Customer Reviews

The Invisible Bridge

5 star:		(130)
4 star:		(46)
3 star:		(20)
2 star:		(12)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

World War II and the Holocaust have been covered so extensively in so many formats, and yet there are so many under represented stories. This book takes up one of these side stories, the story Jews in Hungary, that didn't make the textbooks or documentaries. And unlike textbook or documentary coverage, it brings the day-to-day realities of the war to life and will touch you in the way, only a personal story can.

Obviously this is a historical fiction, which is different from a primary source, but the writing is authentic and either very well researched or edited by a very knowledgeable historian. So many historical fiction books lose credibility on historic slips, but this book never does. When a new radio is described, it is Bakelite, not plastic. The words painted vivid pictures that had me craving croissants in Paris and Paprika and Potato dumplings in Hungary.

But the power of this book is that it will make you appreciate your warm bed, your clean sheets and each meal and trip to the grocery store by portraying what it was like when all these things were unavailable. It has been hard to get all of these deprivations out of my head since I finished the book. I have read remarkably few books that describe the hunger of those living in Europe as eloquently as this book.

It did take me a while to get into this book. 600 pages is pretty intimidating and it is dense in Jewish and Hungarian names, but after 100 pages I was hooked and drug along. The writing is immensely readable and I felt a connection to the characters (enough so that I have to admit I flipped to the back to make sure at least someone made it through.) The book culminated in a marathon session when I just couldn't put it down. It's a powerful book that is high on my annual recommendation list.

I loved this book for many of the reasons that I loved The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society (Random House Reader's Circle) because it shone light on a forgotten war story and it felt so authentic. Great book.

If it is an author's highest goal to fully absorb her reader into the novel, then Julie Orringer's "The Invisible Bridge" stands as a marvel. When her characters joyed, I smiled. When they faced terror, my mouth went dry and my breath grew short. As they suffered, I found myself pushing back tears. As a reader I am rarely sentimental, yet something here seized my heart, and through almost 600 pages, this author artfully cupped it in her hands.

As Europe races towards war, a young Jew young Andras Levi travels to Paris to study architecture. Through school where he is a star, and the theatre where he works, Andras meets a parade of colorful characters. When set up with a girl, he instead falls in love with her mother, Klara. The two become swept up in a passionate affair, and in time she reveals the dark secret which forced her to flee Hungary sixteen years earlier. Orringer weaves a web of gripping digressive sub-plots, each of which pulls us along, but there is never any real doubt where these characters will end up -- Andras and Klara will spend the war back in their native Hungary.

With the library of novels written describing the Holocaust in Poland and Germany, and more seeming to appear every day, I found it fascinating to read Orringer's well researched descriptions of the experience of Hungarian Jews. Hated by the Fascist Arrow Cross Party, yet "protected" from Hitler by the regent Horthy they suffered abuse, humiliation, and often murder, but through much of the war were spared becoming grist for the mill of Nazi genocide. Hungarian Jews, as the last of Europe's great communities to be destroyed, as well as being perhaps the least considered, here receives a very fine elegy from the descendant of one survivor.

At heart, "The Invisible Bridge" is a war romance, much in the vain of "The English Patient" or even more Halprin's superb "A Soldier of the Great War." As such, one often has to suspend disbelief and the prose can at time graze against the purple. Coincidences abound. Our hero Andras, may indeed be too good to be true, though he does suffer from an excess of intellectual pride and a certain naïveté. Yet if you are someone inclined towards historical romances, such things are besides the point; you read on because you are compelled to do so, to see what becomes of these people, to pray that you see them safely and happily to the end. This would be an evocative piece of fiction even if it weren't Orringer's first novel. As such, it is simply extraordinary.

