Overview

In 1909, Malka Kaminsky steals her dowry to flee Russia and an arranged marriage, arriving in New York hungry for freedom. Drawn into the hustle of the Golden Land, Malka joins a sweatshop strike and is nearly beaten by thugs, but a stranger and fellow Russian Jew, Yaakov Rogovin, rescues her. Malka doesn' t thank him, refusing to acknowledge her debt, but when chance brings Yaakov to her Sabbath table, they laugh and trade warm glances- only to deny their mutual attraction. After all, they carry deep scars from Russia, where admitting to desires always led to heartache. But as they strive to become entrepreneurs- Yaakov as a musician, Malka as a dressmaker- they hope that independence will show them how to live unafraid, despite the past. And they will need that lesson soon, because when Malka' s fiance arrives, determined to reclaim her, she seeks Yaakov' s help, neither of them aware what fighting for their dreams will cost.

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9781947976566

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Reviews

How do we cast off the haunts of guilt and allow for hope? How do we free ourselves of past shames to let in love? Larry Zuckerman invites us to explore such questions in his richly textured and transporting novel. To Save A Life brings together Malka, who has stolen her dowry and fled an arranged marriage in Grodno, and Yaakov, who has left his family in Valozyn in the aftermath of an attack, both struggling to build new lives and to forge connections free of their painful pasts. Beautifully written, and brimming with scenic details of 1900s New York, from pickets to pushcarts to singing waiters, this is a historical novel readers will relish. -Jennifer Rosner, author of The Yellow Bird Sings and Once We Were Home In this absorbing story of Jews settling in the ""Golden Land"" of New York in the early 1900s, the search for freedom is revealed as more than finding a place. It is also a journey toward reconciliation with the past, with faith, with dogma; this is the ground of hope for the future. Zuckerman writes with empathy, insight, and delightful flashes of wry humor, creating characters that seem to breathe beyond the page. I love it. -Robyn Cadwallader, author of The Anchoress and The Fire and the Rose

Author Information

Larry Zuckerman' s grandparents spoke Yiddish around him whenever they wished to protect their privacy- and their impassioned, expressive tone made him want to know what he was missing. In paying homage to their generation and mother tongue, To Save a Life expresses his love for other times and places. His previous novel, Lonely Are the Brave (Cennan Books, 2023), portrays a World War I hero turned at-home father in a Washington State logging town. Larry' s nonfiction includes The Potato: How the Humble Spud Rescued the Western World, which was excerpted in the New York Times and won an award in the United Kingdom, and The Rape of Belgium: The Untold Story of World War I, which reflects his fascination with that tragic era. He has appeared on NPR' s Morning Edition with Rene e Montagne and delivered a keynote address at the 2009 World Potato Congress in Christchurch, New Zealand. He lives in Seattle.

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