The thing I love about the bookgroup I belong to is that we have our best discussions about books we didn’t like.  We had a great discussion last night!

Away is a story about a Russian Jew, Lillian, that immigrates to the US after her family is murdered, She gets settled in New York, but then makes ongoing choices to give up comfort and friends for love and independence.   She rarely does the “smart” thing.


<< spoiler alert>>


But it has a “happily ever after” ending.

One of the things that we are trying to do this year is come up with a take away from the book and discussion. Here is mine:  Every so often you meet someone who immigrated to the US some time ago (at work, in a class, someone’s parents) that seems to have a normal, typical middle class life.  But you get to talking, and find out little bits of their younger life:  stories of war, poverty, or other unimaginable hardships and wonder how they did it.  This is one of their stories. Too bad the story telling didn’t live up to the story.