num_pages: 276
description: With only a yellowing photograph in hand, a young man -- also named Jonathan Safran Foer -- sets out to find the woman who may or may not have saved his grandfather from the Nazis. Accompanied by an old man haunted by memories of the war; an amorous dog named Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior; and the unforgettable Alex, a young Ukrainian translator who speaks in a sublimely butchered English, Jonathan is led on a quixotic journey over a devastated landscape and into an unexpected past. By turns comic and tragic, but always passionate, wildly inventive, and touched with an indelible humanity, this debut novel is a powerful, deeply felt story of for the past, family, and truth.
language: English
title: Everything Is Illuminated
titlecomplete: Everything Is Illuminated
characters: Lista, Yankel D, The Gypsy Girl, The Kolker, Brod, Alexander Perchov, Grandfather (Everything Is Illuminated), Safran, Jonathan Safran Foer
genres: Jewish, Historical Fiction, Historical, Literary Fiction, Novels, Literature, Fiction, Holocaust, Contemporary, Magical Realism
ratings_count: 177837
places: Trochenbrod, Ukraine
awards: awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award, awardedAt: 1009872000000
name: Guardian First Book Award, awardedAt: 1072944000000
name: PEN/Robert W. Bingham Prize, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: William Saroyan International Prize for Writing
category: Fiction, awardedAt: 1041408000000
name: Corine Internationaler Buchpreis
category: Rolf Heyne Buchpreis
publisher: Harper Perennial