The Light At the End Of The Day by Eleanor Wasserberg

The Light At The End Of The Day by Eleanor Wasserberg.

Published 6th August 2020 by 4th Estate.

Read August 2020.

Kraków, 1937: Painter, Jozef is commissioned to paint the portrait of the pampered younger daughter of a well-to-do Jewish family, and although he is reluctant, the dire straits he finds himself in mean that he is forced to accept the job.

When Jozef meets the Oderfeldt family, he has little liking for the parents,  the spoiled Alicia, or her bookish older sister, Karolina. But as work on the painting progresses, his destiny becomes irrevocably entwined with the Oderfeldt family, as he develops an understanding of Alicia and falls in love with the quiet Karolina - and it is the magic of the painting that binds them.

But then war comes to Poland and the Odefeldts are forced to flee their home. The family become scattered, the lovers are divided, and the painting is lost, as they become caught up in the fortunes of war.

This is a story of love, survival and remembrance....

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The Light At The End Of The Day is a heartbreaking tale of a Jewish family torn apart by war, that draws heavily on the experiences of Eleanor Wasserberg's own family.

The book begins at the point where the Oderfeldt family are forced to flee Kraków in 1939, when it becomes clear that the German invasion is inevitable. Unfortunately, they have left their escape attempt too late, having decided to wait until the last minute to see whether the rumoured approaching war would come their way, and events sadly go awry.

The story then jumps back in time to 1937, when Jozef is commissioned to undertake the painting of Alicia. This seems a bit disorienting at first, but actually proves a skillful way for us to get to know the family, their foibles and secrets, and to establish the importance of Jozef's painting - before moving back to 1939 and continuing with what happens next.

Jozef's painting of Alicia is central to the novel and proves a rather original way to establish the relationships between the characters and tie all the strands together in the most magical of ways. The commissioning of the painting lays bare the inner workings of the Oderfeldt family; its creation forms the bond between Alicia, Jozef and Karolina; the mere idea of it proves a talisman; and its providence brings the threads of the story back together many years in the future.

I was very impressed how Eleanor Wasserberg brilliantly plays out the narrative on both the German and Russian sides of occupied Europe, so we learn about the lesser known fates of Jewish refugees in the Russian work camps. I was also very struck by how the beginning of her tale plays upon the fact that the Oderfeldts were busy keeping up appearances and entertaining their wealthy and influential friends while the events of Kristallnacht played out in Berlin, and how this shapes the reader's opinion of them as a dysfunctional family.

This is an epic tale of love, loss, suffering, survival and the bonds of family. It is an important and poignant account of a period of history we should never be allowed to forget. I found myself completely engrossed by both the story and the writing, and brokenhearted by the tragic nature of events, but they also show us that there can be hope even in the darkest of times - and it can be the strangest of things that give us solace and bring us back together.

The Light At The End Of The Day is available to buy in hardback, ebook and audio versions from your favourite book retailer now.

Thank you to Matt Clacher at 4th Estate for sending me a copy of this outstanding book, in return for an honest review.

From the cover of the book:

A family scattered. 

Lovers torn apart.

A painting that unites them all.

When Jozef is commissioned to paint a portrait of the younger daughter of Kraków’s grand Oderfeldt family, it is only his desperate need for money that drives him to accept. He has no wish to indulge a pampered child-princess or her haughty, condescending parents – and almost doesn’t notice Alicia’s bookish older sister, Karolina. 

But when he is ushered by a servant into their house on Kraków’s fashionable Bernadyńska street in the winter of 1937, he has no inkling of the way his life will become entangled with the Oderfeldts'. Or of the impact that the German invasion will have upon them all.

As Poland is engulfed by war, and Jozef’s painting is caught up in the tides of history, Alicia, Karolina and their parents are forced to flee – their Jewish identity transformed into something dangerous, and their comfortable lives overturned …

Spanning countries and decades The Light at the End of the Day is a heart-breaking novel of exile, survival and how we remember what is lost.

About the author:

Eleanor Wasserberg is a graduate of the Creative Writing Programme at the

University of East Anglia. Originally from Staffordshire, she now lives in Norwich.

Her first novel, Foxlowe, was longlisted for the Authors’ Club Best First Novel Award and

shortlisted for the 2016 East Anglian Book Awards and The Shirley Jackson Novel Prize. Her

second novel, The Light At The End Of The Day, out in August 2020, is a story of exile,

survival and how we remember what is lost.