The Boston Girl: A Novel

by Anita Diamant Narrated by Linda Lavin

Overview

2016 Audie Award Finalist for Best Female Narrator

New York Times bestseller!

An unforgettable novel about a young Jewish woman growing up in Boston in the early twentieth century, told “with humor and optimism...through the eyes of an irresistible heroine” (People)-from the acclaimed author of The Red Tent.

Anita Diamant's “vivid, affectionate portrait of American womanhood” (Los Angeles Times), follows the life of one woman, Addie Baum, through a period of dramatic change. Addie is The Boston Girl, the spirited daughter of an immigrant Jewish family, born in 1900 to parents who were unprepared for America and its effect on their three daughters. Growing up in the North End of Boston, then a teeming multicultural neighborhood, Addie's intelligence and curiosity take her to a world her parents can't imagine-a world of short skirts, movies, celebrity culture, and new opportunities for women. Addie wants to finish high school and dreams of going to college. She wants a career and to find true love. From the one-room tenement apartment she shared with her parents and two sisters, to the library group for girls she joins at a neighborhood settlement house, to her first, disastrous love affair, to finding the love of her life, eighty-five-year-old Addie recounts her adventures with humor and compassion for the naïve girl she once was.

Written with the same attention to historical detail and emotional resonance that made Diamant's previous novels bestsellers, The Boston Girl is a moving portrait of one woman's complicated life in twentieth century America, and a fascinating look at a generation of women finding their places in a changing world. “Diamant brings to life a piece of feminism's forgotten history” (Good Housekeeping) in this “inspirational...page-turning portrait of immigrant life in the early twentieth century” (Booklist).

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly - Audio

★ 02/23/2015
Actress Lavin, best known for her star role in the 1970s sitcom Alice, is an ideal narrator for Diamant’s portrait of Addie Baum, a turn-of-the-century girl born to immigrant parents in Boston. Set in the 1980s, the story is framed as an oral history in which Addie describes to her granddaughter her coming of age in the 1910s and 1920s. We journey through the immigrant experience, the joys of adolescent friendships and first romantic “assignations” (as Addie puts it), the sadness wrought by the 1918 influenza epidemic, and the struggles of pioneering women in the workplace. Lavin nails the notoriously difficult Boston accent as she brings Addie to life with marvelous wit and wisdom, showcasing the heroine’s innate playfulness as well as her gutsy perseverance. Lavin’s performance sparkles throughout. It’s hard to imagine a more perfect pairing of novel and narrator. A Scribner hardcover. (Dec.)

Publishers Weekly

10/06/2014
Bestseller Diamant (The Red Tent) tells a gripping story of a young Jewish woman growing up in early-20th-century Boston. Addie Baum, an octogenarian grandmother in 1985, relates long-ago history to a beloved granddaughter, answering the question: “How did I get to be the woman I am today?” The answer: by living a fascinating life. First reminiscing about 1915 and the reading club she became a part of as a teenager, Addie, in a conversational tone, recounts the lifelong friendships that began at club meetings and days by the seaside at nearby Rockport. She tells movingly of the fatal effects of the flu, a relative’s suicide, the touchy subject of abortion and its aftermath, and even her own disastrous first date, which nearly ended in rape. Ahead of her time, Addie also becomes a career woman, working as a newspaper typist who stands up for her beliefs at all costs. This is a stunning look into the past with a plucky heroine readers will cheer for. (Dec.)

New York Journal of Books

Engaging… interesting, informative, and a good read.

Dallas Morning News

“This compelling new novel by the author of the book club favorite The Red Tent (1997) also celebrates a woman’s story.

Fort Worth Star-Telegram

An exploration of the immigrant experience, love,marriage and friendship, plus many significant world events, including World War I and II, Prohibition, the Spanish flu epidemic, civil rights and the sexual revolution. Through it all, family and friendship remain resilient.

Boston Herald

Anita Diamant’s The Boston Girl introduces[a] woman of substance…[who] relates how growing up in a time of gender inequality, strict family expectations, and a widening generation gap of social values made her a successful person.

