papa’s death, a downturn in business at the family restaurant, and, above all, her childlessness. After several miscarriages, she, a successful ad exec, and husband Conlan, a reporter, befriended a pregnant young girl and planned to adopt her baby—and then the birth mother changed her mind. Angie and Conlan drifted apart and soon found they just didn’t love each other anymore. Metaphorically speaking, “her need for a child had been a high tide, an overwhelming force that drowned them. A year ago, she could have kicked to the surface but not now.” Sadder but wiser, Angie goes to work in the struggling family restaurant, bickering with Mama over updating the menu and replacing the ancient waitress. Soon, Angie befriends another young girl, Lauren Ribido, who’s eager to learn and desperately needs a job. Lauren’s family lives on the wrong side of the tracks, and her mother is a promiscuous alcoholic, but Angie knows nothing of this sad story and welcomes Lauren into the DeSaria family circle. The girl listens in, wide-eyed, as the sisters argue and make wisecracks and—gee-whiz—are actually nice to each other. Nothing at all like her relationship with her sluttish mother, who throws Lauren out when boyfriend David, en route to Stanford, gets her pregnant. Will Lauren, who’s just been accepted to USC, let Angie adopt her baby? Well, a bit of a twist at the end keeps things from becoming too predictable.
Heartfelt, yes, but pretty routine.Pub Date: July 1, 2004
ISBN: 0-345-46750-7
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2004
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