From Publishers Weekly
Stollman's second novel, after his lauded debut, The Far Euphrates, is another thoughtful, resonant examination of Jewish life in the aftermath of the Holocaust. Now a famous neuroanatomist, Dr. Joseph Ivri reflects on his life and career. Raised in a devout Jewish household in placid, post-WWII Ontario, Joseph is obsessively studious, somber and a bit of a religious prodigy. Several painful events have contributed to his serious view of the world: his father's illness and death, the institutionalization of his best friend and the diminishing eyesight of his younger brother, Asa. A welcome addition to the household when Joseph is 14 is boarder Eva Laquedem Higashi, a beautiful, sagelike refugee from Prague via Shanghai, who is the very embodiment of the dislocated life many European Jews faced even after the Allies' victory. Eva brings with her a most precious possession: a rare 15th-century Hebrew manuscript, the Augsburg Miscellany, smuggled out of Europe at great risk and at tragic cost. The manuscript's implications prove a suspenseful factor, as its history is gradually revealed. While the book's leisurely pace and religious allusions may limit its audience, discerning readers will be intrigued by its quiet mysticism. Stollman's measured prose harbors its share of idiosyncratic nuggets, including liberal doses of Japanese folklore and an appearance by Hannah Arendt. Yet the narrative gains cohesion from Joseph's encompassing intelligence, and his world both provincial and worldly is evoked with delicate accuracy. A practicing neuroradiologist, Stollman illuminates the mysteries of life with the clear eye of a scientist and the faith of a believer. Rights sold in Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
In this rich effort, Stollman returns to the setting of his first novel, The Far Euphrates. Another Jewish family, this time the Ivris (a widowed mother and her two sons, teenaged Joseph and ten-year-old Asa), lives an unremarkable life in Windsor, Ontario, in the late 1940s. Things change, however, when a stranger rents a room from the Ivris. The drifter, Eva Laquedem, fled Prague at the outbreak of World War II and has been on the move ever since. She has in her possession an illuminated 15th-century Hebrew manuscript known as the Augsburg Miscellany, which her family has owned for centuries and for which she has risked her life, having smuggled it out of Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia. Narrated by the adult Joseph, now an accomplished neuroanatomist, the story depicts Eva as a beautiful muse who left as suddenly as she came. The richness of Torah study, the ancient languages of the Near East, and the opening up of one's soul are some of the gifts that the mysterious boarder bestows on the Ivris and the reader. Stollman's first novel was an American Library Association Notable Book, and this tale of people searching for family values is sure to have similar success. Highly recommended for all libraries and for teen readers as well. Molly Abramowitz, Silver Spring, MD Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Neuroradiologist Stollman's first novel, The Far Euphrates (1997), earned a string of awards, and his second is similarly seductive in its fairy-tale-like transmutation of the sorrows of the Holocaust. Like the author, Joseph hails from Windsor, Ontario, is fascinated by the human brain, and has written a book, but most of this sweet and fanciful tale takes place during his childhood just after his father's death and the end of World War II. Joseph studies the Torah, his younger brother worries about his deteriorating eyesight, and their resourceful mother starts a catering business. Suddenly the proverbial stranger comes to town, Eva Higashi, the stunning refugee daughter of a renowned Jewish Czech scholar and widow of a Japanese doctor. A magical being in possession of a sacred illuminated manuscript, she brings renewed life and mystery to Joseph and his struggling family. As Eva's sad yet enchanting story unfolds, Stollman intertwines fantasy with musings on the cherished belief in a "unifying pattern" underlying the harsh arbitrariness of existence and promising order, connection, and meaning. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
The Illuminated Soul FROM THE PUBLISHER
"Drawing on such diverse sources as the anatomy of the vertebrate brain, the Bible and Jewish legends, Japanese pictography and literature, and the ancient languages of the Near East, The Illuminated Soul is an unforgettable novel about the transforming power of beauty and the attendant pains of memory and desire." "At the outbreak of World War II, when the Nazis invaded Czechoslovakia, Eva Laquedem flees Prague, carrying with her, at great risk, the renowned Augsburg Miscellany - a magnificent fifteenth-century Hebrew illuminated manuscript that has been in her family for generations. After spending the war years in Japan, she travels rootlessly, like the legendary Wandering Jew, until chance brings her to the town of Windsor, Canada, and to the home of Adele Ivri, a devout widow, and her two sons." Eva is unlike anyone Adele and her two sons have ever met. Her rare beauty, the dazzling tales she tells them - of her travels, of wondrous places and creatures, even of the dangers she faced during the war - change their lives, as do the exquisite illuminations contained within the pages of the Miscellany. The two boys, Joseph and Asa, fall in love with Eva, and as Joseph recounts the story and his love for her, and the past begins to intrude upon the present, he finally reveals the novel's secrets, the darkness to which we are all subject.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
