An emotionally stirring narrative somewhat blunted by structural problems.
In Raydun’s novel, a Jewish family recounts their tale of emigration from the Soviet Union.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, a young student named Benjamin is in Israel with his great-grandparents, Iliya and Frida Mikhailovich; his grandparents, Raya and Sergey; his mother, Rita; and his Aunt Marianna. Eager for a break from the monotony of the lockdown, Benjamin asks his family about their immigration history for a school paper he’s writing. He learns that when Israel sought the repatriation of Jewish people from the Soviet Union, Iliya, his wife, and their children—seeing this as the family’s way out of Ukraine—lied about having Jewish relatives in Israel to secure their departure. The narrative follows the family, which, after contending with suspicious guards and bag searches, takes multiple trains before reaching Vienna. While there, the family struggles with discrimination and culture shock, most notably in the markets: “Raya hated the supermarkets in Vienna. The audacity of the abundance set her skin on fire.” Later, the family heads to Rome to be closer to the American Embassy, with their sights ultimately set on immigrating to the United States. Rome is where the women of the family (save for Raya, who is tormented by her fears of the outside world and the ills it may bestow upon her children) thrive as Frida opens an unofficial medical clinic and Rita quickly learns the Italian language. Marianna often goes to the beach with Iliya, and it is there she catches the eye of a young Italian boy named Luca. (As her mother notes, “Marianna did inherit every family member’s best features and left the less favorable ones to her sister.”) The men have less luck: Sergey feels intense guilt because his desire for a better life for his children meant abandoning his parents, and Iliya experiences an emotional crisis, thinking, “If this was his life’s dream coming true, then why was he feeling as if he were being buried alive the second he was finally free?” In alternating, present-set chapters, Benjamin peppers his family with questions and has them explain aspects of their story that are foreign to his experience as “the spoiled brat of the family.”
Raydun’s tale bears emotional heft, ironically stemming mainly from the two characters who receive the least amount of focus in the story: Iliya has dementia in the present, but his brief instants of lucidity are moving; equally stirring is Rita’s present-day understanding of herself as an afterthought in the family, essentially left to fend for herself. Unfortunately, more time is given to Marianna’s love life. The story is an important one, rooted in actual immigration history, but the prose could be a bit more elevated. Additionally, while the lockdown chapters are necessary, the switching between past and present is too frequent and interrupts the fluidity of the narrative. Still, this is an engaging tale about a specific wave of immigration about which relatively little has been explored.
An emotionally stirring narrative somewhat blunted by structural problems.Pub Date: Oct. 14, 2025
ISBN: 9798988085911
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: Nov. 3, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.
After being released from prison, a young woman tries to reconnect with her 5-year-old daughter despite having killed the girl’s father.
Kenna didn’t even know she was pregnant until after she was sent to prison for murdering her boyfriend, Scotty. When her baby girl, Diem, was born, she was forced to give custody to Scotty’s parents. Now that she’s been released, Kenna is intent on getting to know her daughter, but Scotty’s parents won’t give her a chance to tell them what really happened the night their son died. Instead, they file a restraining order preventing Kenna from so much as introducing herself to Diem. Handsome, self-assured Ledger, who was Scotty’s best friend, is another key adult in Diem’s life. He’s helping her grandparents raise her, and he too blames Kenna for Scotty’s death. Even so, there’s something about her that haunts him. Kenna feels the pull, too, and seems to be seeking Ledger out despite his judgmental behavior. As Ledger gets to know Kenna and acknowledges his attraction to her, he begins to wonder if maybe he and Scotty’s parents have judged her unfairly. Even so, Ledger is afraid that if he surrenders to his feelings, Scotty’s parents will kick him out of Diem’s life. As Kenna and Ledger continue to mourn for Scotty, they also grieve the future they cannot have with each other. Told alternatively from Kenna’s and Ledger’s perspectives, the story explores the myriad ways in which snap judgments based on partial information can derail people’s lives. Built on a foundation of death and grief, this story has an undercurrent of sadness. As usual, however, the author has created compelling characters who are magnetic and sympathetic enough to pull readers in. In addition to grief, the novel also deftly explores complex issues such as guilt, self-doubt, redemption, and forgiveness.
With captivating dialogue, angst-y characters, and a couple of steamy sex scenes, Hoover has done it again.Pub Date: Jan. 18, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5420-2560-7
Page Count: 335
Publisher: Montlake Romance
Review Posted Online: Oct. 12, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2021
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A heartbreaking, laugh-provoking, and absolutely Ephron-esque look at the beauty and fragility of everyday life.
A woman faces a health crisis and obsesses over a local accident in this wonderful follow-up to Sandwich (2024).
Newman begins her latest with a quote from Nora Ephron: “Death is a sniper. It strikes people you love, people you like, people you know—it’s everywhere. You could be next. But then you turn out not to be. But then again, you could be.” It sets an appropriate tone for a story that is just as full of death and dread as it is laughter. Two years after the events of Sandwich, Rocky is back home in Western Massachusetts and happily surrounded by family—her daughter, Willa, lives with her and her husband, Nick, while applying to Ph.D. programs; her widowed father, Mort, has moved into the in-law apartment behind their house. When a young man who graduated from high school with Rocky’s son, Jamie, is hit by a train, Rocky finds herself spiraling as she thinks about how close the tragedy came to her own family. She’s also freaking out about a mysterious rash her dermatologist can’t explain. Both instances are tailor-made for internet research and stalking. As Rocky obsessively googles her symptoms and finds only bad news (“Here’s what’s true about the Internet: very infrequently do people log on with their good news. Gosh, they don’t write, I had this weird rash on my forearm? And it turned out to be completely nothing!”), she also compulsively checks the Facebook page of the accident victim’s mother. Newman excels at showing how sorrow and joy coexist in everyday life. She masterfully balances a modern exploration of grief with truly laugh-out-loud lines (one passage about the absurdity of collecting a stool sample and delivering it to the doctor stands out). As Rocky deals with the byzantine frustrations of the medical system, she also has to learn, once more, how to see her children, husband, father, and herself as fully flawed and lovable humans.
A heartbreaking, laugh-provoking, and absolutely Ephron-esque look at the beauty and fragility of everyday life.Pub Date: Oct. 28, 2025
ISBN: 9780063453913
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
PERSPECTIVES
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
