Anna Fodorova
Novel
ISBNs: print: 978-1-913665-60-9; eBook: 978-1-913665-61-6
234x156mm 180pp
£12/£4
London 1988, Munich and Prague 1989: Agata grew up in post-war Prague and believes that her mother was the only member of her family to survive the Holocaust – but not everyone died.
Agata’s search for her ‘lost’ family, set against the background of revolutions in Eastern Europe, threatens to tear apart not only the family she already has, but her own identity.
A woman searches for her unknown family against the background of a historical upheaval that radically changed our whole continent. A story of a personal turmoil that unravels in London and also in a less known part of Europe. A memory of our common history written in her genes masterfully portrayed by the author.
Pavla Jazairiova, author, journalist.
A visceral, compelling story of a woman driven to understand the truth about her family, despite her mother’s evasive tactics. Her search takes on a claustrophobic intensity as she makes troubling choices, vividly conveyed, along with intimate portraits of married life, and the pain and exultant joys of discovery as she strives for personal knowledge amidst the cover-ups of historical trauma.
Marsha Rowe, author and Spare Rib founder
Fodorova’s brilliant story pulled me back eighty years into a time of almost unimaginable horror, then pushed me back into a world that clearly hasn’t healed, where trauma still reverberates.
I loved Agata and her determination to uncover the truth, and I did not see the slam-dunk punch of an ending coming, not even for a moment.
This book leads the reader through scenes of terrible cruelty, but with such a deft touch that we don’t need to look away. Instead, there is learning, and a beginning of understanding, and perhaps even some hope for the future.
Rosalind Stopps, author
Those of us without a tranquil family history might feel more than most the urge to probe the mysteries of our deep past. The past before we were born. In Agata, Anna Fodorova has created a character of robust complexity, both lovable and irritating, whose search to claim the wider family of her origins among the lost and survivors of the Holocaust leads her to risk the present happiness of the one she needs to cherish. Her tenacity is wholly believable. We know that love can be at odds with the other forces that compel our actions, and Fodorova’s rendering of domestic life and its everyday extremities impresses with its tender precision.
I appreciated so much about this novel: its awareness that uncovered secrets can hurt as well as heal; its reminders that the past lives inside us, while it drives the movement of history and societies. In the course of Agata’s quest the Berlin Wall comes down and another reckoning begins. With its gentle and often humorous insights, In The Blood is a part of this.
Liz Heron, Author, Editor, Translator
Pychologically astute, elegant and readable, this is a family saga like no other.
Lynn French, author and editor
Listen to an interview with Anna Fodorova on Radio Prague International
listen to a sample from the audiobook, read by Lisa Rose
