Tasa's Song

I got an early release of this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.
The book covers the time between 1933 and 1948, the approach to World War II and beyond. I have read many books on the Holocaust and the fate of the Polish Jews during it. This book takes a slightly different approach. While the horrors of the war are evident and the persecution of Polish Jews and people by both the Soviets and the Germans are well described, this novel does not take the reader to the concentration camps. Tasa’s family life is described in her early years, during her middle and high school years and beyond, and how the war affected them. Tasha is an aspiring violinist and her devotion to her music and her happy childhood and family memories in peace time are what sustains her through he difficult years of hiding and then dealing with loss of people in her life after the war. It is a family story, a love story, and a war story. I found some of the descriptions repetitious, and long winded, but overall I liked the book and recommend it to others who are interested in this period and history. I learned more than I previously knew about the fight between the Germans and Soviets for Polish territory.

Thank you Net Galley, She Writes Press , Caitlin Hamilton Marketing and Publicity and the author, Linda Kass for giving me a chance to preview this book.

I was given this book to review from NetGalley and I'm really glad I got it! This book takes place between 1933 and 1957 and tells the story of a Jewish girl named Anastasia, or as she prefers to be called, Tasa. It's about her family's struggle through the Nazi occupation of Poland, their home, and the Soviet pushback. I thoroughly enjoyed this book! It wasn't your typical book on the holocaust; it didn't provide a full account of the events of World War II nor did it take you inside any concentration camps.

Tasa, a smart and extremely talented violinist and her family live in a relatively small town in Eastern Poland, where Jews and Catholics lived and worked together in peace. Tasa has a passion for classical music and it's intricately woven into her life and the story. Growing up in her hometown was peaceful and carefree until the Hitler and the Nazi party ideologies begin to take shape; the Nuremberg laws established and enforced in Germany and a variation enacted in Poland, becoming stricter.

After Tasa and her cousin Danik are sent off to a town called Brody to board with her mother's friend, Frau Rothstein, and attend Brody Catholic school for levels 7 and higher, things begin to get bad and fast. Seeing the effects Hitler's evil and anti-Semitism views had on her school and those who attend, she's senses something far more terrible is coming. Terrible events begin to happen more regularly and pretty soon, Tasa and her family have to deal with them within their personal lives. Separation, hiding underground and unsure about what the next day will bring, Tasa remains rooted in her love for her family, her strength, her will to survive and most of all her love for music.

An avid music lover myself, I was enthralled with this story and how the author fittingly wove different classical pieces into her story, ever relevant to Tasa's current state, whether it be sad, happy, at peace, troubled, frightened or needing to be strong for her family. There's a piece for everything and Tasa summons the music in her head when she needs it or when something reminds her of it; the sound of the wind blowing through the trees, birds chirping, certain smells of the home she longs for, people she's lost, others she's found. It reminds me of another wonderful book I recently read called The Little Paris Bookshop, in which a man essentially had the same thing, except they were books instead of songs.

Tasa's song is a beautiful story of love and loss, strength, uncertainty and the sustaining power that music can have through it all. I love a very descriptive story and Kass has done a marvelous job describing the way the music sounds, feels and even looks! I highly recommend listening to the songs listed as you read, it helps the story manifest itself even more, though she didn't need a great deal of help with that, it's so wonderfully written. I highly recommend this book to all and I will certainly purchase this book when it's released, and read it again!

This well written book describes the atrocities committed during WWII. In the beginning Tasa's family had hoped the rest of the world including the United States would help them. The family waited to long to leave Poland and remained trapped. They saw such evil and persecution against the remaining Jewish community. Tasa was strong and her music helped her survive. Everyone should read this book

After reading The Girl from the Train by Irma Joubert, I came across the description for Linda Kass’ upcoming novel, Tasa’s Song and found it intriguing enough to request to preview the book. Like The Girl from the Train, Tasa’s Song takes place in eastern Poland during World War II and involves the impact of the Soviets and communism on the Polish people as the war progresses. Where The Girl from the Train looked at adopted families, Tasa’s Song looks more at the close ties that can develop between members of an extended family; where The Girl from the Train looked at words and language and their connection to one’s spirit and identity, Tasa’s Song looks at those same things through music.

Tasa—short for Anastasia—is from a wealthy and prominent Polish Jewish family in a rural area of Poland. She and her cousin, Danik—with whom she grew up and continues to develop a specifically close relationship to—board in a larger city to attend a private school. Tasa began learning violin from her grandfather and the instrument and music become a key part of how she interacts with the world around her. Moments—particularly of high emotion—become associated with certain pieces of music or movements within larger pieces. Playing those pieces proves to be an integral part of coping with the increasing uncertainties and terrors surrounding her as she, her family, and her friends become stranded between the advancing Nazi forces and the Soviets who took over eastern Poland at the outset of the war.

