Svetlana's Reads and Views

 Title of the book: Irmas passport: one woman, two world wars, and a legacy of courage   Author: Catherine Ehrlich  Publisher: She Writes Press (SWP) Publishing Date: 2021 ISBN: 978-1-64742-305-6 Summary: Inspired to learn languages by her multi-lingual Austrian grandmother, Irma, the author seeks the wellsprings of Irma’s indomitable spirit. By delving into the late Irma’s extraordinary memoirs, shared in this book, she explores her outspoken grandparents’ influential lives at the crossroads of German and Jewish national movements. Along the way, she uncovers a deep heritage of empowered women. Golden-haired Irma grew up in Imperial Austria believing that wars and prejudice were fading. Her journey from Bohemian country girl to grande dame in New York would traverse a fascinating landscape of renowned people at pivotal moments in history, captured in her memoirs. Irma studied languages as one of the first female university students in Prague while her cousin, F...

  Name of Book: Jane Austen and Shelley in the Garden Author: Janet Todd ISBN: 978-1909572270 Publisher: Fentum  Type of book: Aging, contemporary times, history, Jane Austen, England, Wales, Italy, Venice, travel, friendship, ideals, Percy Bysse Shelley, desires, meditations, life, death, living, teaching, poetry, breaking, liberalism, conservatism, engineering  Year it was published: 2021 Summary: Eccentric Fran wants a second chance. Thanks to her intimacy with Jane Austen, and the poet Shelley, she finds one. Jane Austen is such a presence in Fran's life that she seems to share her cottage and garden, becoming an imaginary friend. Fran's conversations with Jane Austen guide and chide her - but Fran is ready for change after years of teaching, reading and gardening. An encounter with a long-standing English friend, and an American writer, leads to new possibilities. Adrift, the three women bond through a love of books and a quest for the idealist poet Shelley at two pi...

  Title of the book: People Love Dead Jews; Reports From A Haunted Present Author: Dara Horn Publisher: Norton Publishing Date: 2021 ISBN: 978-0-393-53156-5 Summary: Renowned and beloved as a prizewinning novelist, Dara Horn has also been publishing penetrating essays since she was a teenager. Often asked by major publications to write on subjects related to Jewish culture—and increasingly in response to a recent wave of deadly antisemitic attacks—Horn was troubled to realize what all of these assignments had in common: she was being asked to write about dead Jews, never about living ones. In these essays, Horn reflects on subjects as far-flung as the international veneration of Anne Frank, the mythology that Jewish family names were changed at Ellis Island, the blockbuster traveling exhibition Auschwitz, the marketing of the Jewish history of Harbin, China, and the little-known life of the "righteous Gentile" Varian Fry. Throughout, she challenges us to confront the reasons ...

  Name of Book: The Measure of Time Author: Gianrico Carofiglio, Howard Curtis  ISBN: 978-1-913394-48-6 Publisher: Bitter Lemon Press  Part of a Series: Guido Guerrero Series  Type of book: Italy, mystery, crime, contemporary times, former lover, lawyer, time, translation, possibly mafia, danger Year it was published: 2021 (2019) Summary: The latest in the Guido Guerrieri series. The setting is Bari in Southern Italy. Against his own instincts, defence attorney Guerrieri takes on an appeal against what looks like an unassailable murder conviction. The alleged perpetrator is the son of a former lover. A taught legal thriller and a meditation about the ravages of time. Characters: Main character is Guido Guerrieri, a sixty plus lawyer who had a lucrative career. He is best described as cultured, even tempered, loves to work out and has very good friends and inspires loyalty in others. There are other characters such as such as his associates and close friends, but they...

