Four Mothers
by By Bilu, Dalya (TRN) and Horn, Shifra
Category: Fiction , Literary

Shifra Horn's beautifully imagined novel tells the story of four generations of women in one family against the background of one hundred years in Jerusalem.The story begins with Amal, of the fifth generation, who is despondent over her husband's desertion after the birth of her son. Her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother are overjoyed, because the birth of a healthy boy means that their family's long curse has been broken - there is no daughter to inherit it. Come, listen, they say to Amal, listen to the story of the curse that foreshadowed every father's disappearance. Be comforted by your "four mothers": Mazal, the orphan, whose ill-fated marriage initiates the curse; her daughter Sara, whose beautiful golden hair becomes a symbol for her power to heal; Sara's daughter Pnina-Mazal, the unwanted child whose talent for knowing others' thoughts brings her both joy and sorrow; and her daughter Geula, Amal's mother, whose sharp intellect and idealism are her gift and her burden.