Review
------
Praise for Survivor Café
A Best Book of 2017 (San Francisco Chronicle)
A Finalist for the National Jewish Book Award
A Most Notable Nonfiction by Bay Area Authors Selection (East
Bay Times)
"Rosner’s memoir, which combines moving personal narrative with
illuminating research into the impact of mass trauma on a
personal and cultural scale, is imbued with urgency, sincerity,
heartache, and heart." ―San Francisco Chronicle, 1 of 100 Best
Books of 2017
"Mixing the personal with the historical and the literary with
the scholarly, Rosner achieves a breathtaking overview of events
as varied as the Holocaust, the Vietnam War, the Rwandan
genocide, and Japanese American internment. Her impressive,
highly readable Survivor Café takes on important issues of
atrocity, trauma, and memory, rendering them all with such great
clarity and intimacy that the reader will not soon forget them,
or this powerful book." ―Viet Thanh Nguyen, Pulitzer
Prize–winning author of The Sympathizer
"This is a personal exploration for Rosner, but also an
exploration of the commonalities found in the children of
survivors." ―Read it Forward
"Survivor Café is an exercise in making, in identifying
convergent paths in apparently disparate legacies left by the
world’s humanitarian disasters . . . [Rosner] asks us to look
inside ourselves, to learn from the past, to forgive, and to
understand the deep connections binding us to our past, our
future, and to all other things." ―Lilith Magazine
"Survivor Café is a beautifully expressed personal examination
of how trauma is passed down through generations...An exquisite
read." ―The Daily Gazette
"In deep fissures and dark alleys having to do with
multigenerational trauma, anti-Semitism, racism, terrorism,
torture, death and loss, Berkeley writer Elizabeth Rosner
uncovers, improbably, hope and connection." ―The Mercury News
"There’s been a slew of research examining the genetic effects
of psychological trauma, but author Elizabeth Rosner is among the
first to take a deep dive into the personal implications of such
inheritance with her stunning new book, Survivor Café: The Legacy
of Trauma and the Labyrinth of Memory.” ―Orange County Register
"Deeply moving." ―Berkeleyside
"Rosner’s writing is crafted like the poet she is, and her
ability to meld and transcend her own story with those of
survivors of wars, slavery, and genocide is nothing less than
brilliant and more importantly, healing." ―ACEs Connection
"Rosner demonstrates a rare blend of scholarly assessment and
personal revelation, tempering her singular passion with an
encompassing mercy. In this important and vital contribution to
the conversation about legacy and responsibility, Rosner distills
the magnitude of such burdens and defines the of
memorialization with an elegance and eloquence that reverberates
with both depth and nuance." ―Booklist (starred review)
"A thoughtful, probing meditation on the fragility of memory and
the indelible inheritance of pain." ―Kirkus Reviews
"Novelist Rosner (Electric City) shines an unblinking light on
the most horrific of 20th-century crimes and asks: What is the
intergenerational legacy of trauma? . . . She considers art,
anniversaries, memorials, and psychotherapy, but the most
powerful technique she finds for dealing with trauma is simply
telling the story behind it . . . Themes of memory, language, and
the bodily imprint of trauma are powerful, as are Rosner’s
accounts of revisiting Buchenwald with her her . . . Rosner's
conclusions―that powerful suffering must be communicated before
healing can occur and that the most profound of human atrocities
must be acknowledged so that their like does not happen
again―open the door to understanding and, optimistically, show a
path to peace." ―Publishers Weekly
"This is the book that clinicians and patients alike have been
waiting for. Rosner seamlessly integrates the latest research on
intergenerational trauma with her own deeply moving personal
account. The result is a true advancement in the field, a
must-read that is rich, accessible, compelling, and informative."
––Joshua Simmons, Psy.D., Clinical Psychologist and Candidate in
Analytic Training at the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco
“Using her experiences as a child of Holocaust survivors,
[Rosner] navigates the audience through the realms of
epigenetics, psychotherapy, history, and philosophical struggles
to bring something unique to the study of trauma . . . These
personal recollections provide a dimension that softens some of
the most indigestible theories and concepts that we have come to
associate with memory, psychology, psychoanalysis, trauma, and
history . . . paving the way for future studies." ––Ellis Spicer,
Reviews in History, Institute of Historical Research
"Elizabeth Rosner's Survivor Café is about how we inherit, not
just our histories, but the complexities of how we survive them.