The description of the book led me to believe that most of the book would be focused on the way that music helped Tasa to cope with the war and it’s aftermath. However, the book—after the prologue set in 1943—jumps to Tasa’s adolescent life in the 1930’s so that the reader sees snippets from the years leading up to the war and Tasa’s family going into hiding. It occurred to me as I realized how little of the book would actually deal with the aftermath of the war that there are really very few novels—at least that I’ve encountered—that examine those years immediately following the end of World War II from the perspective of the European Jews who survived. And while I was disappointed that more of Tasa’s Song wasn’t centered on that part of the character’s story, it actually does a far better job of examining that time than pretty much anything I’ve read before.

So often—and it is the case with the beginning of Tasa’s Song—novels about this period of history examine the years leading up to the war and the questions of just how the Nazis were able to take power to the extent that they did, how they were able to accomplish the atrocities they managed without raising people against them sooner. In many instances, these novels focus on the trials associated with living in hiding, borrowing from narratives like The Diary of Anne Frank. But they also usually end with the war’s end, the characters having survived to be liberated and see Hitler dead. The Girl from the Train and Tasa’s Song both look at what happened to survivors after the war—to the way people were separated anew and/or the difficulties of relocating the people they’d become separated from during the war. As the aftermath was just as rife with political tensions amongst the vastly different Allied nations involved, I wish there were more novels that explored this post-war period of time in Europe.

What Tasa’s Song does best is incorporate Tasa’s relationship with classical music. At the end of the book is a playlist of sorts that lists the various pieces that Tasa describes, plays, and relates to throughout the book with the list broken down by the chapter in which it occurs. I wish I’d skipped ahead to find that list ahead of time so that I could look up the pieces I was less familiar with and listen to them in conjunction with reading the passages where they featured. For those I was already familiar with, the descriptions and the ‘how’s of why Tasa’s mind goes to those pieces at those moments are beautifully clear and certainly adds to Tasa’s character and how she comes to life. As much as she enjoys and appreciates music, given the depths of her relationship with it, I’m a little surprised there isn’t more time spent on what Tasa might like to do with her playing in the future—it makes sense that such plans would take a back seat during the war, but even in the early years there are no hints at what kind of career she might aspire to or even if she aspires to a career in music at all.

Tasa’s Song by Linda Kass will be available for purchase beginning May 3, 2016.

I enjoyed this book. It was a different perspective of the War. While members of Tass's family had been taken away to "work camps" they were in Russia, so not as bad. She'd had to hide in a bunker and came very near to getting caught. So for the most part, she was on the outskirts and saved from the tribulations that a lot of Jews suffered. However, that didn't mean other members of her family didn't suffer and her along with their tragedies.

I thought this was a well written book, sad, but it definitely held my interest. Tasa was a love able character and I kept rooting for the best for her. There were several instances when I held my breath, afraid that they were going to take her away. All in all it was very entertaining and I enjoyed reading it.

Thanks to She Writes Press and to Net Galley for providing me with a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 rounded up .

"More than 70 years after the Holocaust, we approach a world without survivors, without witnesses. Of the 360,000 remaining elderly survivors, one thousand die each month. In seven years, it is predicted that there may be no one left who can say, “I was there.” Composing human stories from the real-life memories of survivors helps us to understand, to learn, and to honor their lives, just as we do each year on Holocaust Remembrance Day. As we remember our mothers, grandmothers, or great grandmothers, we keep them as part of us, and we silently affirm, “Never again.” " ( Linda Kass BookPage May 5, 2016 )

This is why Linda Kass wrote this book and this is why I read books on the holocaust because I firmly believe how important it is to keep remembering. Kass emphasizes here and illustrated that for me in the novel and it was so much more meaningful to know that she based this story on her mother's survival.

Tasa is from a family of means who is in danger because of being Jewish and when the Soviets took over Poland they are forced to leave their home. There is not an in depth view of the horrors of the work camps or the the ravages of the war itself but all of this is looming in the background, as those close to Tasa experience these things. Tasa's mother , her aunts and younger cousins taken by the Soviets to a work camp in Siberia, her uncle who is arrested and her cousin and love , Danik who joins the effort against the Nazis. Instead we do see the effect on Tasa , her father and other family members who because they are Jewish must hide under a barn for a year with little or no knowledge of what has happened to her mother.

I'm not a musician and don't know a thing about classical music but I appreciated how her music gave her strength. Someone more familiar with music may have a better understanding of what Kass has done here. Why 3.5 ? I read not long ago But you did not come back . Not to diminish this wonderful story of the resilience of the human spirit but the power of that memoir stays fresh in my mind . I still highly recommend this and thank Linda Kass for sharing a part of her mother's story.

Thanks to She Writes Press and NetGalley.