Malinski - Softcover

Siofra O'Donovan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1901866696 ISBN 13: 9781901866698

Publisher: Lilliput Pr Ltd, 2002

Synopsis

Two young brothers in Lvov, Poland, are separated by war. Henryk Malinski, imprisoned by the Nazis with his mother in the family home-the aura, power, and brutality of the Nazis are brilliantly evoked-flees with her ahead of the advancing Soviets, eventually settling in Ireland, where he becomes Henry Foley, a rakish, boozing academic, and spends his life in denial of, and tortured by, the demons of his childhood. Stanislav takes refuge with a devout and deranged aunt in Kracow, where he lives out the decades of his life-a solemn, gray, and humorless character, a human reflection of the communist state. Half a century later, after the fall of communism, Stanislav receives a letter: Henryk/Henry is coming for a visit. Malinski explores the powerful force of human memory, and particularly its complexity. As each character shows us, there is no real escape from memories, or from the past. It is only as the brothers confront each other and their history that they can begin to find peace.

About this title

From Library Journal:

As World War II smashes into Poland, two young brothers are separated when their mother takes one of them from hiding and returns to the family estate, though she knows that it is now occupied by Nazis. At this point, first novelist O'Donovan leaves us as she leaves the brothers to discover just why their mother went back. This question is central to the unfolding of the brothers' stories, which are related through entwined interior monologs. Stanislav Malinski remains in postwar Poland, where the Communist "Worker's Paradise" achieved a "cloning of all that was grey." He assumes that his brother, Henryk, now resettled as Henry Foley in Ireland, has been leading the good life. But Henry has an awful secret that he is determined to keep to himself, for the disbelief he encounters when he tries to tell it to a friend makes him conclude that "the truth was just another tall, wide, impossible story." Yet it is Henry who decides, once communism has fallen, to seek out Stanislav and try to understand what has happened to them. Irish author O'Donovan writes with sensitivity and an eye for nuance that propel her narrative forward and make the reader eager to know how her tale will end. Recommended for larger public libraries and all literary collections. Edward Cone, New York
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Lilliput Pr Ltd
• Publication date: 2002
• ISBN 10: 1901866696
• ISBN 13: 9781901866698
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 214