Reviewer Persis ("Perky") Granger: Perky is
an avid reader and a writer of fiction and nonfiction, including
Adirondack Gold, A Summer of Strangers and Shared Stories from
Daughters of Alzheimer's: Writing a path to peace. She studied at the
College of Wooster (OH) and the University of Massachusetts
(Amherst), earning a BA at the latter. She later completed her Master
of Science in Teaching at SUNY Plattsburgh.
She presents
programs to adults and youth, and hosts writers’ retreats in New
York and Florida. Learn more at www.PersisGranger.com (also accessed
as www.FictionAmongFriends.com.)
Author: Dave Clarke
ISBN: 978-0615227474
Publisher: Hologram
Publishing
Author Dave Clarke spins a fascinating tale of a grieving daughter’s accidental discovery of a previously unknown and fabulously valuable Chagall painting, found among the huge collection of old books left by the young woman’s recently deceased mother.
Author: Dave Clarke
ISBN: 978-0615227474
Publisher: Hologram
Publishing
Author Dave Clarke spins a fascinating tale of a grieving daughter’s accidental discovery of a previously unknown and fabulously valuable Chagall painting, found among the huge collection of old books left by the young woman’s recently deceased mother.
More interesting than the fairy-tale-like inheritance
of riches is the story that unfolds after young Kate McBride, a
bakery worker, receives the proceeds of the painting’s sale. The
story is driven by Kate’s strong ethics, her determination to do
the right thing and her natural empathy for those in need. The money
takes Kate to Europe where the chance viewing of a photograph at
Dachau turns her life in a new direction—the search for Hannah
Kessler Stern, believed to be a survivor of the Holocaust. Kate’s
seriousness is nicely offset by the facetiousness of best bud Connie
Perez. All of Clarke’s characters are highly believable, and his
use of authentic dialect is compelling.
The reader is transported back to pre-World War II Europe, when young Marc Chagall, an aspiring Russian painter from a large Jewish family, met and fell in love with eighteen-year-old Hannah Kessler, daughter of a Jewish insurance mogul who intends for his daughter to marry the son of his business associate and carry on the family business. Their tender story stands in stark contrast to the horror set in motion by the rise of Adolph Hitler and his ethnic purging.
Clarke has put human faces on history, and has
highlighted, not only the terror of Nazism, but also the unresolved
injustices that remain today, decades after the murders and
destruction of families in the concentration camps and the wholesale
looting of art and other valuables by Nazis. He has done it so
artfully that I was pulled headlong into the story. The harshness of
war’s ugliness and injustice were gently offset by the beauty of
his description and the joyful freshness of the love story. The
reader, however, will remember it all.
Clarke is to be commended for his treatment of this
topic, and for directing profits from his book to the Survivor
Mitzvah Project, begun as a 100% charity to support aging Holocaust
survivors in need around the world. ( Visit their web site,
http://www.survivormitzvah.org/.)