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SAM

Less After More
This book is wonderful to read for many reasons. The narrative flows brilliantly, like Diamant's usually does. The picture of bonding by strangers who have much to overcome is compelling. It's a lovely story though it is set against an ugly backdrop.
The title of the book, like the title of this review, evokes a divergence from recent, and currently traditional, depictions of the holocaust toward more gentle introductions to that horrible episode in history. It focuses on the beginning of something and points toward a better time to come.
While I might personally hope for something more developed in the way of characters and story, I believe this book, with a moderate style similar to the one found in "The Book Thief", might bring more readers to the genre than a story heavier on the truth of the horror of the holocaust and the aftermath might bring.
There was definitely opportunity to develop the characters - from whence they came especially, but also to where they went. There was also the opportunity to delve more fully into the early immigration of European Jews to Palestine and the difficulties they faced from Arabs and British alike, but that doesn't really seem to be what this book is about.
I believe the book is about healing, and a new beginning, and a focus on the future, set a very transitional and temporary present. The four main characters, as well as some of those on the periphery, begin to deal with and leave behind the past, form tenuous and transitory relationships in the present, then go on to a new life with a new permanence. We don't see very much of the past or the future in this offering - it is merely implied so, therefore, is known only by the reader through his independent knowledge. I don't necessarily think that diminishes it. I think it makes the book palatable to a wider audience. I HOPE it doesn't start a trend of diluting or redefining the holocaust, which needs to be remembered and never repeated.

PDXReader

Good, but not great.
Anita Diamant's latest is a fast read and I found it reasonably enjoyable, but I left it feeling oddly disappointed. I thought she could have done so much more with her characters and with the history behind the events in her book. The book's four main heroines are somewhat flat and nearly interchangable. I think it's great that Diamant is bringing attention to a little-known event in world history, but for a richer understanding of it I'd point readers to the Leon Uris novel Exodus.

Other books by Anita Diamant at BookBrowse