Stollman's second novel, after his lauded debut, The Far Euphrates, is another thoughtful, resonant examination of Jewish life in the aftermath of the Holocaust. Now a famous neuroanatomist, Dr. Joseph Ivri reflects on his life and career. Raised in a devout Jewish household in placid, post-WWII Ontario, Joseph is obsessively studious, somber and a bit of a religious prodigy. Several painful events have contributed to his serious view of the world: his father's illness and death, the institutionalization of his best friend and the diminishing eyesight of his younger brother, Asa. A welcome addition to the household when Joseph is 14 is boarder Eva Laquedem Higashi, a beautiful, sagelike refugee from Prague via Shanghai, who is the very embodiment of the dislocated life many European Jews faced even after the Allies' victory. Eva brings with her a most precious possession: a rare 15th-century Hebrew manuscript, the Augsburg Miscellany, smuggled out of Europe at great risk and at tragic cost. The manuscript's implications prove a suspenseful factor, as its history is gradually revealed. While the book's leisurely pace and religious allusions may limit its audience, discerning readers will be intrigued by its quiet mysticism. Stollman's measured prose harbors its share of idiosyncratic nuggets, including liberal doses of Japanese folklore and an appearance by Hannah Arendt. Yet the narrative gains cohesion from Joseph's encompassing intelligence, and his world both provincial and worldly is evoked with delicate accuracy. A practicing neuroradiologist, Stollman illuminates the mysteries of life with the clear eye of a scientist and the faith of a believer. Rights sold in Germany, Italy and the Netherlands. (Feb. 18) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Library Journal
In this rich effort, Stollman returns to the setting of his first novel, The Far Euphrates. Another Jewish family, this time the Ivris (a widowed mother and her two sons, teenaged Joseph and ten-year-old Asa), lives an unremarkable life in Windsor, Ontario, in the late 1940s. Things change, however, when a stranger rents a room from the Ivris. The drifter, Eva Laquedem, fled Prague at the outbreak of World War II and has been on the move ever since. She has in her possession an illuminated 15th-century Hebrew manuscript known as the Augsburg Miscellany, which her family has owned for centuries and for which she has risked her life, having smuggled it out of Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia. Narrated by the adult Joseph, now an accomplished neuroanatomist, the story depicts Eva as a beautiful muse who left as suddenly as she came. The richness of Torah study, the ancient languages of the Near East, and the opening up of one's soul are some of the gifts that the mysterious boarder bestows on the Ivris and the reader. Stollman's first novel was an American Library Association Notable Book, and this tale of people searching for family values is sure to have similar success. Highly recommended for all libraries and for teen readers as well. Molly Abramowitz, Silver Spring, MD Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
A studious young Jewish boy sees a wider and more exciting world after a beautiful and mysterious woman enters his family's house in Windsor, Ontario. Narrated by the boy, Joseph, from his vantage decades later as a well-traveled and respected neuroanatomist, the story tells of that beautiful stranger, Eva Laquedem. Soon after WWII, the queenly Eva comes to rent a room; and, almost before she has introduced herself, the family-Joseph, his mother, his little brother Asa-has solidly fallen in love with her. Before her arrival, Eva had hopscotched around the globe after fleeing her home of Prague on the eve of WWII. She kept with her the entire time a precious 15th-century illuminated Hebrew text called the Augsbury Miscellany, highly sought after by collectors and scholars. A great deal of this utterly graceful second novel by Stollman (The Far Euphrates, 1997) deals with the ruminative contents of the manuscript and its philosophical implications. In Joseph's telling, it seems that Eva hardly stops speaking from the second she sets foot in his house, though that hardly seems to bother her enthralled audience. It doesn't hurt that her tales are full of drama, history, and passion, not to mention laced with erudite quotations and learned references. In fewer words, we learn about Joseph's mother, quietly struggling to make a career for herself as a caterer, and Asa, a delicate child slowly going blind. Eva's sound and fury can grow oppressive, and it may be hard to imagine anyone-even a lonely family like this-so desperate for civilized conversation and a whiff of foreign intrigue as to put up with her so patiently. But Stollman is a writer of rare skill, every line molded and sculpted toperfection, and life in a small Canadian Jewish community is well rendered. The sense of loss pervading these Holocaust-stricken pages is almost overwhelming-even if The Illuminated Soul does spend too much time on its least interesting character.
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