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Atomic Anna
by Rachel Barenbaum
✨ Review ✨ Atomic Anna by Rachel Barenbaum
This is one of my FAVORITE books I've read so far this year!
Atomic Anna centers three generations of women - Anna, her daughter Molly, and Molly's daughter Raisa - across the 20th century. From the 1910s to the 1990s, these women struggle with the meaning of family and their obligations to society as they strive to prioritize their passions (science / comics / math & engineering). When Anna discovers a mechanism to time travel, she strives to right the wrongs of her life while keeping her family safe across the century.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Genre: Historical Fiction, Family Drama
Location: USSR, Philadelphia, Berlin, Chernobyl
Pub Date: April 5, 2022
Barenbaum delivers EVERYTHING I love best in historical fiction -- badass women, multiple timelines (in this case, via time travel), global historical context (WWII, Cold War, Chernobyl, and migrant communities in the U.S.). The book weaves in ethical discussions of atomic energy, violence and revenge, and the potential dangers of scientific research alongside questions of family and parenting, gender roles, and more. I loved that it tackled WWII and the Cold War through a Soviet perspective, and through a Russian Jewish woman who certainly wasn't a Soviet diehard - this provided a fascinating, thought-provoking take on these global political conflicts from the view of a marginalized scientist.
I was hooked from the first pages of the prologue and could barely put this book down. She so brilliantly uses time travel to create a nonlinear timeline where characters cross paths and shape each other's lives in surprising ways throughout the book. While I've read books where time travel is more science-based than magic-based, this world of time travel comes with many limitations, which ramped up the intensity of the suspense within.
VERY VAGUE SPOILER BELOW....
.
.
I was a little disappointed in the ending of the book. Everything seemed tied up a little too seamlessly, and I'd have loved for a little more nuance and complexity here.
.
.
Read this if you like:
⭕️ Time-travel stories, historical fiction of the 20th century
⭕️ Badass women in STEM
⭕️ Complex multi-generational family dramas
Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and #netgalley for a digital and physical copy of this book!
This is one of my FAVORITE books I've read so far this year!
Atomic Anna centers three generations of women - Anna, her daughter Molly, and Molly's daughter Raisa - across the 20th century. From the 1910s to the 1990s, these women struggle with the meaning of family and their obligations to society as they strive to prioritize their passions (science / comics / math & engineering). When Anna discovers a mechanism to time travel, she strives to right the wrongs of her life while keeping her family safe across the century.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Genre: Historical Fiction, Family Drama
Location: USSR, Philadelphia, Berlin, Chernobyl
Pub Date: April 5, 2022
Barenbaum delivers EVERYTHING I love best in historical fiction -- badass women, multiple timelines (in this case, via time travel), global historical context (WWII, Cold War, Chernobyl, and migrant communities in the U.S.). The book weaves in ethical discussions of atomic energy, violence and revenge, and the potential dangers of scientific research alongside questions of family and parenting, gender roles, and more. I loved that it tackled WWII and the Cold War through a Soviet perspective, and through a Russian Jewish woman who certainly wasn't a Soviet diehard - this provided a fascinating, thought-provoking take on these global political conflicts from the view of a marginalized scientist.
I was hooked from the first pages of the prologue and could barely put this book down. She so brilliantly uses time travel to create a nonlinear timeline where characters cross paths and shape each other's lives in surprising ways throughout the book. While I've read books where time travel is more science-based than magic-based, this world of time travel comes with many limitations, which ramped up the intensity of the suspense within.
VERY VAGUE SPOILER BELOW....
.
.
I was a little disappointed in the ending of the book. Everything seemed tied up a little too seamlessly, and I'd have loved for a little more nuance and complexity here.
.
.
Read this if you like:
⭕️ Time-travel stories, historical fiction of the 20th century
⭕️ Badass women in STEM
⭕️ Complex multi-generational family dramas
Thanks to Grand Central Publishing and #netgalley for a digital and physical copy of this book!