In Case We're Separated

<p>Spanning the length and breadth of the twentieth century Alice Mattison's masterful <em>In Case We're Separated</em> looks at a family of Jewish immigrants in the 1920s and 1930s and follows the urban emotionally turbulent lives of their children grandchildren and great-grandchildren against a backdrop of political assassination the Vietnam War and the AIDS epidemic. Beginning with the title story which introduces Bobbie Kaplowitz--a single mother in 1954 Brooklyn whose lover is married and whose understanding of life is changed by a broken kitchen appliance--Mattison displays her unparalleled gift for storytelling and for creating rich multidimensional characters a gift that has led the <em>Los Angeles Times</em> to praise her as a writer's writer.</p>