Safekeeping: A Novel

(Paperback)

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Description

A dazzling debut novel about love, loss, and the courage it takes to start over.
Its 1994 and Adam, a drug addict from New York City, arrives at a kibbutz in Israel with a medieval sapphire brooch. To redress a past crime, he must give the priceless heirloom to a woman his grandfather loved when he was a Holocaust refugee on the kibbutz fifty years earlier. But first, he has to track this mystery woman downa task that proves more complicated than expected.
On the kibbutz Adam joins other lost souls: Ulya, the ambitious and beautiful Soviet migre; Farid, the lovelorn Palestinian farmhand; Claudette, the French Canadian Catholic with OCD; Ofir, the Israeli teenager wounded in a bus bombing; and Ziva, the old Socialist Zionist firebrand who founded the kibbutz. Driven together by love, hostility, hope, and fear, their fates become forever entangled as they each get one last shot at redemption.
In the middle of that fateful summer glows the magnificent brooch with its perilous history spanning three continents and seven centuries. With insight and beauty, Safekeeping tackles that most human of questions: How can we expect to find meaning and happiness when we know that nothing lasts

Reviews

"Luminous, irreverent, and ambitious...Full of romance, tragedy, betrayal, and the constant reminder that chaos is a driving force in everyone's story, Safekeeping is a wise and memorable debut by a novelist of great talent and originality." -- The Boston Globe "A book that is greater than the sum of its parts. A complex, beautiful story about the inheritance of Jewish history." -- The Globe and Mail "One of the most assured debut novels in years...It's a page-turner that satisfies all the cravings of escapist reading while meeting the real world head-on." -- The Montreal Gazette "A pleasurable and engulfing read." -- The Jerusalem Post "This beautiful story of loss and hope sweeps artfully through 600 years of Jewish resilience. With its richly drawn, believable characters and its great sensitivity, Hope's novel is a striking debut." -- Booklist "When a debut novel comes along and dares just enough and hits the right notes, it deserves our attention." -- Tablet Magazine "This emotional journey will leave readers with aching hearts and deepened empathy for the waifs and strays of our world." -- Shelf Awareness (starred review) "An intricate tapestry of love and longing, failure and redemption. Not every character will be saved but readers will keep rooting for them." -- Library Journal "[Jessamyn Hope] may be a first-time author, but she's already a master storyteller." -- Washington Jewish Week "Gorgeously written, evocative novel." -- Colorado Review One of The Boston Globe's "Suggested Summer Reads" for 2015. A New York Public Library Staff Pick Finalist for the 2016 Paterson Fiction Prize Included on BuzzFeed Books' "53 Books You Won't Be Able to Put Down" Praise for Jessamyn Hope's Safekeeping: "A summer on a kibbutz; a disparate cast of characters torn by their own past lives and the inescapable burdens of history; a plot driven by a valuable gold brooch crafted by a master goldsmith in the Middle Ages: from these seemingly ordinary materials Jessamyn Hope has wrought something wonderful. I don't mean simply that her plot is compelling, utterly lucid, and deeply resonant, which it is; or that her troubled characters are created with both deep compassion and clear-eyed skepticism, which they are; or even that she writes brilliantly, which she does. What's most wonderful about Safekeeping is the author's uncanny sense of how much of the world can be understood by keen attention to its smallest particulars, and how meaningfulness will multiply when you refuse to force upon the reader your own personal meanings. Like the exquisite gold brooch that shimmers emblematically at its center, Safekeeping seems to glow with a rich patina of timelessness, the sign of true art. Listen, do yourself a huge favor, read this book." -- Mark Dintenfass, author of Old World, New World and A Loving Place "There is no writer whose first novel I have awaited more eagerly than Jessamyn Hope, and Safekeeping surpasses my expectations. It's a brilliant and captivating novel about the past, the present, and the future, about love and legacy, and it is written with Hope's singular blend of intelligence, clarity, and grace. I am very happy it is finally here among us." -- Peter Cameron, author of Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You and Coral Glynn "This globetrotting, century-hopping novel is extraordinary. Fearless and tender, Jessamyn Hope holds in her hands both the sweep of history and the intricacies of the human heart. Lives shaped by larger forces must still be lived, and with desire and fear, strength and frailty, the characters in Safekeeping movingly struggle towards transformation. These are people and a story that will stick with me." -- Caitlin Horrocks, author of This Is Not Your City "With a sharp eye and a masterful hand, Jessamyn Hope brings to life the complex world of one Israeli kibbutz--from the troubled young volunteers to the new immigrant Russians to its old embattled Socialist founders--during a single sweltering Middle Eastern summer. Rich in history, lavish in its portrayal of place, and fueled by an exciting tale about a jewel that must be restored to its rightful owner, Safekeeping is a terrifically absorbing read by a writer who knows what she's talking about. I was hooked from the first page." -- Joan Leegant, author of Wherever You Go and An Hour in Paradise "In Safekeeping, Jessamyn Hope explores the manifold contradictions of the people drawn to Israel as elegantly as the medieval jeweler who designed the heirloom brooch that dramatically catalyzes her plot. Both passionate and compassionate, the novel is a joy to read." -- Melvin Jules Bukiet, author of After: A Novel and editor of Nothing Makes You Free: Writings by Descendants of Jewish Holocaust Survivors "In Safekeeping, Jessamyn Hope introduces an extraordinary cast of characters and by way of their desires and secrets weaves an intricate and moving portrait of humanity. Hope is an enormously skillful storyteller, providing great suspense while also creating the daily patterns of these memorable lives." -- Jill McCorkle, author of Life After Life and Going Away Shoes "I hadn't read very far into Jessamyn Hope's beautiful novel before I knew I was in the presence of a unique talent. Her voice is unlike anyone else's, and she knows these characters inside out and has made them come alive in these gorgeously written pages. Safekeeping is cause for celebration. I admired every word of it." -- Steve Yarbrough, author of The Realm of Last Chances and Safe from the Neighbors

Author Bio

Safekeeping is Jessamyn Hope's debut novel. Her fiction and memoirs have appeared in Ploughshares, Five Points, Colorado Review, Descant, and PRISM international, among other literary magazines. She was the Susannah McCorkle Scholar in Fiction at the 2012 Sewanee Writers Conference and has an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. Originally from Montreal, Hope lived in Israel before moving to New York City. Learn more at jessamynhope.com.