The reader's shelf

摘要

This issue marks the one-year anniversary of Nancy Pearl's final Reader's Shelf column. While there are many new outlets to hear what Nancy has enjoyed reading-from Pearl's Picks online (the service she sells to libraries with her monthly suggestions) to National Public Radio-I thought it would be nice to invite her home, figuratively, and ask her to share what she has loved reading this past year. From a reporter's take on the Iraq war to an insightful send-up of the daily grind, these are some of the titles Nancy liked best. Amy Bloom's stunning and luminous novel AWAY (Random. 2007. ISBN 978-1-4000-6356-7. $23.95) is an immigrant saga that sweeps from Russia through New York City, Chicago, Seattle, and into the Yukon toward Siberia. At 22, Lillian Leyb lost her husband and parents and was separated from Sophie, her three-year-old daughter, during a Russian pogrom. Penniless, she travels to America and lands in New York City in 1924 where she settles into a kind of fevered existence, working as a seamstress in a Jewish theater, sleeping with the boss, fronting for his gay son, and befriended by a playwright. When her cousin arrives from Russia and reports that Sophie is alive in Siberia, Lillian's story becomes a test of endurance as she struggles to get her daughter back.