With the heart of a poet, Rosner unpeels the layers of trauma in
a way that will stay with you long after you read the last page.”
―Emily Rapp Black, author of The Still Point of the Turning World
"In Survivor Café, Elizabeth Rosner brilliantly captures both
the enormity of war and its enduring aftershocks―the devastating
legacies for victims, perpetrators, and societies who suffer
through and beyond it. A mixture of history, personal narrative,
and research, the book expertly documents how atrocities are
passed down through generations and how we may find ways to
contain this pernicious inheritance. Survivor Café is a vital,
living document that proves the end of war is far from the end of
the battle." ―Andrew Carroll, editor of the New York Times
bestsellers War Letters and Behind the Lines
"Elizabeth Rosner explores how trauma infiltrates minds and
bodies and language. In lyrical, luminous prose, she takes on the
obligation to remember lives lost. Genocide, war, nuclear bombs,
lynching―Rosner does not turn away from unceasing violence and
its aftermath. Urgent and necessary, this book offers brave
witness to the world we have made and must repair." ―Sarah
Sentilles, author of Draw Your Weapons
“A staggering work of intellectual vigor and raw emotion,
Survivor Café mines the darkest recesses of our collective past,
excavating both the hate and hope of human history. Rosner's
handling of intergenerational trauma, as well as the
need to acknowledge and transcend it, reminds us of the power and
mercy of stories. In our current age of hyper-immediacy, with
increasingly short news cycles and even shorter memories,
Rosner's work reminds us of our sacred duty to carry these
stories forward like a lantern in the dark.” ―Aline Ohanesian,
author of Orhan's Inheritance
"Using the Holocaust as a focal point, Survivor Café renders a
profound and unflinching portrait of trauma and the memory of
trauma, the consequences of inhumanity, atrocities that do not
end with one generation but are inherited as nightmare, memory,
and affliction, passed on to the next generation and the next and
the next. With vivid stories and brilliant ins, this book
must be required reading for those who want to understand not
just our collective history but the present moment." ―Susan
Griffin, award-winning author of A Chorus of Stones
"In this haunting and poetic book, Elizabeth Rosner summons her
readers to a deep and abiding commemoration of genocide. The
daughter of Holocaust survivors, Rosner describes scientific
evidence that deep trauma persists not only emotionally but also
physically through generations. This is an inspired, illuminated
book―the fruit of hard experience and deep study. I salute
Elizabeth Rosner’s Survivor Café, a work of wisdom and,
ultimately, hope." ―Elizabeth Farnsworth, author of A Train
Through Time
Praise for Electric City
"Rosner beautifully bridges past and present in the dynamism of
her historical depictions, capturing the dangers and excitement
of invention, the complex play between generations of America's
immigrant populations and its native peoples, the wonder of young
love, and the insatiable spark of curiosity that is a calling
card of scientific inquiry, and a hallmark of the human heart."
―Elle Magazine
"Rosner's lyrical new novel chronicles the rise and fall of this
company town, following several generations of immigrants and the
Native American people who watched them come...Through layers of
time 'sticky like amber,' Rosner etches images of family,
community, and the electric power of love." ―Jane Ciabattari, BBC
"…remarkable, lyrical… It's a wondrous thing to watch the
deepening and unfurling of a writer's talent over one book and
another and another. Electric City is Elizabeth Rosner at her
best yet, a book that leaves the reader hungering for her next."
―Chicago Tribune
"Rich and poignant…The provenance of each character is
thematically and dramatically significant…and the novel
beautifully explores the ways we attach ourselves to a place, the
ways we might escape it, and how these things, like the Hudson
River, often flow both ways." ―San Francisco Chronicle
"Rosner skillfully captures the city's conflicts between science
and nature, history and progress. From immigrant experience to
coming-of-age story, Electric City is a luminous tale." ―San Jose
Mercury News
"…there is also a great affection in this novel, for a place at
once as old as lightning and as young as the latest invention.
