In My Mother's House : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: A gem of a book
Review: I am a voracious reader always on the lookout for a good new (to me) author. Margaret McMullan is that. This latest novel of hers is a haunting, evocative story of a mother and daughter (told from alternating viewpoints, a tactic that works very well here) seeking connectedness after a lifetime of polite estrangement. As the story unfolds, we see why Jenny has become who she is as a mother. Her story unfolds from 1930's Austria to current day America. Ms McMullan's descriptions of 1930's Austria as war encroaches on an unsuspecting people, are so vivid that you can smell the air and hear the music. And by the end of the book, you will come to care about Jenny and Elizabeth greatly and come to understand a lot about love, loss, and especially, hope.

Rating:
Summary: I've Already Been Attracted
Review: I know the author's first novel and that's why I started to read this - her second.
As I had expected, I've already been attracted by the story though I'm yet only half way. I especially like the description of a father and a very young daughter relationship at the beginning which easily reminds us of our own similar happy childhood with our father. Elegant, refined still very serious is my first impression of this novel. Besides, the English of this novel is not so hard for non-English speakers like me.
I can't wait to see what will be happening to this family. I'll go on reading as fast as I can. "I'll be back" here when I'm finished with it.

A Japanese reader in Japan!!

Rating:
Summary: "In My Mother's House"
Review: Margaret McMullan has invested emotion and authenticity in her story - a story of a family's connection to its past; guarded secrets, religious convictions, resentment and finally understanding. We hear ancestors speaking to their descendants throughout the story, revealing the joys and disappointments of life that ultimately become the inheritance of a mother and daughter.

"In My Mother's House" takes the reader on a journey that begins at the family's rich and abundant ancestral home in Vienna at the start of World War II. Along the way, the family's memories of escape and survival, separation and confluence are illuminated for the reader.

The richness of a life left behind in Austria is contrasted sharply with the less meaningful, modern-day life of a daughter who is determined to learn of her mother's past so as to make sense of the present.

McMullan's historical fiction is compelling as it draws upon the darkest days of the Holocaust, lost religious traditions and the smells and sounds of Vienna in the 1930s - a time and place lost forever.