I do not especially care for most romance novels but I do love historical fiction and The Invisible Bridge appealed to me as a Jewish love story set against the backdrop of Hungary and France during World War II. As a first novel for Julie Orringer, The Invisible Bridge is indeed an impressive achievement in the research and presentation of established historic events. I am not Jewish so I have a great appreciation for any knowledge of Jewish history, particularly of the Holocaust and World War II, that I might learn through literature. The Invisible Bridge proved to be no exception. It is reminiscent of some of great works of historical literature that I have the highest respect for, including Fatelessness by Imre Kertesz, Night (Oprah's Book Club) by Elie Wiesel, Mila 18 by Leon Uris, The Pianist: The Extraordinary True Story of One Man's Survival in Warsaw, 1939-1945 by Wladyslaw Szpilman, and Suite Francaise by Irene Nemirovsky to name a few. I might not put Ms. Orringer's first novel up againt any of those as a literary achievement but I think The Invisible Bridge really demonstrates knowledge, skill and accomplishment. In fact I think this novel leans more toward the tradition of James Michener, another writer of historic fiction who I still admire to this day.

The novel is indeed well crafted and the language poetic. I must admit though that I cared least for the first 200 pages of this 600 page novel. In the opening chapters where the plot is meticulously developed and the characters fleshed out, I almost had to give up on the book entirely, wondering if I really wanted to invest any more time in what I thought was an overly long, overly sentimental, "Harlequin-style" romance.

First of all, the many, many unbelievable coincidences upon which the story is built completely blocked my willing suspension of disbelief and annoyed me greatly. Secondly, the main character, Andras Levi, is just too good a hero to be true. He is without a flaw ~ handsome, intelligent, talented, charming, devoted, honest, exceptional in every way. He's a good Jewish son, a devoted lover, a dedicated friend, an excellent student, the perfect employee, a great patriot. Likewise, his mysterious beautiful heroine is also dramatic perfection. Furthermore I thought too much of the dialogue was unnatural and rigid, lacking nuance and personality.

Since I can never put down a book unfinished that I intend to review, I persisted on, reading with a skeptical eye rather than a sympathetic one. Interestingly enough, by Part Four I realized that I had entirely forgiven the book its earlier weaknesses and had completely thrown myself under the spell of Ms. Orringer's powerful storytelling. I was riveted; I could not put it down.

The historic presentation of the book is as forceful and gripping as it is chilling and haunting. Ms. Orringer's ability to translate into words the shattering horror of the Jewish experience of the Holocaust and World War II is masterful storytelling of wrenching emotional intensity. The story is familiar, telling of the subjection of the Jews ~ the subjection of human beings to the social forces which have stripped away everything from them and are "made nonsensical, made small, consigned to impossibility, crammed into a space too narrow to admit life. But today as he'd marched to work and shoveled dirt and eaten the miserable food and slogged home through the mud, he hadn't felt indignant, he hardly felt anything at all. He was just an animal on earth, one of billions." Yet Andras learns to survive. He survives by remembering the great love in his life and by pretending, by fooling himself into staying alive; making himself "a willing party to the insidious trick of love."

The strength of Ms. Orringer's novel is the tender and poignant testimony of the human spirit, the fragile structure of a human being standing against the barbaric forces of history. It is a touching story of the power of love, the foundation of life which withstands the horror and tragedy, grief and despair of war.

It is just a pity that her focus is on romantic maudlinism and contrived, ridiculous plotting in the first part of the book. I can't quite get beyond those weaknesses and therefore rate it 3 stars rather than more.

The Invisible Bridge - Julie Orringer
5 stars

Sometimes, there is a final deciding factor that puts a book into the five star category. In the case of The Invisible Bridge, the book moved from four stars to five because I could not stop thinking about it. Two weeks after reading this book, I'm still thinking about the characters, the setting, the art and the historical background of this novel.
It is the story of Andras Levi, a young Hungarian Jew who immigrates to Paris to study architecture on the eve of World War Two. I was fascinated by the detailed descriptions of life in Budapest and Paris. I learned aspects of art and architecture that are still sending me to google for more information. In addition to the details of Andras' intellectual life there is his deep affection towards his brothers, his loyal friendship with other Jewish students and his complicated, passionate love affair with an older woman. Even before the war begins, the book depicts the consequences of widespread anti-Semitism affecting Andras both in his native Hungary and in Paris. In the end, all of the growing success and future hopes of the Levi brothers come crashing down into the day to day need for survival. This was a very powerful story; well worth the telling and well worth reading all of the 600 pages.