All the characters in this book―and, I suppose, this reviewer―are
just molecules passing through the Electric City." ―Historical
Novel Society
"Rosner's richly imagined historical novel conveys an abiding
sense of time and place. A deeply evocative paean to the wonders
of science, the perils of technology, and the sacrifices of
people in thrall to their power." ―Booklist
"With deft descriptions, Rosner sketches the bustling city, on
land long cherished by aboriginal culture, which grew and
flourished as whites invaded and industrialized...offers a gentle
meditation on love and loss." ―Kirkus
"This beautiful book joins the compression, vivid intensity, and
imaginative connectivity of poetry to the deep character work of
the novel. Rosner handles with effortless assurance both the
small, stories and the great impersonal worlds of
science, nature, and history that combine to make us who we are."
―Karen Joy Fowler, We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves, Winner
of the 2014 PEN/Faulkner Award
"A heady mix of world-changing history (Thomas Edison and
Charles Steinmetz) coupled against a bew love triangle
ignites Rosner's gorgeously written exploration of the way
inventions transform cities, hearts, and lives, sometimes with a
terrible cost, and the way light nudges inroads in the darkness.
Electrifyingly original." ―Caroline Leavitt, New York Times
bestselling author of Is This Tomorrow and Pictures of You
"Reminiscent of In the Skin of a Lion and set in a 1960s New
York manufacturing town once founded by Thomas Edison, Electric
City is a love story made incandescent by Rosner's prose. The
triangle she creates between Sophie Levine and her two admirers
is as tangled, tragic, and beautiful as the history of their
fundamentally American city." ―Maria Hummel, author of Motherland
"At the heart of this gripping novel is the brilliant
mathematician Charles Proteus Steinmetz, whose ability to capture
lightning in a bottle electrifies a city and animates the lives
of friends and strangers. Rosner achieves something just as
powerful and thrilling in this marvelous book." ―Ann Packer,
author of The Dive from Clausen’s Pier
"Electric City is the gripping narrative of an ever-changing
America seen through the prism of one town caught between the
past and the future, and the tangled tragic love triangle set
within it. Compelling, beautiful, important, and timeless,
Electric City is as much a thoughtful look at our changing past
as it is a metaphor for the present. Elizabeth Rosner is a bright
literary light." ―Jennifer Gilmore, author of The Mothers
"At once a subtly nuanced love story, a celebration of American
invention, and a critique of the juggernaut of 'progress' in the
twentieth century, Electric City is a compelling, deeply moving
novel about the heyday and decline of Schenectady (the titular
"Electric City") as an industrial power. The novel moves between
the twenties and sixties, deftly interweaving the historical and
fictional in a way that illuminates the tension between western
ideas of progress and Native American rhythms and sensibilities.
But the real incandescence in this story comes from Rosner's
luminous, eloquent prose. Simply a beautiful novel." ―Marjorie
Darraugh, Peus Books
Praise for Blue Nude
"An elegiac story of an emotionally and creatively starved
artist and his muse..The present diverges to the past, and Rosner
develops her protagonists as though they are pieces of art,
slowly becoming unveiled. Although their backgrounds are
divergent, their interior lives are similar. Rosner’s
multilayered composition is rendered in beautiful, spare prose
and will resonate long after the last page." ―Publishers Weekly
"We watch, spellbound, as the story seems to levitate midair, as
the characters seamlessly unfold a plot that is no less than
fascinating. Using the rhythms of poetry, Elizabeth Rosner has
created a lyrical tour de force." ―Linda Gray Sexton, Half in
Love: Surviving the Legacy of Suicide
"Rosner has a painter's eye and a poet's ear. Blue Nude is a
luminous book about painful histories―both private and global―and
how they stay with us even as they travel through to become
something else―quite possibly art. A book both heady and
tangible, both unflinching and generous, but always beautiful to
read." ―Karen Joy Fowler, The Jane Austen Book Club
"Through German artist, Danzig, and Israeli muse, Merav,
Elizabeth Rosner builds a bridge from loss to reconciliation,
from anger to understanding. Blue Nude is a lyrical exploration
of how we -- as individuals and as a society―move past our
separate histories and toward a shared redemption. This is truly