The Jerusalem Post

"A beautiful novel that captures yourheart."

People

Diamant infuses [The Boston Girl] with humor and optimism, illuminating a wrenching period of American progress through the eyes of an irresistible heroine.

Miami Herald

The Boston Girl convincingly traces the story of a scrappy, intelligent immigrant, who does more than merely survive the 20th century; she embraces it all—tragedies, joys, and the humdrum—with unflagging passion.

Booklist

"A graphic, page-turning portrait of immigrant life in the early twentieth century...an inspirational read.

USA Today

"Addie is…a good storyteller, and her descriptions of the human devastation of World War I and the flu epidemic … have an immediacy that blows away any historical dust."

Huffington Post

The story of every immigrant and the difficulties of adapting to and accepting an unfamiliar culture."

San Francisco Chronicle

Crisp, lively, clear, wry, affectionate, compulsively readable and very entertaining…The Boston Girl’s…[narrator] is supremely brave and bighearted — a marvelous role model no matter how you parse it.

Historical Novel Society

Readers…will feel lucky that they read this richly textured all-American tale.

Good Housekeeping

Strong female ties form this story’s core. Through these relationships…Diamant brings to life a piece of feminism’s forgotten history [and reminds us] there will always be those who try to prescribe what you should be. Good friends are those who help you find out for yourself.

Boston Globe

Ravishing. . . .whip-smart, warm, and full of feeling… deeply pleasurable. . . you can’t help wanting to linger.

|Los Angeles Times

A vivid, affectionate portrait of American womanhood …Diamant has built her career on taking women seriously, and Addie Baum is another strong heroine with an irrepressible voice.

Los Angeles Times

A vivid, affectionate portrait of American womanhood …Diamant has built her career on taking women seriously, and Addie Baum is another strong heroine with an irrepressible voice.

USA Today

"Addie is…a good storyteller, and her descriptions of the human devastation of World War I and the flu epidemic … have an immediacy that blows away any historical dust."

Miami Herald

The Boston Girl convincingly traces the story of a scrappy, intelligent immigrant, who does more than merely survive the 20th century; she embraces it all—tragedies, joys, and the humdrum—with unflagging passion.

San Francisco Chronicle

Crisp, lively, clear, wry, affectionate, compulsively readable and very entertaining…The Boston Girl’s…[narrator] is supremely brave and bighearted — a marvelous role model no matter how you parse it.

Booklist

"A graphic, page-turning portrait of immigrant life in the early twentieth century...an inspirational read.

Library Journal - Audio

06/01/2015
Linda Lavin—best known for the title role in the sitcom Alice—brings warmth and charm to this story of a Jewish girl's coming of age in early 20th-century America. Lavin's Boston accent and Yiddish pronunciation lend authenticity to this first-person bildungsroman. Diamant's (Day After Night) latest has Addie Baum recounting to a granddaughter her attempts to leave the physical and cultural claustrophobia of her parents' tenement world. While attending a book discussion group at a settlement house, Addie makes several friends and begins to achieve liberation as women are winning the right to vote and deciding their own direction in life. VERDICT Detailed and charming, this work is recommended for fans of Boston, American history, and Jewish immigrant tales. ["Readers interested in historical fiction will certainly enjoy this look at the era, with all its complications and wonders": LJ 10/15/14 review of the Scribner hc.]—David Faucheux, Lafayette, LA

JANUARY 2015 - AudioFile

Eighty-five-year-old Addie Baum’s granddaughter asks, “How did you get to be the woman you are today?” So begins a touching, unforgettable journey with a witty, charming guide. Narrator Linda Lavin brings heartfelt emotions, intelligence, and humor to Addie. Her performance is so truthful it feels as if Lavin is Addie Baum or Addie Baum is Lavin. Born here in 1900 of Russian immigrants, Addie experiences the conflict between the old and new worlds. Lavin is relaxed and mellow, chuckling when Addie finds something amusing—you can hear the impish smile on her face. As Addie’s life unfolds, Anita Diamant offers a well-researched, detailed look at women in the last century, and Lavin gets it just right. PS: I want Linda Lavin to be my BFF. S.J.H. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award, 2016 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2015, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews

