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Nancy Reisman
teaches creative
writing at the
University of
Michigan.

tile-sounding name, even sending
himself postcards to a secret address as
if to solidify that identity.
Jo is perhaps the saddest of the
group, trapped in many ways, suspi-
cious of people and regretful of her
own sharp speech; she glimpses happi-
ness in her short-lived affection for
another woman but ultimately hides
her desires.
The patriarch Abe, who is bossy, ele-
gant, ignoring of his children but still
lovable, doesn't get his own chapters,
but Lillian — the sister of his best
friend Moshe, whom he begins to date
while his wife is very sick, to the dis-
may of his children — has a voice.
There's much that is timely in
Reisman's depiction of war, when
America is "perched on the brink of
emergency and war seeps into the
smallest corners of life."
Irving joins the Army, Celia volun-
teers at the Red Cross and a friend of
the family persists in writing letters to
her relatives in Poland, which are
never answered, but the letters them-
selves are a kind of prayer.
When the war breaks out, Sadie's
daughter is mastering shoes and socks.
"It had been a relief to discuss socks,
shoes after socks, the matching up of
shoes and feet, finessing knots and
bows. ... For a time, Sadie tried to
acknowledge Europe only after the
girls were asleep, but even the attempt
seemed absurd. There were temple
meetings, committees for fund-raising,
committees for refugees; and the
weekly arrival of worsening news she
learned to hold in her mind, silently,
while drawing the alphabet in huge
blue letters and slicing apples to
demonstrate fractions."
For Reisman, one of the challenges

of writing the novel was writing about
the war in a way that acknowledged
the power of what was happening, yet
stayed within the context of the family
dynamics she was examining. "I think
it's a hard balancing act for all of us,"
Reisman comments. "Protecting the
things we cherish most and without
tuning out the world."
Reisman, 43, grew up just outside of
Buffalo and left to attend college.
Although she hasn't lived there since,
she visits several times a year. Her par-
ents grew up in Buffalo, and her
grandparents spent much of their lives
there as well.
She writes of a time before she was
born, "a time planted in my imagina-
tion when I was young. A sort of lost
world," she explains, adding, "I miss
the storytellers who told me about it."
The author of an award-winning
collection of short stories, House Fires,
she writes in part from memory. As
she explains, "It has to do with a sense
of place. I mean the landscape, the
sky, the way the wind comes in off the
lake. I think that has really marked my
sensibility. Here and there, bits and
pieces of my own life are woven in,
how a room in a house might have felt
to me."
Of the Cohen siblings, Sadie
emerges as the most responsible,
although she finds that being wife,
mother, sister and daughter can be
overwhelming. For her, "There's
always a feeling of hurry, of catching
up, only glimpsing each moment
before it shifts."
Reisman reflects on mothers as "the
secret heart of this book. The loss of
one's mother — either through
absence and illness or death, or
through a withholding of love —
seems to me profoundly heartbreak-
ing," she says.
The book includes other mothers,
too — Lillian's mother, Sadie's moth-
er-in-law, other women in the com-
munity — some of who withhold
love, or mix it up with anger and dis-
appointment.
"I'm also interested in the ways that
the characters learn to care for and to
some degree parent each other," she
says, "how they incorporate their
mothers' best legacies into their own
adult lives." ❑

Nancy Reisman speaks at the
Jewish Book Fair in Ann Arbor
7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 10,
at the Jewish Community Center
of Washtenaw County. Free.

(734) 971-0990.

fabulous thing happened to David and Missy Bean
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2004

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