In a style that is beautiful and stark at the same moment, Michaels ferrys us through Jakob’s life as he deals with his loss and its impact on his future. It is the story of Jakob Beer, a Jewish child saved from the holocaust by a Greek stranger. 'From the Trade Paperback edition.'' … ( more)įugitive Pieces is a tour de force that must be consumed slowly and savored, like a good wine or a piece of New York cheesecake. Filled with mysterious symmetries and rendered in heart-stopping prose, 'Fugitive Pieces' is a triumphant work, a book that should not so much be read as it should be surrendered to.

As Michaels follows Jakob across two continents, she lets us witness his transformation from a half-wild casualty of the Holocaust to an artist who extracts meaning from its abyss. With this electrifying image, Anne Michaels ushers us into her rapturously acclaimed novel of loss, memory, history, and redemption. And although by all rights he should have shared the fate of the other Jews in his village, he has not only survived but been rescued by a Greek geologist, who does not recognize the boy as human until he begins to cry. A 'New York Times' Notable Book of the Year Winner of the Lannan Literary Fiction Award Winner of the Guardian Fiction Award In 1940 a boy bursts from the mud of a war-torn Polish city, where he has buried himself to hide from the soldiers who murdered his family.

Fugitive pieces book review