The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem, by Sarit Yishai-Levi (2013; English Version 2016)
The Beauty Queen of Jerusalem follows several generations of
the women in the Ermosa family from the beginning of the 1900s, through the
birth of the State of Israel, to the 1970s.
The Ermosas were Sephardic Jews who had lived in Jerusalem since they
were expelled from Spain during the Inquisition. The novel is sprinkled with Ladino words and
phrases.
Gabriela is the some-times narrator of the novel as she
comes of age and tries to understand her very dysfunctional family. Her grandmother Rosa tells her that the
Ermosa women are cursed to be married to men who don’t love them. Rosa had been an orphan when she suddenly
finds herself married to well-to-do Gabriel.
For a brief moment, she believes her life has changed, but then finds
herself in a loveless marriage, arranged by her mother-in-law to keep her son
from his true love.
Gabriela’s mother, Luna, was the eldest daughter of Gabriel
and Rosa. Luna, deemed the most
beautiful woman in Jerusalem, is a spoiled, self-centered woman. Family life circles around Luna’s moods. Luna married David, who had a secret
past. She thought he was her knight in
shining armor, only be faced with the daily grind of married life. When her daughter, Gabriela, is born, she
feels no bond with her child. Gabriela
bonds with her loving father, aunts and grandmother, but feels no special love
for her mother.
The family dramas are played out against the drama of the
events leading up to the creation of the State of Israel, including the
tensions between the Sephardim and Ashkenazim.
We learn much about the stories and lives of Rosa and Luna. The novel seems to take an abrupt turn,
however, when the focus is on the adult Gabriela, and her story is told quickly
on only a few pages.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will look for others by
this Israeli author.
5 Stars
Read: February 7, 2018
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