On the positive side, this book was clearly well-researched and well-plotted if one can ignore the numerous extraordinary coincidences on which the plot hinges. When it is not overwrought, it can also be well-written, and it goes without saying that the subject matter itself is intense, rich in tragic potential.

Andras, the main character, is so perfect, seflessly loving, brave, handsome, intelligent, good, really really really good, amazing, unbelievably, annoyingly, mawkishly good, that he ceases to be a character. He is just a facade of human perfection. In fact, he is so perfect that everyone around him must also be perfect. His brothers are therefore impausibly "good". He is the ideal son and his parents were extraordinary parents. And goodness is his lover full of goodness! Their lovemaking, naturally, is perfection itself. And Andras's dear friend, Polaner, is so good he makes the rest of them seem like dirtbags.
Polaner is gay, and this is the 1930s, but of course these people are all so good that nobody has a speck of ambilavence. he is just loved and accepted perfectly for who he is.
Doesn't anyone ever have a selfish private thought ever ever?????

Here is the typical scene in this novel, repeated over and over in various forms, and if you like it, please go out and buy this:

An eighty year old man is dying of natural causes in the midst of a fierce battle. "We need to go, now, or we'll all die!" someone says. And our hero, Andras, declares, "No! I will not leave him. Never! You go on." "But...he'll be dead in a few hours anyone! It makes no sense!" "No!" Andras insists. "I cannot leave him. I don't care if i die. You go!" At which point, the reader (this reader anyway) is thinking, "Dude! Moron! Yes, that means you, Andras. You barely even know this guy. What's you're freaking problem?"

Also, though there is a good deal of history, there is not a long of understanding or thinking about the era or the politics. there is no "why" that is ever pondered, by the author or the characters. because, ultimately, this is a sappy romance.

The era is certainly fascinating, disturbing, and always makes for gripping reading (i am jewish, so that colors my perspective). but there are so many better novels, and memoirs. with real characters, full of the complexity and foibles that make them, and all of us, human. So, if you don't like romance novels, there is not really much reason to read this.

Having spent time in Budapest, particularly at the opera house, and having been to Auschwitz (though Auschwitz isn't a focus in this book), I am familiar with Budapest and the surrounding areas. I am also well read on the subject of the Shoah and conditions people faced during this time. Orringer's writing is highly descriptive, well researched, and her appropriate use of the Hungarian language peppered throughout gave this writing local color realism that was visceral and believable. I couldn't wait to turn the next page to find out what happened to Tibi and Matyas--the whole family, in fact. Her writing had me smiling, crying--it was poignant and at times heart wrenching, as she was able to accurately evoke hardship, love, suffering... I can't wait to read what she writes next!The Invisible Bridge (Vintage Contemporaries)

The Invisible Bridge, without a doubt, has been the finest novel I have read in years! And, I am a prolific reader! Beautifully written, this historical fiction, captures the period and times of Europe preceding, during and after World War II in Hungary and Paris. The writing was so exquisite and poetic and powerful that, at times, I was forced to simply pause and reflect and take in what I had read. I was so absorbed that if I was interrupted while reading, I jumped, forgetting where I was. When I finished this novel, I was desolate because the book was over. I did not know what to do with myself and I realized that this was the reason I read. This was the reason and the purpose for reading. This was why I cherished and loved books. It was hard to pick up another book. "Read trash," someone told me, in order to get through, so that you can pick up another book again. Nothing will ever compare to The Invisible Bridge. I loved the characters. I found myself rooting for them, accepting their weakness and strengths, their foibles as my own. For the first time, I truly understood the time period, the fear and apprehension, the unknowing about what the future might hold, what living with uncertainty meant and entailed. I loved the passions and the lies, the sadness and the sorrow, the horror and the determination to survive, all that encompasses a life that is lived deeply and with longing. Orringer has been compared to Tolstoy. To me, she is one of the finest young writers on the scene today. 5 Stars is not enough for this Masterpiece.

The Invisible Bridge is an amazing book. An amazing, extremely long book--so you'll get your money's worth out of it! Set primarily in Paris and Hungary just prior to and during World War II, the book follows Andras Levi and his family and friends as they live their lives as European Jews during this era.

