Winter Eyes (Stonewall Inn Editions (Paperback))

Rating:
Summary: Hauntingly Moving and Beautiful
Review: Anyone who has ever tried to come to terms with himself, to understand himself will identify with this compelling novel and its plot. Keeping secrets--even for supposedly "good" reasons--can be so destructive. This is just part of what Raphael's novel is trying to say. More and more, it seems as though there is a need for so many of us to find some link to our past; often, we find the path to that discovery blocked. Stefan faces just this sort of stumbling block in the novel. As he reaches to unmask the secrets, he is also in a process of self discovery. His growing awareness of himself as a gay young man may now mean that he has secrets of his own to keep. Triumphantly, however, the novel is not ultimately about guilt or shame. It is about discovery; it is about taking the results of discovery and making them your own. Stefan does, in fact, become a better man because of the search he has undertaken. This novel stays with you; its impact and intensity increase in the weeks and even months after it has been completed. I know I will read it again--I can pay no higher compliment to a book or its author.

Rating:
Summary: Finding His Way through Unknowns
Review: Finding His Way through Unknowns

As I saw the number of unread pages dwindling, I was plagued by fear that this engaging novel might just stop rather than really ending, but as I read the conclusion of Winter Eyes at two o?clock in the morning, I lifted both thumbs over my head and said, ?Yes, yes, yes!? The book is a great read with an explosion of an ending, fireworks.

Lev Raphael?s Winter Eyes is a richly textured portrait of Stefan Borowski as he grows up in New York with parents who are traumatized by their World War II past in Poland. They do everything possible not to deal with that painful history and to protect Stefan from it. These secrets and his awakening sexual interests create a world of unknowns for him. I always cared about and was sometimes anxious about him as he found his way through family and peer relationships from the first grade through his first year of college.

In addition to being excellent reading, Winter Eyes gives new perspectives for thinking about important questions involving families, the past, and sexuality.


Rating:
Summary: Surviving isn't always thriving
Review: I have read many of this author's works. As always I am moved and perhaps a bit dirtied by his canny ability to get me into the web of his story. Winter Eyes took me though New York as I knew it growing up. The people are real, the smells are powerful and the prejudices are grating. Our family use to say you had to speak 6 languages to cross all the territories from home to school. Mr. Raphael doesn't say these things, he shows it in his dialogue, the mystery of couplings working and coming undone and the alliances among family members. These assets make Winter Eyes so poignant to me, particularly when one assumes that surviving the holocaust was so unbelievable that nothing else could harm you. That myth was shattered as the author shows how the survivors are still in prison and their attempts to protect the family become a worse warden. Tough, straight and vivid read.

Rating:
Summary: Identity and Denial
Review: Stefan, the child of Holocaust survivors, is denied knowledge of his own identity and family history. His parents and Uncle Sasha, who have suffered endless horrors during the Holocaust, conspire to protect Stefan from the secret of his heritage. They deny their religion, their ancestors, and their heritage, leaving an empty void in its place. Stefan's relationship with his parents is a metaphor for that emptiness. There is no warmth, love, or strong family ties in his relationship to them. When he tries to learn about his aunt, grandparents, and family history his inquiries are rebuffed. Stefan, in turn, rebuffs his parents' attempts to stay close to him. After their separation he rejects them, prefering to live with his uncle.
He denies his parents their right to happiness when they try to move on in their lives, although they are obviously both doing much better apart.
This haunting story indicates that the pain and sorrow of the Holocaust survives, and impacts the life and destiny of so many generations after the event.