The Lost Shtetl: A Novel

by Max Gross

Hardcover, 2020

Status

Available

Call number

F GRO Los

Genres

General Fiction

All Topics

Fiction

Collections

ADULT COLLECTION, Adult Fiction, SPECIAL: AJL JEWISH FICTION AWARD

Publication

HarperVia (2020), 416 pages

Description

"What if there was a town that Hitler missed? For over fifty years the tiny Jewish shtetl of Kreskol has existed virtually untouched and unchanged. Spared of the Holocaust and Cold War, Kreskol has enjoyed an isolated peace. But when a marriage dispute spirals out of control, Kreskol is suddenly rediscovered and brought into the 21st Century. Pesha is in a loveless, arranged marriage and summons the courage to escape Kreskol on foot. But when her husband goes after her, panicked town leaders (protecting secrets of their own) send a woefully unprepared young man out to bring them home. The orphaned outcast named Yankel-unlearned, functionally illiterate (his Yiddish is useless to the modern-day outside world), and tagged with an inconceivable origin story-soon finds himself in the care of a psych ward. But when the truth comes out about his origins, his name is splashed across the covers of Polish newspapers. Ready or not, Poland commits to returning Yankel to Kreskol, and reintegrating the town that time forgot. In the course of doing so, the devious origins of the town's disappearance come into the light. And what has become of those runaways? Kreskol, torn asunder by disagreement between those embracing change and those clinging to its old world ways, may soon be forced to make a choice or disappear altogether"--… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member froxgirl

Do you have to be Jewish to love this book? No. You just have to be the type of reader who enjoys a bit of historical magical realism. In this tale, the tiny, insular Polish shtetl (Yiddish for "village") of Kreskol has been hidden in the deep woods, beyond modern viewing and imagination, surviving

world wars and undiscovered even by Nazi troops when Poland was overrun. When a contentious married couple divorces (very rare) and then disappears, a baker's apprentice is recruited to venture into the outer world and find them. Yankel hitches a ride with gypsies, the only outsiders who travel through Kreskol, and is brought to Smolskie, the nearest small city. Here Yankel makes the startling discoveries of cars, trains, cellphones, televisions, internet, and planes, and lands in a psychiatric hospital where he finds sympathetic staff members who help him to make a gradual adjustment to the perils and pleasure of what for him is a true new world. We also follow the couple Yankel is seeking, Pesha and Ishmael, as they go their own separate and doomed ways. And back in Kreskol, everything changes when the whole of Poland and the entire world marvels at their secret existence. This is a delightful adventure story, filled with humor and pathos.

Quote: "He saw in the story of the Holocaust a vision of the future that Kreskol narrowly avoided. He saw all the great advances of technology that had been honed and perfected in the service of mankind's most primitive and horrific instincts."

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LibraryThing member evatkaplan

interesting premise. Written like a Batsheva Singer, with Jewish phrases and lingo and style. It was a bit long.
I found the ending very uncomfortable

LibraryThing member Kristelh

Reason Read: Jewish Book Club Dec 2022 read, ROOT
I was happy to read this book this month because it had been on my shelf for awhile. It is a story of a shtetl that was lost in Poland and totally did know that there was a WWII. Their contact with the world disrupts their community but it also

results in the world accusing them of faking this and eventually this lost shtetl wishes they had never been found. It's an easy read with exploration of the Yiddish Jews and how culture and contact with the world can come with serious concerns.

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