To be quite honest I kept expecting to get bored with the book; again, its length seemed as though it might be a barrier to a story with a riveting plot. However, given the subject matter and the outstanding writing, I never found my interest waning. Does the book add anything new to the already-dense library of WWII novels? In my opinion, yes.

First, the experience of Hungarian Jews was far different in many ways from those in Germany, Poland, or other countries that seem to be highlighted in greater detail in previous books. In this sense the book reminded me of The Glass Room, by Simon Mawer, which was set in Czechoslovakia during the same era. The story provided a lot of information about what happened in Hungary that may have been overlooked in prior works.

Next, the writing and characters were remarkable. If there were ever a book that conveyed the everyday life and fears of the Jewish population during this time, this is it. The author manages to deftly unwrap the experience of Hungarian Jews as they moved slowly and inexorably toward their fate. And the author did so without it becoming snooze-worthy, by vividly describing how it was to live when life or death was often decided by the smallest of cruel details.

In summary, I was extremely moved by the beauty and simultaneous gritty reality of The Invisible Bridge, and I learned a lot about WWII-era Hungary. If the author was trying to convey in prose what was so devastatingly rendered in poetry at the end of the book ("Any Case", by Wislawa Szymborska), she did so brilliantly. A definite recommend.

INTRODUCTION: As I mentioned in a recent review, sometimes books come out of nowhere, hijack my reading schedule and it takes a while until I can un-weave the magical spell they had exerted on me and leave their universe, usually needing at least one complete reread as well as an immediate review.

The novelistic debut of the author, The Invisible Bridge attracted my attention by its fascinating cover in a Borders bookstore several days ago and the blurb below made me open it; I got hooked on the first page which you can read in the extract linked above and I stayed way, way too late to finish the novel since I really needed to find out what happens with the main characters, while rereading it at leisure during the next few days.

"Paris, 1937. Andras Lévi, a Hungarian Jewish architecture student, arrives from Budapest with a scholarship, a single suitcase, and a mysterious letter he has promised to deliver to C. Morgenstern on the rue de Sévigné. As he becomes involved with the letter's recipient, his elder brother takes up medical studies in Modena, their younger brother leaves school for the stage - and Europe's unfolding tragedy sends each of their lives into terrifying uncertainty. From the Hungarian village of Konyár to the grand opera houses of Budapest and Paris, from the lonely chill of Andras's garret to the enduring passion he discovers on the rue de Sévigné, from the despair of a Carpathian winter to an unimaginable life in forced labor camps and beyond, The Invisible Bridge tells the unforgettable story of brothers bound by history and love, of a marriage tested by disaster, of a Jewish family's struggle against annihilation, and of the dangerous power of art in a time of war."

FORMAT/CLASSIFICATION: The Invisible Bridge stands at about 600 pages divided into five parts and 42 named chapters with an epilogue some decades later. The novel spans the turbulent years from 1937 to 1945 with action mostly in Paris, Budapest and various labor camps on or behind the Eastern front lines where Hungarian Jewish males were conscripted as forced laborers for the army instead of as soldiers, since they were considered unreliable to be given weapons and training to use them.

The novel follows the intertwined destinies of the lower-middle class Levy family from a village near Debrecen, of whom middle brother and architect-to-be, Andras is the main hero, though older brother Tibor and younger Matyas play important roles too and the rich Hasz family of Budapest, of whom early forties Gyorgy is a Bank President and his son Jozsef, a painter-to-be is studying - and partying, with more of the latter than the former of course - in Paris.

There is also mysterious early thirties Klara - Claire - Morgenstern who is a ballet teacher in Paris with a 16 year old strong willed daughter Elisabet, to whom Gyorgy's mother, the matriarch of the Hasz charges the twenty two year old Andras to secretly deliver a letter when he gets to Paris for his studies, in addition to carrying a huge package with goodies for Jozsef.

Romantic, epic, dark even painfully so at times, The Invisible Bridge is historical fiction of the highest caliber.

