Alexis Schaitkin – författare

A sweeping, absorbing novel about the fate of two children sent from Europe to the English countryside to escape the onset of World War II and the aftermath of the decisions they made there.An image appeared in her mind, a childhood memory she hadn't known it contained: a conductor leaning over her on a train late at night, speaking to her in a language she didn't speak, one of his eyes looking at her while the other stared, unblinking, straight through her. She felt her skin prickle everywhere at once.Evelyn Lieberman has always been good at carrying her grief while carrying on. A widow in a Florida retirement community, she keeps busy with regular visits to her grandchildren and a full social calendar with her friends, the Girls. She speaks little about her past and is proud of the life she has built in the present.When Evelyn's friend recommends a book by a prominent British author, Simon Glaser, Evelyn is startled to find that the novel tells a hauntingly familiar story. She decides to seek out the book's writer, the only other person who could have known the details of what happened all those decades ago.Spanning prewar Vienna, the Yorkshire moors, postwar New York, a Florida retirement community, and the London literary world, Two Lives is a sweeping and masterful exploration of inheritance, memory, and the human yearning to reconcile our pasts with our present and take the measure of our lives.

A sweeping, absorbing novel about the fate of two children sent from Europe to the English countryside to escape the onset of World War II and the aftermath of the decisions they made there.An image appeared in her mind, a childhood memory she hadn't known it contained: a conductor leaning over her on a train late at night, speaking to her in a language she didn't speak, one of his eyes looking at her while the other stared, unblinking, straight through her. She felt her skin prickle everywhere at once.Evelyn Lieberman has always been good at carrying her grief while carrying on. A widow in a Florida retirement community, she keeps busy with regular visits to her grandchildren and a full social calendar with her friends, the Girls. She speaks little about her past and is proud of the life she has built in the present.When Evelyn's friend recommends a book by a prominent British author, Simon Glaser, Evelyn is startled to find that the novel tells a hauntingly familiar story. She decides to seek out the book's writer, the only other person who could have known the details of what happened all those decades ago.Spanning prewar Vienna, the Yorkshire moors, postwar New York, a Florida retirement community, and the London literary world, Two Lives is a sweeping and masterful exploration of inheritance, memory, and the human yearning to reconcile our pasts with our present and take the measure of our lives.

'Hypnotic, delivering acute social commentary on everything from class and race to familial bonds and community . . . I devoured Saint X in a day.' — New York Times, Oyinkan Braithwaite (author of My Sister, The Serial Killer)Claire is only seven years old when her college-age sister Alison vanishes from the luxury resort on the Caribbean island of Saint X on the last night of her family’s vacation. Several days later Alison’s body is found in a remote spot on a nearby cay, and two local men are arrested. But the evidence is slim, the timeline against it, and the men are soon released.Years later, riding in a New York City taxicab, Claire recognizes the name on the cabbie’s licence, Clive Richardson – her driver is one of the men originally suspected of murdering her sister and the fateful encounter sets her on an obsessive pursuit of the truth. But as Claire doggedly shadows Clive, hoping to gain his trust, waiting for the slip that will uncover the truth, an unlikely intimacy develops between them, two people whose lives were forever marked by a tragedy.Alexis Schaitkin's Saint X is a flawlessly drawn and deeply moving story that hurtles to a devastating end.

'I read Saint X in a night, captivated by its mystery but also by the smart, evocative way Schaitkin writes about race, loss and place.’ – Maggie Shipstead, The Guardian, ‘The 30 best holiday reads’ ‘Hypnotic, delivering acute social commentary on everything from class and race to familial bonds and community . . . I devoured Saint X in a day.’ – Oyinkan Braithwaite (author of My Sister, the Serial Killer), New York TimesClaire is only seven years old when her college-age sister Alison vanishes from the luxury resort on the Caribbean island of Saint X on the last night of her family’s vacation. Several days later Alison’s body is found in a remote spot on a nearby cay, and two local men, employees at the resort, are arrested. But the evidence is slim, the timeline against it, and the men are soon released. It’s national tabloid news, a lurid mystery that will go unsolved, but for Claire’s family, there is only the sad return home to broken lives.Years later, riding in a New York City taxi, Claire recognizes the name on the cab driver’s licence: Clive Richardson, one of the men originally suspected of murdering her sister. The fateful encounter sets her on an obsessive pursuit of the truth as to not only what happened on the night of Alison’s death, but the no-less-elusive question of exactly who was this sister she was barely old enough to know: a beautiful, changeable, provocative girl of eighteen at a turbulent moment of identity formation. As Claire doggedly shadows Clive, hoping to gain his trust, waiting for the slip that will uncover the truth, an unlikely intimacy develops between them, two people whose lives were forever marked by a tragedy.Alexis Schaitkin’s Saint X is a flawlessly drawn and deeply moving story that hurtles to a devastating end.

Wer bist du, wenn du den liebsten Menschen verlierst?  Claire ist die kleine blasse Schwester, die ihre zehn Jahre ältere Schwester abgöttisch bewundert. Während eines Karibikurlaubs der Familie verschwindet ihre Schwester. Der dramatische Vorfall bestimmt Claires Leben. Auch als Erwachsene hört sie nie auf, nach der Wahrheit zu suchen. Da begegnet ihr ein Mann, der damals mit ihnen auf der Insel Saint X war."Eine Geschichte über Trauer, Wahrheit, die Privilegien von Weißen und unsere Kultur, in dem Mord Unterhaltung sein kann." Washington Post"Ein vielschichtiges atmosphärisches Debüt über die Auswirkungen eines mutmaßlichen Mordes." Joyce Carol Oates"Hypnotisch und fesselnd." New York Times"Schaitkin hat mich ganz in ihren Bann geschlagen, und ich musste wissen, was mit den Schwestern geschehen ist." Oyinkan Braithwaite, New York Times Book Review"Dieses Debüt mit seinen scharfsinnig verwobenen Themen ist der passende Kommentar zu unserer Zeit." New York Times"Ein ganz besonderer Roman über Hautfarbe und Privilegien, über Familie und welche Rolle man in ihr einnimmt. Sprachlich herausragend, hier ist eine neue literarische Stimme zu entdecken." Chang-rae Lee