Month: October 2013

The Why of Things

Posted on by Seniye Groff

 

Elizabeth Hartley Winthrop’s book The Why of Things will take you by surprise. Winthrop is a masterful storyteller with writing skills, attention to detail, and an intriguing storyline.

Joan and Anders Jacobs arrive with their two daughters at their Massachusetts summer home to find a truck in their quarry. The driver, James Favazza, has apparently committed suicide. This event opens the family’s raw wounds from their own, Sophie, the 17 year old daughter’s suicide just a year earlier. Evie, the 15 year old daughter investigates the crash site and collects “evidence” convinced that foul play has happened. Joan stalks the funeral and the home of Favazza’s mother. Anders cannot stop thinking about his dead daughter and Eloise, the youngest daughter, keeps bringing dead animals home to bury.

“It was many years ago, but the question I still struggle with is the “why”.  For the living, for those left behind, there is no answer that is good enough.”

Winthrop discloses the past details of Sophie’s suicide molasses-slow so that I was trying to piece together how the current tragedy for the Jacobs family connected to the painful death of their daughter. Winthrop was so skillful in how she weaved the two stories together. In the end, each family member has figured out how they need to heal and readers will imagine that if faced with similar events, this story offers insight, entertainment and a satisfying end.

The Aftermath

Posted on by Seniye Groff

“In austere times, self–pity was a heavily rationed commodity, a thing no one should be caught indulging in public.”

Rhidian Brook indulges the reader in “The Aftermath” to details of 1946 Hamburg during the rebuilding and denazification of Germany.  Colonel Lewis Morgan, a British officer, makes the unorthodox decision to live with the German family owning the house he has been stationed in, during his work in Hamburg.  Soon after Lewis moves in, his wife Rachel and son Edmund join him in the very grand home.   Herr Lubert and his daughter Freda, must move to the top floor servant quarters.

Lubert is still reeling from his wife’s death two years earlier.  Freda is combative and divisive with secrets of her own.   At the same time, Rachel is still distraught over her older son, Michael’s, death.  Rachel is lonely and lost in her foreign surroundings.    Rachel is very aware of what the other military families think about her living with a German family.  She is intent on keeping her distance from the household  “enemy”.

As Rachel slowly removes the imaginary wall, and gets to know Lubert, she discovers herself again.  When Lewis must leave to take another assignment, Rachel decides to secretly travel.  As she is fearful, but also free, she must share a secret that will change the path she has chosen.

Brook is a master with mixing the mundane details with characters’ trials and tribulations.  His specifics are engrossing and the way he leads the reader down the path to be immersed is masterful.  In the end, this story of passion, betrayal and ultimate truth and forgiveness will have you hooked.

 

Margot by Jillian Cantor

Posted on by Seniye Groff

Yes, I read a lot of books!  Due to being a book reviewer, as well as, an avid book lover on the side, I read lots.  TONS!  I have managed to find several books this year that have been stunning.  And now I have found a book that is also transformative.  The dictionary tells me that is not a word, so be it.  “Margot” by Jillian Cantor is absolutely that–transformative.

Cantor has skillfully taken “The Diary of Anne Frank” and introduced the reader to Anne’s sister, Margot Frank.  Margot escapes to Philadelphia and becomes Margie Franklin (even though history tells us she died in Bergen-Belsen).  Peter,the boy she loved at seventeen and who lived in the annex with her,  decided that when WWII was over, they would move to Philadelphia and lose “their Jewishness”.    Margie believes Peter is dead but has a faint glimmer of hope that maybe he survived, also.

Margie works as a secretary in a Jewish law firm.  She does everything to hide her Jewishness including wearing a sweater no matter how hot the temperatures reach, in order to hide her numbered tattoo that she received in the Nazi camp.  She practices her religion (or ritual of religion) on Friday nights and rests on the Sabbath.  Margie is constantly “tested” as she works for a Jewish lawyer, Joshua.  Joshua asks her for help during a case dealing with the unfair treatment of Jews.  Joshua becomes a representation of Peter in many ways.

Margie “needs to be whole again” and faces many crossroads as she remembers the past, sees her sister’s story on the big screen and dreams of the future.  Pick up this book.  Read it!  You will never be the same again.