Books Set in Europe; Italy and England

Mapping the Edge, by Sarah Dunant (1999)

This was a very strange novel.  It follows Anna Franklin, a single mother, who left her 6-year-old daughter, Lily in the care of her housekeeper to take a brief trip to Italy.  Anna was writing an article about dating through the want ads.  (Remember, this book was written over 20 years ago.)  When Anna failed to return home, her two closest friends gather ponder what could have detained Anna.

The novel alternates between two different scenarios.  Was Anna kidnapped by a man who wants her to be his dead wife, or has she found a companion who fulfills her sexual fantasies?

Sarah Dunant has also written several historical fiction novels, including The Birth of Venus.  I liked those novels much better.

Read:  August 25, 2020

3 Stars

Books Set in North America: United States: Maine

The Guest Book, by Sarah Blake (2019)

The Miltons were an old WASP family to whom the word “summer” was a verb.  One summer afternoon in 1936, while sailing in Penobscot Bay, Ogden Milton and his wife Kitty decided on a whim to buy Crockett’s Island.  This Island became the family’s rock and anchor for the next several decades.  The novel follows three generations of Ogden women, and the story goes back and forth between Kitty the matriarch, her daughter Joan, and granddaughter Evie.

A year earlier, the Milton’s had lost their 5-year old son when he fell from a window.  Thus, when Elsa, a German Jew who was an acquaintance of Ogden’s, asked Kitty if she would take care of her young son to protect him from the War, Kitty declined.

The Milton’s were known for hosting elaborate parties on their summer island, but the guest were all old money.  The next generation began mixing with people who were NOKD (not our kind, dear).

Ogden was head of a family investment firm and all his employees were of moneyed families.  When he hired Len Levy, a Jew, everyone was wary of him and the stereotypes of Jews and money was not far from their minds.  Len was assigned a somewhat menial task of reviewing documents.  In the process, he uncovered the firm’s investment with Nazis.

The surviving Milton son, Moss, was expected to join the firm and take over from his father.  Moss, however, was artistic and wasn’t interested in his family’s firm.  He befriended Reg Pauling, an African-American writer.  On a whim, he off-handedly invited both Reg and Len to his family’s island.  When they decided to take him up on the offer, the Milton’s were caught off guard.

Kitty spent the rest of her life trying to atone for the decisions she made in her life.

I felt this book tried to take on too much by mixing race and religious stereotypes into this novel.

It was a fast read.

Read:  August 7, 2020

3 Stars

Books Sent in Asia: Middle East: Israel and Lebanon

Pumpkinflowers: A Soldier’s Story of a Forgotten War, by Matti Friedman (2016)

In the Israeli military language, casualties in war are called flowers, and deaths are known as oleanders.  These euphemisms are deemed to take away some of the ugliness of war.

Pumpkinflowers describes the author’s involvement in Israel’s military presence in southern Lebanon during the late 1990s.  Pumpkin was the name of the Israeli outpost in the Lebanon Security Zone.  During the period that Israel maintained these outposts to protect the communities in northern Israel from Hezbollah’s growing presence in the area.

In the late 1990s, the author was drafted into the Israeli army and sent to Outpost Pumpkin (it was never referred to as The Pumpkin).  Shortly before the author was sent to Pumpkin, two Israel helicopters, filled with young soldiers, collided on their way to Pumpkin.  There were 73 oleanders.  Israel’s support for continuing these outpost began to wane after this event.  It was about this time that Friedman arrived at Pumpkin.  Brief skirmishes continued unto 2000, when Israel withdrew from the security zone.

The soldiers could look down on the Lebanese village of Nabatieh.  In particular, they observed a small restaurant.  They would joke about how they would like to have a meal at the restaurant someday.

The First section of the book focuses on a young soldier, Avi, who was a bit of a rebel.  He was also a talented writer, who served at Pumpkin before the author’s arrival.  The Second section describes Friedman’s days at Pumpkin.