ANALYSIS: "The Invisible Bridge" succeeds so well because of three aspects:

1: The characters: Andras and Klara first and foremost are such extraordinary characters, the young idealistic student who cannot help himself but fall in love with the 31 year old woman with a 16 year old girl and a dark past we get hints about and who somehow managed to make a reasonably successful life for herself and Elisabet despite all; also Tibor, Andras' friends, the closet gay Polaner and the handsome Ben Yakov, the wastrel but good natured Joszef, theater manager Zoltan Novak who is Andras' mentor and first employer and the rest of the Hasz and Levi families are all memorable and distinctive characters and you want them to succeed and later to survive, though of course the odds were what they were, so do not get overtly fond of anyone...

2: The writing style which is spellbinding; the book is a page turner end to end and it manages to combine the first half cautious optimism of the main characters even in face of the clouds of war and of rising antisemitism in France and violence in Germany and other places, with the day to day struggle to survival in the face of the tightening vise of the second half. "The Invisible Bridge" does not descend into melodrama in the first half, nor does it descend into despair and darkness without a light in sight, in the second half, but it maintains a "matter of fact" attitude throughout that kept me guessing almost to the end what will be the fate of the characters.

3: The world-building: as noted at the end of the novel, "The Invisible Bridge" is based on the author's family stories and real life experiences plus a lot of research and it shows. The feel of both Paris of 1937-1939 and of Hungary from 1939-1945 is pitch perfect and the Jewish traditions are vividly expounded. "The Invisible Bridge" feels to me "right" as a book set partly in Eastern Europe in a way few books by Western authors feel and the little details like recipes, names, ways of speech contribute mightily to that feeling.

There are several moments that descend a bit into farce like the story of Ilana, the Italian Orthodox Rabbi's daughter that Tibor helps elope to Paris to secretly marry Andras' friend, the handsome ladies' man Ben Yakov - who is actually in love with Black American student Lucia - and of course Tibor falls in love with Ilana, while Ben Yakov is desperately unhappy that he cannot marry Lucia so he hopes that Ilana's beauty will 'cure him" of his "wandering eye" so to speak- all with predictable results of course, but the novel manages to surprise after that. But the lighter interludes work well as a balance to the increasing darkness that descends on the world and on our characters.

Another superb touch in the novel was how famous stories like Job's fate are weaved explicitly in the novel, first in the story of Andras' father nicknamed "Lucky Bella" in an ironic and tragic way as he lost everything in life - family, child, inheritance - by age 30 and was living in depression and despair on the community's charity until a wise rabbi convinced him to try and turn around his fortunes and then in the tragic story of one of novel's important characters, though for this one you have to read the book to find out what's what. The last meeting of Andras with the respective character in 1943 is one of the emotional highlights of the second half of the novel.

In turns, a wonderful love story, an epic historical saga in the grand traditions of yore and a dark story of destruction and survival, The Invisible Bridge (A++) is one of two awesome mainstream novels that will lead that category in my best of 2010 list.

Note: this review has been published originally on Fantasy book Critic and all links referred are found there

The story begins in 1937 Hungary. We travel to Paris with our protaganist Andras Levi, an hungarian-jewish architecture student on scholarship to study. Andras is a smart, talented and mature young man who uses these characteristics to survive in Paris and again in Budapest after the subtle beginnings of WWII begin to affect his life. In 1940 war is eminent and spreads like spilled syrup over Andras, the people he loves and all of Europe with a weight of love, the need to survive and having absolutely little to no control over ones life.

From the beginning, while reading make note of the characters because none are lost throughout the story. This is a long read with good purpose. Appropriately titled, 'The Invisible Bridge' is a book of bonds that are connected regardless of distance, time and circumstance.

Be ready for the vivid details and the highs and lows of this story. This story is beautifully written. Strong characterization lends itself to a relationship with the characters, each with their own story and depth. There were several times when I had to stop from reading to take in what I'd just read because I could see what had happened.

I feared, worried and rejoiced with these characters and was at ease with the realistic ending.The detail lends itself to the length but also to the vision of the story in my head. At times, this book can be very heavy but you read on and survive with the characters.Excellent depth and a good, long book to curl up with on a rainy or snow day.