Sacred Time - Ursula Hegi

On December 1953 Anthony Amedeo's world is nested in his Bronx neighborhood, his parents' Studebaker, the Paradise Theater, Yankee Stadium - and in his imagination, where he longs for a stencil kit to decorate the windows like all the other kids on his street. Instead he gets a very different present: his uncle Malcolm's family.

Malcolm is in jail for stealing - once again - from his last new job, and Anthony's aunt and twin cousins settle into the Amedeos' fifth-floor walk-up. Sharing a room with girls is excruciating for Anthony, despite his affinity for the twins. But the real change in Anthony's life comes one evening when he causes the unthinkable to happen, changing each family member's life forever.

Evoking all the plenty and optimism of post-war America, Sacred Time spans three generations, taking us from the Bronx of the 1950s to contemporary Brooklyn. Observing the dark side of family as well as its gracefulness, Hegi has outdone herself with this novel about childhood's tenderness and the landscape of loneliness. Ultimately she reveals how the transforming power of a singular event can reverberate through a family for generations.

ISBN: 9780743257268

Pages: 244

Paperback

Simon & Schuster, 2004 

Good condition; pages mildly tanned; spine leans slightly; Bookseller's stamp inside

B29