Elizabeth Graver's epic fifth novel, Kantika, spans countries and continents, taking readers from Istanbul to Barcelona, then to Havana and finally to New York City. Graver's feisty protagonist, Rebecca Baruch Levy (née Cohen), is born into a wealthy, elite family, but faces multiple challenges with courage and grit as she carves out a life of her own.
Graver (The End of the Point) begins her novel in 1907, during "the beautiful time" in Constantinople, when Rebecca is a child attending the local French Catholic school and playing with her best friend, Rahelika. Her life is a mélange of Ladino and French, religion and superstition, delight and darkness; she is known in her community, provided for and loved. This idyll, of course, does not last; when World War I breaks out, the nuns' school closes abruptly and Rahelika's family leaves for the U.S. Nearly a decade later, Rebecca's family is also forced to flee their home city (now named Istanbul) for Barcelona, where her father, having gambled away much of his money and lost the rest, takes a lowly job as the cleaner of a synagogue. He is furious at being made to return to the land that chased his ancestors away, but his wife, Sultana, and his children, including Rebecca, adapt to the new life in their own ways. Graver skillfully portrays the effects of cataclysmic change on a family, the ways some people embrace changes and challenges, and others shrink from them--as well as the sheer ingenuity of some, like Rebecca, who will try nearly anything to survive and thrive.
After some years as a dressmaker in Barcelona and a first marriage that produces two sons but ends in widowhood, Rebecca embarks on an ocean voyage to Cuba, to marry Sam Levy, a man she has not yet met. When they arrive in New York City to begin their life together, Rebecca meets Sam's daughter, Luna. Motherless and severely disabled, but as stubborn as Rebecca herself, Luna will become Rebecca's nemesis, her constant companion and, eventually, something like her friend.
Graver crafts a compelling narrative with Rebecca at its center, weaving in threads of religion and history, feminism and family dynamics, passion and duty, survival and love. Ladino, Rebecca's mother tongue, is woven throughout the text in phrases and proverbs, and each section contains a family photo, at once enigmatic and enticing. "The past feels heavy, the present thin," Rebecca muses after Lika's departure for the U.S. The phrase is a fitting description for Graver's novel, where the weight of the past and the ephemeral nature of the present tangle together to create a bewitching whole. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams
Shelf Talker: Elizabeth Graver's complex, beautiful fifth novel follows a Sephardic Jewish woman as her life crosses multiple continents.