  Name of Book: Love and Other Consolation Prizes  Author: Jamie Ford  ISBN: 978-0-8041-7675-0 Publisher: Ballantine Books Type of book: 1902, 1909- 1911, 1962, world fair, friendship, prostitution, secrets, love, America, Washington Seattle, China, family, daughter's, marriage, relationship, exclusion, prejudice, Asian racism, life  Year it was published: 2017 Summary: A powerful novel about an orphan boy who is raffled off at Seattle’s 1909 World Fair, and the friends who teach him what it really means to have a family, from the author of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet. Inspired by a true story, this is the unforgettable story of a young boy named Ernest, set during the 1909 Seattle world’s fair called the Alaska Yukon Pacific Expo. It is a time when the magical wonders of technology on display at the expo future seems limitless. But for Ernest, a half-Chinese orphan who found his way to America through a last desperate act of his beloved mother, every doo...

  Name of Book: Sown in Tears Author: Beverly Magid ISBN: 9781478104575 Publisher: Self published Part of a Series: Where do I go? Is a sequel  Type of book: Russia, 1905 1906, pogrom, survival, lessons, ptsd, revolution, work, Judaism, widowhood, betrayal, murder  Year it was published: 2012 Summary: The novel is set in Russia, 1905. Anti-semitism is virulent and most Jews are confined to live in the Settlement of Pale. After an attack of the village of Koritz, Leah Peretz survives but is left alone to care for her two young children. Her life is complicated by the unexpected attentions of the Russian officer, Captain Vaselik. Can she trust him? Should she allow herself to become involved with the burgeoning underground revolutionalry movement starting up in the country. Leah's journey to self-discovery in a time of chaos and upset is a difficult but rewarding one Characters: Main characters include Leah and Vaselik. Leah is a recent widow who has to care for her two you...

 Name of Book: How to betray your country Author: James Wolff ISBN: 978-1-913394-51-6 Publisher: Bitter Lemon Press Part of a Series: Beside a Syrian Sea prequel Type of book: spying, spies, middle East, operation, Turkey, job, PR, United Kingdom, contemporary times, mystery, thriller, secrets  Year it was published: 2021 Summary: Disgraced British spy August Drummond is on his way to Istanbul when he sees a passenger throw away directions to a cemetery just moments before being arrested. August can’t resist the temptation to go in his place. But when he comes face to face with a terrifying figure from Islamic State, he realizes he’s about to confront the greatest challenge of his career…Things are looking bad for disgraced spy August Drummond. In emotional free fall after the death of his wife, fired for a series of unprecedented security breaches… and now his neighbor on the flight to Istanbul won’t stop talking. The only thing keeping him sane is the hunch that there’s some...

 When it rains it pours, when it doesn't rain, it doesn't pour. Last few weeks I hadn't gotten any books, and I am not sure if and when that will change. So far no new news when it comes to books. I have been working on reviewing, so expect a lot of reviews.  Possible reads:  The conscious parent by Shefaly Tsabary  The lost girls of Paris by Pam Jenoff  Loveyoubye by Rossandra White  Dust off the bones by Paul Howarth  A sword among the ravens by Cynthia Ripley Miller  Come As you are by Jennifer Haupt  Wheel of the fates by J Boyce Gleason The eighth girl by Maxine Mei Fung Chung A thousand steps by T. Jefferson Parker  Honor by Thrity Umrigar  Notes on an execution by Danya Kukafka  Beeline by Ben Rawlence  Vladimir by Julia May Jonas  On a night of a thousand stars by Andrea Yaryura Clark  The Kennedy debutante by Kerri Maher  Shadow child by Rahna  Reiko Rizzuto White fur by Jardine Libaire  L...

 Dust off the bones- Paul Howarth  SR: November 21st 2021 FR The master and the maid - Laura Libricz  SR: October 23rd, 2021  FR: November 21st 2021 The quest for the CROWN of thorns- Cynthia Ripley Miller  SR: October 29th, 2021  FR: November 11th, 2021 A sword among the ravens- Cynthia Ripley Miller  SR: November 11th, 202q FR:  The last rose of Shanghai- Weina Dai Randel SR: October 23rd, 2021 FR:    Nonfiction: A history of the Roman people by Allen M Ward SR: August 1st ,2021 FR: