Panoramic in scope, Away is the epic and intimate story of young Lillian Leyb, a dangerous innocent, an accidental heroine. When her family is destroyed in a Russian pogrom, Lillian comes to America alone, determined to make her way in a new land. When word comes that her daughter, Sophie, might still be alive, Lillian embarks on an odyssey that takes her from the world of the Yiddish theater on New York’s Lower East Side, to Seattle’s Jazz District, and up to Alaska, along the fabled Telegraph Trail toward Siberia. All of the qualities readers love in Amy Bloom’s work – her humor and wit, her elegant and irreverent language, her unflinching understanding of passion and the human heart – come together in the embrace of this brilliant novel, which is at once heartbreaking, romantic, and completely unforgettable.
BOOK REVIEWS
BookBrowse
On a purely formal level, Away is stunning, and succeeds as a gleaming showcase for Amy Bloom's considerable talents. However, what makes Away an up-all-night read is its vitality, the breath that makes it all come alive. It’s a tight story – 235 pages span three years and a cast of characters each worthy of their own novel; but the focus is clear - Bloom’s spotlight pans where it needs to, and then stops on a dime, showing you where to look, deep at the quick of the story, where it pulses with life. (Reviewed by Lucia Silva). Full Review (820 words).
Media Reviews
Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. Bloom has created an extraordinary range of characters, settings and emotions. Absolutely stunning.
USA Today - Jocelyn McClurg
[T]here are some wonderful characters and scenes in Amy Bloom's novel about a young Russian Jewish immigrant trying to make a new life in America after the massacre of her family, but Away never transported me to the transcendent heights this talented writer hopes to achieve.
The Daily News - Jane H Furse
In just 248 pages of astonishing prose, Bloom covers vast emotional (and geographic) terrain, giving a familiar story epic proportions.
The Boston Globe - Elinor Lipman
It's not easy to be lyrical, funny, and brilliant all at once, and Bloom is, with a serious bonus: We don't feel any authorial reach to imbue Away with those attributes. A marvelously sly observer of all things human, she has the confidence to write, "Red McGann smiles. It is not the worst smile she will ever see, but it has the kind of tenderness you find on the faces of boys who love their dogs and kick them." Plain, unostentatious words? They accrue on every page into artful and irresistible fiction.
The Washington Post - Ron Charles
[W]hat begins as a paean to the immigrant spirit in a city of millions is ultimately a gasp of wonder at the persistence of love, even in the remotest spot on earth. Hang on.
The New York Times - Janet Maslin
It is accessible to the point of pure enthrallment without compromising its eloquence or thematic strength. Yet it is also a classic page-turner, one that delivers a relentlessly good read.
The Seattle Times - Richard Wallace
As one of our most accomplished short-story writers, Bloom has demonstrated time and again in her fiction how transformative this multidimensional emotion called love can be, shaping unlikely friendships, challenging whom we think people are. Bloom understands the complexity of human bonding. Her gift — beyond her ability to write interesting, surprising sentences — is to develop situations where people open up, often during moments of loss and tragedy, certainly in rough times, and create solutions to their desires and pain that aren't readily obvious.
The San Francisco Chronicle - Helen McAlpin
Bloom's cryptic title doesn't do her book justice, but there's little else that doesn't work in this exquisitely unsentimental novel about exile, hope and love in its various incarnations - maternal, romantic, sexual, platonic, inconvenient, unruly, unreasonable, abiding.
The Guardian (UK) - Liz Hoggard
[A] page-turner. At only 240 pages, it has the rich texture of an epic, but Bloom doesn't hang about. Like her heroine, Lillian Leyb, she crosses cultures and continents at a breakneck pace, only pausing when Lillian has to barter her skills (or her body) for the next leg of the journey.
Recent Reader Reviews
Rated of 5
by Janet Tarasovic Swept Away Lillian Leyb is a remarkable heroine whose passion, courage, and determination are inspiring. Equally enthralling are the dozen characters whose lives intersect with hers—actors, immigrants, jailbirds, train porters, prostitutes, constables,... Read More
Rated of 5
by J. Arnold Outstanding 2nd Novel! Amy Bloom’s enthralling second novel, Away, evokes Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain. Both books explore the seemingly impossible journeys of two protagonists longing for love, redemption, and identify associated with memories. Arresting characters... Read More
An epic novel and a thrilling literary discovery, The Orphan Master's Son follows a young man's journey through the icy waters, dark tunnels, and eerie spy chambers of the world's most mysterious dictatorship, North Korea.
War, natural disaster, reckless gods and the recognition of impermanence in the world are just some of the threads that AS Byatt weaves into this most timely of books. Linguistically stunning and imaginatively abundant, this is a landmark.
A beguiling, imaginative, inspiring story about the bigness of being alive as an individual, as a member of a tribe, and as a participant in history, exploring how we use storytelling to survive and shape our own truths.
Brilliantly evoking the long-vanished world of masters and servants, Margaret Powell's classic memoir of her time in service is the remarkable true story of an indomitable woman who, though she served in the great houses of England, never stopped aiming high.
Vivid, daring, and unforgettable, The Printmaker's Daughter shines fresh light on art, loyalty, and the tender and indelible bond between a father and daughter.
After hearing the interview on NPR with the author, Ayad Akhtar, I was intrigued.
This is a timely, contemporary novel concerning topics of...
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I read The Healing in two sittings it is a fascinating story of plantation life at the beginning of the Civil War. Granada, a slave newborn child...
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Amazon to open bricks and mortar store in Seattle(Feb 07 2012) Last week, the word in the blogosphere was that Amazon was considering opening a bricks-and-mortar store. Over the weekend goodereader.com added substance to...
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Arizona bills Amazon for $53 million in uncollected sales tax(Feb 06 2012) The ongoing sales tax battle between many US states and large online retailers, most notably Amazon, continues with a thrust from Arizona which, last week,...
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(820 words).
USA Today - Jocelyn McClurg
of 5
by Janet Tarasovic
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