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Toward Love and Acceptance
The Bones of the World shares the stories of three people and their suffering who want nothing more than to be accepted for who they are. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
I didn’t begin the novel with the idea of a literary triptych. I began simply wanting to understand suffering. It was in exploring the breadth and depth of suffering, trying to peer into its most hidden corners, that I was taken with the concept of ancestral suffering, particularly in light of my own Jewish heritage, and wondered how it contributes to our experiences of suffering today, and how it contributes to who we are as individuals. Thus were Rachel, Sariah, and Jakob born.
What were the morals you were trying to capture while creating your characters?
I don’t believe I write with a lesson (or moral) in mind. I write to create a space for possibilities…to enlarge the world in which I, personally, live, and I suppose in doing so I hope I am able to enlarge the world in which you and others live. And by enlarge, I mean to loosen our calcified ideas, to see possibilities where previously we saw only fetters, and to lean in all things toward love and acceptance.
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
Ah, you have discovered my weakness! I am too often wrapped up in themes (read “in my head”) rather than sinking into my heart, though I’m working on it. LOL! But, because you asked, here’s a list: The relationship between present and past; what we can learn in isolation vs. within community; the role of fear in our creation of otherness; the importance of being true to who we are; suffering–its thorns and its balm; the role of story in the world.
What is the next novel you are working on, and when will that be available?
I am working on two right now, though I know I’ll have to let one go at least for the time being. The “winner,” for the present, is the story of a mother, who invites her grown daughter, in an attempt to heal the frayed fabric of their relationship, to accompany her on a scientific expedition to an island off the coast of Finland, where they join others to unearth the mystery of the presence of polar bears. It would be available sooner if I could find someone to take care of the puppy I just adopted!
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The journey will take her back in history, to Sariah, a young woman whose status during the Inquisition is doubly-marred as a Jew and as a lesbian; and to Jakob, a teenage boy who spends the Holocaust hidden in a farmhouse where he plans his revenge in the only way he can. Back in the present, in the cemetery, the Jewish children murdered by the Righteous wait for their stories to be told.
Written with a trenchant humor, The Bones of the World asks who we become as a result of suffering. Like Jakob, desiring revenge? Like Sariah, seeking the salve of a community that accepts her? Or like Rachel, opening to the ancestral suffering that is her life’s clay, and her role in the swell of its story? A deeply spiritual book, The Bones of the World seeks to locate the place of suffering in a holy world and explores why we must tell these stories that are so often hard to hear.
The Bones of the World
What happens to the stories of people lost? Is there a way to preserve and re-tell those stories to keep history alive and hopefully from repeating the most egregious parts of it? Are there those among us tasked with keeping the truths of stories of those who disappeared and can no longer share the lessons of their life and death?
Find out the answers by following the stories of three people living decades and centuries apart through the everyday experience of being hated for no reason other than who they and their families are by blood.
The Bones of the World by Betsy L. Ross brings the story of Rachel, Jacob, Sariah, and their families living through profound periods of antisemitism. Their stories are told through separate periods of history and into the not-so-distant future. A light is shed on where a new wave of prosecution of the Jews is still possible if the horrific history of the years and centuries past is forgotten. This emotionally charged book raises several questions as characters wrestle not only to survive the experience but also to find meaning and the right course of action in the death and suffering surrounding them. Do the threat to personal safety and the safety of your community override the commandments guiding your life? Should one submit to suffering or fight against it? And most importantly, how to save global history from being erased through the disappearance of individual people and their stories?
The work of Ms. Ross is a well-written and thought-provoking read for an emotionally mature audience of those who are not afraid of the graphic nature of topics discussed in the book. It is a captivating mystery novel that leaves readers pondering long after the book is read. There are no answers but rather an offering of important personal and philosophical questions to think about as the reader is guided through the intricate maze of intertwining personal stories of the characters. This is definitely a highly recommended read.
Pages: 360 | ISBN : 163988694X
LITERARY TITAN 