Michal Gov­rin invites you, the read­er, to share her jour­ney, which she describes in this book of essays and short fic­tion in strik­ing imagery, “…a geo­log­i­cal rift that changed my emo­tion­al and intel­lec­tu­al land­scape, and placed its seal on my writ­ing… Dis­tant shocks pre­ced­ed the rift.” This is the world of the chil­dren of Holo­caust sur­vivors, of those who have lost fam­i­ly mem­bers in that hor­ren­dous night­mare. How is one intro­duced to that real­i­ty and cope with the incre­men­tal expe­ri­ences of such expo­sure? The author actu­al­ly heard about the Holo­caust from out­siders and in school, from cer­e­monies on cer­tain remem­brance days, before she dis­cov­ered her own mother’s life in the exter­mi­na­tion camps. The read­er sees how her mother’s expe­ri­ences shaped her writ­ing as she describes her vis­it to Poland in vivid images that car­ry a real yet sur­re­al­is­tic qual­i­ty which grad­u­al­ly cre­ates the same effect on the read­er. Sto­ries fol­low of sur­vivors who find com­fort and even joy in being togeth­er, yet one real­izes that expe­ri­ence is almost unbear­able because a con­stant rest­less and ner­vous under­cur­rent threads each meet­ing. Lic­it and illic­it com­mu­ni­ca­tion fol­lows in oth­er sto­ries, includ­ing a mytho­log­i­cal tale and a descrip­tion of prayer’s con­nec­tion to pho­to­graph­ic images. This is a book read­ers will embrace and remember.