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A review by thejoyofbooking
Whatever happened to Anna K. by Irina Reyn
It's rare that a modern retelling can be better than the original. To be honest, I'm not sure that's what happened here, but I do know that I don't feel like I need to go read Anna Karenina now, and that's a cool thing.
Anna, a 30-something New Yorker in the Jewish Russian immigrant community, finally settles down because she feels like she's supposed to. Alex K. seems nice enough, he's financially stable, and it'll finally get her mother off her back. Of course, no sooner is she settled than she meets David, who's dating her cousin Katia, who's being pursued by Lev. It's a modern soap opera fraught with the tensions of both unrequited and unacceptable love.
Anna is the kind of woman you'd love to hate, but you can't quite muster up enough feeling for her to do so. Which, actually, is part of this story's brilliance - drawing an unlikable protagonist while keeping the reader engaged is difficult to do, but I think Irina Reyn does it very well. The tragedy at the end of the book is quietly devastating, all the more so because of its realism.
Anna, a 30-something New Yorker in the Jewish Russian immigrant community, finally settles down because she feels like she's supposed to. Alex K. seems nice enough, he's financially stable, and it'll finally get her mother off her back. Of course, no sooner is she settled than she meets David, who's dating her cousin Katia, who's being pursued by Lev. It's a modern soap opera fraught with the tensions of both unrequited and unacceptable love.
Anna is the kind of woman you'd love to hate, but you can't quite muster up enough feeling for her to do so. Which, actually, is part of this story's brilliance - drawing an unlikable protagonist while keeping the reader engaged is difficult to do, but I think Irina Reyn does it very well. The tragedy at the end of the book is quietly devastating, all the more so because of its realism.