On Division by Goldie Goldbloom
On Division by Goldie Goldbloom
" Goldbloom's wise, sensitive novel offers both a fascinating glimpse into an insular Chassidic community, and a powerful look into one woman's mind and heart. Surie Eckstein is a pillar of her community, surrounded by a large, loving family... but when she becomes pregnant in her late fifties, she's so blindsided by fear and doubt that she can't even tell those closest to her. Goldbloom is unafraid to raise complex, difficult questions about the ideals that have held Surie's life together, and the result is a story that is rich, thoughtful and satisfying "
- Recommended by Erika
I
n Williamsburg, Brooklyn, just a block or two up from the East River on Division Avenue, Surie Eckstein is soon to be a great-grandmother. Her ten children range in age from thirteen to thirty-nine. Her in-laws, postwar immigrants from Romania, live on the first floor of their house. Her daughter Tzila Ruchel lives on the second. She and Yidel, a scribe in such demand that he makes only a few Torah scrolls a year, live on the third. Wed when Surie was sixteen, they have a happy marriage and a full life, and, at the ages of fifty-seven and sixty-two, they are looking forward to some quiet time together.
Into this life of counted blessings comes a surprise. Surie is pregnant. Pregnant at fifty-seven. It is a shock. And at her age, at this stage, it is an aberration, a shift in the proper order of things, and a public display of private life. She feels exposed, ashamed. She is unable to share the news, even with her husband. And so for the first time in her life, she has a secret—a secret that slowly separates her from the community.