I loved this book! I have read many of Schine's other books, most recently the Grammarians and this new one did not disappoint!
Here is what the New Yorker says,
Julian, a directionless young New Yorker, ventures west, to Venice Beach, to help care for his zesty ninety-three-year-old grandmother. When the pandemic descends, he finds himself sequestered indefinitely with her, as she recounts memories of her Anschluss-ruptured Vienna childhood and her family’s subsequent immigration to Hollywood, where she came to know legends including Arthur Schoenberg and Greta Garbo. The novel emphasizes echoes across history but explores intergenerational gaps, too, and—despite handling such weighty subject matter as survivor’s guilt, sexual repression, and the ongoing traumas of racial and religious persecution—maintains a remarkable lightness of tone and of characterization.
I was so pleased that I was reading this on my iPad because I was constantly looking things up and I learned so much about German intellectuals living in LA in that time period. I was not aware that so many moved there to escape Nazism in Vienna (and other locales.) This was particularly relevant for me, having just seen the play, Leopoldstadt on Broadway.
This book was a much more delightful way to acknowledge that time period.
Highly recommend. Loved the poignant ending, too.
No comments:
Post a Comment