FOUR DAYS

by Gloria Goldreich ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 14, 1980

A very long four days. The psychic wounds left by a childhood in a concentration camp torment 41-year-old Ina Feldman, mother of two, who is in a Manhattan hospital for minor breast surgery and a planned abortion. And those childhood memories are especially intense as Ina is visited in the hospital by camp survivors and others, most of whom insinuate their hopes and pleas for having the baby. There's mother Shirley, who has drawn a shell over the camp deaths of her son and sister, and over her own secret abortion; sad, gentle father Norman, who never regained closeness to his wife after the war and is wrecked with guilt for not rescuing his family; cousin Bette, who--with Ina (""skeletal little girls"")--learned to survive by dancing and singing for German guards; sister-in-law Dot, a barren, fiercely loving mother to adopted children; and husband Ray, who really wants the baby as ""life unexpected and unexplained."" Even Ina's psychiatrist, Dr. Eleanor Berenson, stops in; she has worked with Ina on her camp nightmares, guilts, and anger. And in the hospital are two women fighting for their babies--Miriam Gottlieb, whose first baby, the desperate hope of ""surviving"" grandparents, is seriously ill; and Marnie, a beautiful model trying to save her unborn child. Finally, after four days of articulated feelings, telephone calls, and enough food to send Ina to the G.I. ward, she finally conquers her nightmares with a statement toward life and continuity. An earnest up-front homily, delivered in an unremitting high flush, all stops open--but too shrill and didactic to reach the hearts of most readers.

Pub Date: July 14, 1980

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1980

Categories: FICTION