Shadows We Carry

A Novel

by Meryl Ain

This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.

Buy on Amazon Buy on Waterstones

*This page contains affiliate links, so we may earn a small commission when you make a purchase through links on our site at no additional cost to you.

Pub Date 25 Apr 2023 | Archive Date 13 Apr 2023

SparkPress

Historical Fiction | Women's Fiction

Talking about this book? Use #ShadowsWeCarry #NetGalley. More hashtag tips!

Description

In this eagerly anticipated sequel to Meryl Ain’s award-winning post-Holocaust novel The Takeaway Men, we follow Bronka and JoJo Lubinski as they find themselves on the cusp of momentous change for women in the late 1960s. With the United States in the grip of political and social upheaval, the twins and a number of their peers, including a Catholic priest and the son of a Nazi, struggle with their family’s ancestry and how much influence it has on their lives. Meanwhile, both young women seek to define their roles as women, and as individuals.

Enlightening and evocative, Shadows We Carry explores the experience of navigating deeply held family secrets and bloodlines, confusing religious identities, and the scars of World War II in the wake of revolutionary societal changes.

Advance Praise

“When I finished Shadows We Carry by Meryl Ain, I cried. Reading this book was akin to going home . . . . To say it is moving is an understatement. For many readers, the tale of twin sisters Bronka and JoJo will be an eye-opener to Jewish life in a New York gone by. Bravo.”

—Marilyn Simon Rothstein, author of Crazy To Leave You, Husbands and Other Sharp Objects, and Lift and Separate

“The late 1960s of Shadows We Carry was a time of turmoil — political and social turbulence, cultural upheaval, and fraying of the bonds of convention. Meryl Ain has delineated those years beautifully. We feel right there with the novel’s main characters . . . their stories will have great resonance for contemporary readers. Each sister must fight for her own rights as women and as Jews. But each needs to look beyond herself toward a society free from the cruelty of discrimination and the brutality of hatred . . . a memorable novel.”

—Susan Isaacs, New York Times best-selling author

“Shadows We Carry transports you into the multi-faceted lives of Jewish Holocaust survivors and their children during the 1960s and 70s in America. Her fully developed characters wrestle with guilt, love, marriage, Judaism, sexuality, politics, and the unraveling of family secrets. Ain, with impeccable research, has made a significant contribution to our understanding of the Holocaust and its dramatic impact on survivors and their descendants.”

—Esther Amini, author of CONCEALED: Memoir of a Jewish-Iranian Daughter Caught Between the Chador and America

"In Meryl Ain’s sequel to The Takeaway Men is a novel that I couldn’t put down…the story brings to life the turmoil of the era—the Vietnam War and the demonstrations against it, the marches for women’s equality and the fight for pro-choice…One of the most successful elements is how Ain has incorporated events of the day, as well as the history of earlier times, to the fabric of her story. This adds weight to her novel, grounds it in such a way that also lends authenticity and realism to each of her characters.” —Jacquie Herz, author of Circumference of silence