The final sections of the book describe life after Pumpkin.  Years later, Friedman traveled to Lebanon as a tourist.  After traveling throughout the country, he hired a cab to take him to the southern part of the country.  He stopped at the restaurant he had observed as a young soldier from the Pumpkin and enjoyed a meal.  He convinced his driver to take him up the hill where the outpost had been, ostensibly to take photos, but to feel the place again where he has spent 3 years in a forgotten military command.

Read:  August 6, 2020

4 Stars

Books Set in North America, United States, Philadelphia and New York City

Oreo, by Fran Ross (1974)

 

What’s not to love about a novel that, within its first few pages contains the following: 

 

There is no weather per se in this book.  …  Assume whatever season you like throughout.  Summer makes the most sense …  That way pages do not have to be used up describing people taking off and putting on overcoats.

 

This novel is a very funny novel about relations between African-Americans and Jews.  Fran Ross (1935 ~ 1985) was the daughter of a Jewish father and an African-American mother.  She had also been a comedy writer for Richard Pryor, hence, her humor in this book.

 

The heroine of the novel is also the daughter of a Jewish father and Black mother.  Although her given name was Christine Clark, she was known by family and friends as Oreo.  Ostensibly, it was because her grandmother called her Oriole after the bird.  But, of course, this is a nod to the fact that the name is also a racial slur.

 

Her parent’s marriage causes concern on both sides of the family.  Oreo is raised by her maternal grandmother after her father deserts the family, but not before he leaves his legacy of Yiddish words and phrases, and her mother travels with a theater troupe.

 

When she reaches of age, Oreo sets off for New York City to find her father and his new family.  This book is hard to describe, as it is written in such a humorous manner, complete with graphs, tables and mathematical equations.  It addresses heavy issues on race relations and is quite relevant in todays atmosphere.

 

Read:  August 3, 2020

 

5 Stars

Books Set in Europe: The Netherlands, Amsterdam

House on Endless Waters, by Emuna Elon (2016)

The novel begins when the well-known Israeli author, Yoel Blum, is boarding an airplane.  Right from the beginning, we realize that his is not really a likable character.  He is a bit of a snob, and he has trouble interacting well with people.  At some point in the novel, he acknowledges that he is not sure that he married for love, rather than convenience.

Regardless, his latest book is being published in the Netherlands and he is traveling to Amsterdam to promote his book.  He has mixed feelings about this trip because his mother had always told him he should never, ever go to Amsterdam.  Although he was born in Amsterdam during World War II, he and his family never returned.  His mother is now deceased, but he wants to keep his promise to her not to go.

While in Amsterdam, he goes to one of the Jewish museums and observes a movie clip that shows his mother holding a baby, along with his father (who perished in the War) and his older sister, Nettie.  Upon his return to Israel, he discussed what he had seen with his sister.  He tells her that he recognized his family, but the baby doesn’t look like him.  Soon after, he feels compelled to return to Amsterdam to search out his background.

The novel mixes the past and present as Yoel seeks out information of his family.  He decides to use his search for his identity as the basis for his next novel.  At times the past and present blur.  He seeks out the building where his family once had a small apartment.  The building is now a rather seedy hotel, but Yoel decides to rent a room.  He decides to use his search for identity as his next 

Yoel visits the local synagogue and eventually meets a man about his age who confides that he was a child of Jewish parents who were hidden by a Christian family during the War.  This man has only recently confronted his past with the life he lived for most of his life.

As Blum takes notes for his next novel, he imagines his family life in the building of a wealthy Jewish banker, and the banker’s daughter and her family.  All are in denial of what is happening during the War until it is nearly too late.

This novel also reads like a travel map of Amsterdam.  Streets and buildings are vividly described.

The reader can easily guess early on the punchline of the novel, but the payoff comes too late.  SPOILER ALERT:  Yoel is not the biological child of his mother.  Their neighbors switched their son with Yoel’s mother on the pretext that they would soon be following them to Palestine.  Still, it was a fast read, and not many Holocaust novels address the non-Jewish Dutch families who were willing to hide and safe Jewish children.

Read: August 3, 2020

3 Stars