This
was one of those extraordinary books that help you see history in a different
way. It tells the story of the Nazi takeover of society in the early
1930s.
What makes The Oppermans
astonishing is that it was written in real-time and published in 1933, just as
Hitler assumed power. Its author, part of a Jewish family living in Berlin,
recognized what was happening and created an urgent, mesmerizing page-turner.
The book is an excellent and compelling narrative on its own. But knowing when
it was written adds extraordinary power, as well as a remarkable insight into
human self-deception, especially when reality seems too horrifying to be true.
"Extraordinary . . . No single historical or fictional work has more tellingly or insightfully depicted . . . the insidious manner in which Nazism began to permeate the fabric of German society than Lion Feuchtwanger's great novel." -- New York Times
First published in 1934 but fully imagining the future of Germany over the ensuing years, The Oppermanns tells the compelling story of a remarkable German Jewish family confronted by Hitler's rise to power. Compared to works by Voltaire and Zola on its original publication, this prescient novel strives to awaken an often unsuspecting, sometimes politically naive, or else…
Barbara
Kingsolver has an incredible ability to get inside her characters’ heads and
give them voices that feel authentic.
In this revisiting of David Copperfield
by Charles Dickens, she writes about the lives of Appalachian people in the
US today, struggling with poverty and addiction, told from the point of view
of an adolescent boy.
It is a painful story, yet the book is impossible to put
down. Kingsolver empathizes with her characters’ plights and depicts a society
that has ill-served them, over and over. But you never feel lectured to or as
if you are observing the characters from above.
Kingsolver places the reader in
the middle of the action with impeccable craft and a responsible heart.
Demon's story begins with his traumatic birth to a single mother in a single-wide trailer, looking 'like a little blue prizefighter.' For the life ahead of him he would need all of that fighting spirit, along with buckets of charm, a quick wit, and some unexpected talents, legal and otherwise.
In the southern Appalachian Mountains of Virginia, poverty isn't an idea, it's as natural as the grass grows. For a generation growing up in this world, at the heart of the modern opioid crisis, addiction isn't an abstraction, it's neighbours, parents, and friends. 'Family' could mean love, or reluctant foster…
It’s hard to say I love this
book because it is not an easy book to read—even though I read it compulsively.
Beth Macy is a great journalist who spent years covering the opioid crisis as
it was developing. It is tricky to turn social ills into narratives in
non-fiction, but Macy doesn’t use cheap tricks to grab her readers by the
throat.
Her research and compassion—and well-placed anger—drive this
investigation of a terrible epidemic driven by greed. Yet Macy paints with a
nuanced brush, delving into the complexity of modern life that paved the way
for this heartbreaking and horrifying scourge.
Journalist Beth Macy's definitive account of America's opioid epidemic "masterfully interlaces stories of communities in crisis with dark histories of corporate greed and regulatory indifference" (New York Times) -- from the boardroom to the courtroom and into the living rooms of Americans. In this extraordinary work, Beth Macy takes us into the epicenter of a national drama that has unfolded over two decades. From the labs and marketing departments of big pharma to local doctor's offices; wealthy suburbs to distressed small communities in Central Appalachia; from distant cities to once-idyllic farm towns; the spread of opioid addiction follows a tortuous…
In Unlikely Friends, Salamon tells
the intimate story about a conservative backwater in Southern Ohio that brought
together three girls from different backgrounds - Julie, June, and Candee -
respectively, Jewish, Black, and Appalachian. Girls who, in all likelihood,
wouldn’t have become friends if they had lived anywhere else.
While it might
appear to be a small tale, as the country’s political divide widens, this
personal history of unlikely connection is more pressing, more universal than
ever.
This is a story about race and religion, country and community,
and the legends people create to make sense of their lives.