2014-09-13
A Jewish woman born in 1900 tells her granddaughter about growing up in the 20th century. Diamant (Day After Night, 2009, etc.) establishes an agreeable, conversational tone in the opening paragraph: "I'm flattered you want to interview me," Addie says. "And when did I ever say no to my favorite grandchild?" It's 1985, and we quickly learn that Addie is the daughter of Russian immigrants, the only one born in the New World but not the only one to disappoint her bitter, carping mother by turning out to be "a real American." Older sister Betty horrifies their parents in 1910 by moving out to become a saleswoman at Filene's, and Addie flouts their limited expectations by attending high school and joining a reading club at the local settlement house. It's there she learns about Rockport Lodge and snatches a vacation at this "inn for young ladies in a seaside town north of Boston" with the help of the settlement house's nurturing Miss Chevalier. On her first trip to the lodge in 1916, Addie forms lifetime friendships with other striving working-class girls, particularly Filomena, whose affair with a married artist demonstrates the promises and perils of the new freedoms women are claiming. Addie's narrative rambles through the decades, spotlighting somewhat generic events: the deaths of two nephews in the 1918 flu epidemic, an unfulfilling romance with a traumatized World War I veteran, an encounter with a violent rumrunner. Her increasing aspirations take her from a secretarial job to a newspaper, where she climbs from typist to columnist with the help of other uppity women. True love arrives with labor lawyer Aaron Metsky, and a quick wrap-up of the years after 1931 tells us Addie found her vocation as a social worker and teacher. Enjoyable fiction with a detailed historical backdrop, this sweet tale is paradigmatic book club fare, but we expect something more substantial from the author of The Red Tent (1997) and The Last Days of Dogtown (2005).

Product Details

BN ID:	2940170713004
Publisher:	Simon & Schuster
Publication date:	12/09/2014
Edition description:	Unabridged

Read an Excerpt

The Boston Girl

Nobody told you?

Ava, sweetheart, if you ask me to talk about how I got to be the woman I am today, what do you think I’m going to say? I’m flattered you want to interview me. And when did I ever say no to my favorite grandchild?

I know I say that to all of my grandchildren and I mean it every single time. That sounds ridiculous or like I’m losing my marbles, but it’s true. When you’re a grandmother you’ll understand.

And why not? Look at the five of you: a doctor, a social worker, two teachers, and now you.

Of course they’re going to accept you into that program. Don’t be silly. My father is probably rolling over in his grave, but I think it’s wonderful.

Don’t tell the rest of them, but you really are my favorite and not only because you’re the youngest. Did you know you were named after me?

It’s a good story.

Everyone else is named in memory of someone who died, like your sister Jessica, who was named for my nephew Jake. But I was very sick when you were born and when they thought I wasn’t going to make it, they went ahead and just hoped the angel of death wouldn’t make a mistake and take you, Ava, instead of me, Addie. Your parents weren’t that superstitious, but they had to tell everyone you were named after your father’s cousin Arlene, so people wouldn’t give them a hard time.

It’s a lot of names to remember, I know.

Grandpa and I named your aunt Sylvia for your grandfather’s mother, who died in the flu epidemic. Your mother is Clara after my sister Celia.

What do you mean, you didn’t know I had a sister named Celia? That’s impossible! Betty was the oldest, then Celia, and then me. Maybe you forgot.

Nobody told you? You’re sure?

Well, maybe it’s not such a surprise. People don’t talk so much about sad memories. And it was a long time ago.

But you should know this. So go ahead. Turn on the tape recorder.

—

My father came to Boston from what must be Russia now. He took my sisters, Betty and Celia, with him. It was 1896 or maybe 1897; I’m not sure. My mother came three or four years later and I was born here in 1900. I’ve lived in Boston my whole life, which anyone can tell the minute I open my mouth.

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