a lovely book." ―Meg Waite Clayton, The Wednesday Sisters
"Blue Nude is a novel which spans time and continents, from post
war Germany to California to Israeli kibbutzim, a novel which
explores the big questions of history, e, art, how we choose
to live the lives we’re given–and yet it’s also wonderfully
as well in its exploration of the hearts of its
individual characters. Elizabeth Rosner has written a thought
provoking, moving and original book." ―Dan Chaon, Await Your
Reply and Stay Awake
"Rosner takes on complexity with a brilliant poet’s insistence
that the body can never surrender cultural legacy. Blue Nude is
easy to pick up and, in its suspense, hard to put down. Its
sensitivity to detail acts as a love letter to the world." ―Edie
Meidav, Crawl Space
"What I like especially about Elizabeth Rosner’s Blue Nude is
its patience and careful pace, both utterly appropriate to a
story of troubled reconciliation. In its insistence that
sweetness (honeyed, not saccharine) can come out of violence,
Blue Nude resembles the astonishing Israeli film Walk on Water
which also takes on the contemporary legacy of German-Jewish
relations. It helps that Ms. Rosner has a poet’s eye and an
enviable ability to allow both her lapidary sentences and her
deeply complex characters space to breathe." ―Jonathan Wilson
Praise for The Speed of Light
2002 Harold U. Ribalow Prize
Great Lakes
Selected for the Hadassah National Book Club 2003
Book Sense 76 Pick in 2001
"[An]impressive debut... As witnesses, [Rosner's] characters
move forward, healed or not. They tell the truth, share their
pain, and prop each other up. It seems there's a lesson there for
us all." ―San Francisco Chronicle
"An affirmation of the goodness of life... The author of The
Speed of Light possess[es] the soul of a poet, so rich is the
texture of her language, so filled with music [and] and imagery."
―The Jewish Review
"A haunting tale of timeless secrets and timely salvation... A
spellbinding tribute to the revelations that redeem us and the
emotions that ennoble us." ―Booklist, boxed and starred review
"The Speed of Light is an elegant, meticulous, and quite subtle
novel about lives lived at a remove from, but forever connected
to, tragedy―the camps. Ms. Rosner's imaginative , of course,
is to show us great human importance where we might've thought it
didn't reside, and to change us with this knowledge. She
certainly succeeds." ―Richard Ford
"A resonating novel about silence and sharing, about the mystery
and pain of the past and how it must be recled. Beautifully
written, in images that sing in our ears long after we've put the
book down." ―Chitra Ranerjee Divakaruni, author of The Mistress
of Spices and The Unknown Errors of Our Lives
"Rilke memorably defined art as exactness, a hatred of the
vague, and by that definition The Speed of Light is poetry
sustained. The precision of the language here, the structural
arrangements and the deft evocation of character in history all
herald a genuine talent--not so much emerging as achieved. Ms.
Rosner's debut novel turns sorrow into song." ―Nicholas Delbanco,
What Remains
"With its symphony of voices, The Speed of Light tells a
haunting story of loss and redemption. It is beautifully written
and utterly affecting." ―Tova Mirvis, The Ladies Auxiliary
"Elizabeth Rosner touches a chord deep down where our fears are
buried, then makes that chord vibrate and hum until magic happens
and it sings. I loved this book. It entered my dreams." ―Beverly
Donofrio, Riding in Cars with Boys and Looking For Mary
"Elizabeth Rosner has written a lyrical and absorbing novel
whose power is enriched by its understatement. This uncommon
story not only probes how children wrestle with the silence
handed down to them by a silent her cursed with inexhaustible
sorrow, but it also tells us of the healing magic of love and
does so through a marvelous and unusual character―a Latino
housekeeper―who will find an enduring spot in readers' hearts."
―Joseph Berger, author of Displaced Persons: Growing Up American
After the Holocaust
Read more ( javascript:void(0) )
About the Author
----------------
ELIZABETH ROSNER is the author of three novels and a
poetry collection. The Speed of Light was translated into nine
languages and won several awards in the US and in Europe,
including being shortlisted for the prestigious Prix Femina. Blue
Nude was named among the best books of 2006 by the San Francisco
Chronicle. Electric City was named among the best books of 2014
by NPR. Her essays and reviews have appeared in the New York
Times Magazine, Elle, the San Francisco Chronicle and others. She
lives in Berkeley, CA.
Read more ( javascript:void(0) )