I read THE INVISIBLE BRIDGE with a buddy in my online book club, The Reading Cove. It took me two weeks to finish it.
It's a very dense, sweeping epic set just before, during and after the height of WW2; it's part history lesson, part love story and part memorial for the victims and scarred survivors of that awful time in Hungarian history.
From the open I was immediately impressed with the descriptions of the brothers, Andras and Tibor, out for a night at the opera in late 1930s Budapest, having no idea of the horrors on the horizon.
This is not a story that can be read in a hurry to move on to your next book. It's best served with undivided and patient attention. The pace takes its time, from Paris to Hungary to the Ukraine; be prepared to settle in and snuggle up with this one. It requires time and commitment, as there's a lot of (tedious?) historical detail about the war, and many times when I felt it indulged far too long in certain storylines ~ with sharper editing, the book could've covered the same ground in 200 fewer pages without losing its emotional resonance.
Nonetheless, I remained fundamentally engaged. I cared a lot about Andras and his family and fretted for them all throughout this journey. While many of the characters escape certain fates by way of great luck at times, there were some seriously heartbreaking scenes...and two instances in the last third when I even shed a few tears.
So overall, I'm glad I read this book and would recommend it to intelligent readers. It's a pretty sophisticated, high-quality and powerfully told story that pays its rewards for sticking with it. 3.75 stars.
It's a very dense, sweeping epic set just before, during and after the height of WW2; it's part history lesson, part love story and part memorial for the victims and scarred survivors of that awful time in Hungarian history.
From the open I was immediately impressed with the descriptions of the brothers, Andras and Tibor, out for a night at the opera in late 1930s Budapest, having no idea of the horrors on the horizon.
This is not a story that can be read in a hurry to move on to your next book. It's best served with undivided and patient attention. The pace takes its time, from Paris to Hungary to the Ukraine; be prepared to settle in and snuggle up with this one. It requires time and commitment, as there's a lot of (tedious?) historical detail about the war, and many times when I felt it indulged far too long in certain storylines ~ with sharper editing, the book could've covered the same ground in 200 fewer pages without losing its emotional resonance.
Nonetheless, I remained fundamentally engaged. I cared a lot about Andras and his family and fretted for them all throughout this journey. While many of the characters escape certain fates by way of great luck at times, there were some seriously heartbreaking scenes...and two instances in the last third when I even shed a few tears.
So overall, I'm glad I read this book and would recommend it to intelligent readers. It's a pretty sophisticated, high-quality and powerfully told story that pays its rewards for sticking with it. 3.75 stars.
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