A Replacement Life: a Novel / Boris Fishman 321 p.

Yevgeny (Slava) Gelman is an aspiring young writer with a grunt job at a prestigious New York magazine.  He and his extended family emigrated from Belarus when he was 9, and he has spent his adolescence the way many immigrant children do: translating for his elders, shifting between two worlds, explaining why he doesn't want to become a doctor or a successful businessman.  When the German government begins accepting applications for restitution from Holocaust survivors, Slava becomes involved in his grandfather's scheme to craft false narratives for those Jewish families who survived Soviet rather than Nazi repression.

At last Slava comes into his own as a writer, but here is where his troubles begin. Emotionally Replacement Life feels like a pretty standard coming-of-age story.  Yet Fishman has given Slava a sweet, charming voice, and he cleverly raises questions about the truth and who owns it, and, fundamentally, the power of story.  Worth reading for the hilarious and poignant conversations between Slava and his grandfather alone, I recommend this one.

The Family: Three Journeys into the Heart of the Twentieth Century / David Laskin 383 pp.

A well-constructed and highly readable extended family story. Laskin's ancestors divide into three branches: the original family, from a village called Rakov in what is now Ukraine (or Belarus?), the Israeli, and the American. He and an Israeli cousin sifted through oral family stories and any written historical evidence to trace these three narratives. The result is fascinating. The Israeli branch was begun by a pioneering young women early in the 30s with a powerful wish to settle and develop 'the Land.' The American family ventured to New York where they started a dry goods business and the Maidenform bra company and experienced spectacular commercial success. The Europeans' experience was as tragic as it was predictable. Laskin is a highly talented nonfiction writer; I greatly enjoyed his book The Children's Blizzard. He has a particular flair for concise and vivid physical description. I strongly recommend this one.