Overview

""Anna's Dance: A Balkan Odyssey is an ambitious undertaking. Rich with drama and passion, it's a poignant story of love and misadventure..."" -The Manhattan Review Anna Rossi, the protagonist of the coming-of-age novel, Anna's Dance: A Balkan Odyssey, is a twenty-three-year-old mostly Jewish-American girl alienated from her roots and fearful of intimacy. On an impromptu journey through the Balkans, an area whose history and culture attracts her as a kind of mirror of her own, she meets others who share with her a past of external prejudice and internal suffering. Forced to confront directly what results when nations suppress their minorities, Anna learns that ugly stereotypes can distort one's sense of self and heritage, and that anger and frustration can lead to ethno-nationalism and violence. Set in 1968, when world-wide protests raged against repressive regimes and powerful majorities, Anna's odyssey highlights antisemitism and the Holocaust in America and the Balkans as it immerses her in the pain of other ethnicities, opens her to love and loss, and helps her find meaning, a purpose, and her own place in the world. In Istanbul's oldest synagogue, she proudly embraces her Jewish identity. Steeped in American, Jewish, and Balkan history, Anna's Dance links the marginalized, among them Jews, African Americans, Armenians, and the various Balkan peoples-while exploring concerns that plague us still, both here at home and globally.

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9781684334865

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Reviews

...a highly emotive and character-driven narrative that perfectly captures one young woman's experience of coming of age. -Readers' Favorite ...absolutely compelling reading replete with cultural and psychological insights alike. -Midwest Book Review A beautiful story of finding love and self-acceptance, masterfully woven onto a backdrop of a centuries-old struggle for cultural identity. --Pamela Taylor, author of the Second Son Chronicles This is a Romantic tale of passion, commitment, and danger, a thriller that you will not want to put down. --Valerie Nieman, author of To the Bones and Blood Clay

...a highly emotive and character-driven narrative that perfectly captures one young woman's experience of coming of age. -Readers' Favorite ...absolutely compelling reading replete with cultural and psychological insights alike. -Midwest Book Review Anna's Dance: A Balkan Odyssey is an ambitious undertaking. Rich with drama and passion, it's a poignant story of love and misadventure... -The Manhattan Review A beautiful story of finding love and self-acceptance, masterfully woven onto a backdrop of a centuries-old struggle for cultural identity. --Pamela Taylor, author of the Second Son Chronicles This is a Romantic tale of passion, commitment, and danger, a thriller that you will not want to put down. --Valerie Nieman, author of To the Bones and Blood Clay

A beautiful story of finding love and self-acceptance, masterfully woven onto a backdrop of a centuries-old struggle for cultural identity. --Pamela Taylor, author of the Second Son Chronicles This is a Romantic tale of passion, commitment, and danger, a thriller that you will not want to put down. --Valerie Nieman, author of To the Bones and Blood Clay

Author Information

Like Anna, Michele Levy was bewitched by Balkan dance in her early twenties and has been captivated by the Balkans ever since. She has traveled there several times and published on their literature, history, and culture. In this debut novel, Michele portrays the special beauty, vibrancy, and complexities of the land and its peoples. And she still delights in dancing to a sinuous rhythm and a strong drumbeat.

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