DETAILS: You Are Not Like Other Mothers by Angelika Schrobsdorff. English version copyright: 2012. Original German copyright: 1992. Historical fiction.
SUMMARY: A story of love, culture and motherhood following a family of German Jews before and during World War II.
PROS: This story was very interesting. The author is a contemporary and reading a World War II story from the perspective of German Jews was very interesting. The writing was very well done and the attitudes were, I imagine, very similar to those of people in those days.
CONS: The characters were not very relatable, I thought. I didn't particularly enjoy the first third of the book and I found the mother in the story very spoiled and annoying. Perhaps this was a product of the translation, but the author very strangely switched back and forth between first and third person, often within a single paragraph, which was very distracting. Also, this book is divided into three sections and beyond that, there are no chapters. Again, this may be something that got "lost in translation" but it made it difficult to find a stopping place.
BOTTOM LINE: This was a unique and often enjoyable World War II story. Three stars out of five.
No comments:
Post a Comment