The Empress of Weehawken

Catholic upper class woman from the Rhineland marries Jewish surgeon from Silencia before WWII and retells their years in Germany during the war, later in America and looking back not only on her own life but on that of her daughter Renate and granddaughter, Irene Dische.

First sentence: "Much of what went kaput, as the Americans say, in the generations after mine can be blamed on Carl´s low sperm count. He had murdered his men with heroism, the exact details later. As a result, he only managed one child. And that was the wrong sex. We tried and tried for another. He would plant himself inside me and till away. He worked hard, grunting and sweating- he was not a lazybone."

Year

2007

Language

English

Publisher

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Editions

5

Pages

307

ISBN

9780374299125

Data source: Wikidata