Helpful Score: 2
A must read for anyone who grew up with a nanny. Heartbreaking story of betrayal...without redemption. Well...a little with a well deserved payback.A slice of Jewish/Black relationships.
Helpful Score: 2
Very disappointing.
Helpful Score: 1
This book deals with the relationship between a Jewish Holocaust survivor & a black hotel maid living in L.A. just after WWII. They become friends, then business partners. Then the betrayal! How their families deal with it all, for generations, makes for good reading.
Helpful Score: 1
a book about family, friendship, betrayal, and reconcilation across fifty years.
This was a fabulous book. I absolutely enjoyed it. I listened to it on CD and the reader truly played the parts.
Boy. I really wanted to enjoy this story! It's a dynamite premise, isn't it?
In 1940s L.A., Gilda, a Jewish woman who survives a Nazi concentration camp, gets a job as a hotel maid. Hosanna, a black woman trains her. Over time they become friends. Gilda makes her own lotion, so Hosanna suggests they start selling it to black women to make money. The business takes off...just before Gilda disappears with all their profits.
But that's where the plot promptly deflatesand pretty much never recovers!
After the first 100 pages, the story jumps ahead in time and loses its focusbig time! Hosanna's daughter becomes the focal character seeking revenge for her mother, but a gazillion other irrelevant characters come into play and I completely lost interest.
So here's a tip: You can basically just read the first hundred pages, then the last 100 and you won't miss a thing. C+
In 1940s L.A., Gilda, a Jewish woman who survives a Nazi concentration camp, gets a job as a hotel maid. Hosanna, a black woman trains her. Over time they become friends. Gilda makes her own lotion, so Hosanna suggests they start selling it to black women to make money. The business takes off...just before Gilda disappears with all their profits.
But that's where the plot promptly deflatesand pretty much never recovers!
After the first 100 pages, the story jumps ahead in time and loses its focusbig time! Hosanna's daughter becomes the focal character seeking revenge for her mother, but a gazillion other irrelevant characters come into play and I completely lost interest.
So here's a tip: You can basically just read the first hundred pages, then the last 100 and you won't miss a thing. C+
"Sweeping across fifty years of African-American history, this novel is a tale of bitter betrayal, righteous outrage, unpaid debts, and thwarted love. But ultimately, it is a wise and moving story of healing reconciliations."
