Apart From Love
by Uvi Poznansky
Description
Written with passionate conviction, this story is being told by two of its characters: Ben, a twenty-seven years old student, and Anita, a plain-spoken, spunky, uneducated redhead, freshly married to Lenny, his aging father. Behind his back, Ben and Anita find themselves increasingly drawn to each other. They take turns using an old tape recorder to express their most intimate thoughts, not realizing at first that their voices are being captured by him.
Meanwhile, Lenny is trying to keep a secret from both of them: his ex-wife, Ben’s mother, a talented pianist, has been stricken with an early-onset Alzheimer's. Taking care of her gradually weighs him down.
What emerges in these characters is a struggle, a desperate, daring struggle to find a path out of conflicts, out of isolation, from guilt to forgiveness.
The title Apart From Love comes from a phrase used three times in the story:
Anita to Lenny, in "Apart From Love": After a while I whispered, like, "Just say something to me. Anything." And I thought, Any other word apart from Love, 'cause that word is diluted, and no one knows what it really means, anyway.
Anita to Ben, in "The Entertainer": Why, why can't you say nothing? Say any word - but that one, 'cause you don’t really mean it. Nobody does. Say anything, apart from Love.
Ben, in "Nothing Surrendered": For my own sake I should have been much more careful. Now—even in her absence—I find myself in her hands, which feels strange to me. I am surrounded—and at the same time, isolated. I am alone. I am apart from Love.
Review
By Grady Harp
Uvi Poznansky wears a coat of many colors. Originally from Israel where she studied Architecture and Town Planning then moving to the US where she studied Computer Science and became an expert in Software Engineering, Poznansky managed to combine the design elements of two studies into unique formats. And she has accomplished the same with the other side of her brain - making visual her ideas (she is an accomplished painter, drawer, and sculptor who has enjoyed exhibitions both in Israel and in California, her present base) and making words in poetry and in short stories and children's books. Apart From Love is her first novel and is adorned on the cover with an image of her own painting!
Uvi Poznansky wears a coat of many colors. Originally from Israel where she studied Architecture and Town Planning then moving to the US where she studied Computer Science and became an expert in Software Engineering, Poznansky managed to combine the design elements of two studies into unique formats. And she has accomplished the same with the other side of her brain - making visual her ideas (she is an accomplished painter, drawer, and sculptor who has enjoyed exhibitions both in Israel and in California, her present base) and making words in poetry and in short stories and children's books. Apart From Love is her first novel and is adorned on the cover with an image of her own painting!
But her history of diversity does not end there. The story of this elegantly designed novel is a dissection of a family life and the alterations that occur with the family framework both by intent and by happenstance. It weaves themes of disparate parents - an accomplished pianist Natasha married to the elderly Lenny who cares for Natasha as she descends into the darkness of Alzheimer's Disease and compensates by taking on a very young and uneducated, somewhat socially coarse redhead vixen named Anita - and the manner in which the couple's 27-year-old bright son Ben copes with the situation.
Poznansky's unique way of unraveling this complex story is by making the "chapters" vary as told by Ben, as told by Anita, and as told by Lenny. She understands fully how to bring Ben's confusion about both his past life with his parents and the current situation with his mother's decline and his father's reactive compensation by bonding with a beautiful young, if raw, companion. Few authors would be able to pull off the manner in which the apparent polar opposites of Ben and Anita begin to bond and how Lenny integrates into their apparent clandestine relationship, but Poznansky has the visual and verbal and architectural skills to create this maze and guide us through it.
She capitalizes on the use of the chapters being related in the voices of the characters: Ben relates the situation as he remembers and experiences it in eloquent finely honed grammar while Anita speaks to us with the slang that at first can be grating but morphs into communication that allows the reader to experience the change that develops in her relationship to Ben. In other's hands this could become cloying as a technique, but with Poznansky's skill she uses it as an interface between evolving personalities that makes her story ring true.
So much more could be said about the manner in which the author brings understanding to the hierarchies of relationships - parental, couple, aging, developing, and ones influenced by disease, but that would be robbing the reader of the joy of discoveries that Poznanasky accomplishes in this profound novel. The title is so well chosen: the phrase of the title is the key that unlocks much of the fragile mystery that hovers here. Highly recommended.
About the Author
Uvi Poznansky is a California-based author, poet and artist.
She earned her B. A. in Architecture and Town Planning from the Technion in Haifa, Israel. During her studies and in the years immediately following her graduation, she practiced with an innovative Architectural firm, taking a major part in the large-scale project, 'Home for the Soldier'; a controversial design that sparked fierce public debate.
At the age of 25 Uvi moved to Troy, N.Y. with her husband and two children. Before long, she received a Fellowship grant and a Teaching Assistantship from the Architecture department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where she guided teams in a variety of design projects; and where she earned her M.A. in Architecture. Then, taking a sharp turn in her education, she earned her M.S. degree in Computer Science from the University of Michigan.
During the years she spent in advancing her career--first as an architect, and later as a software engineer, software team leader, software manager and a software consultant (with an emphasis on user interface for medical instruments devices)--she wrote and painted constantly, and exhibited in Israel and California. In addition, she taught art appreciation classes. Her versatile body of work can be seen online at uviart.com. It includes bronze and ceramic sculptures, oil and watercolor paintings, charcoal, pen and pencil drawings, and mixed media.
Uvi has published two children books, Jess and Wiggle and Now I Am Paper. For each one of these books, she has created an animation video.
Apart From Love is her debut novel. Her next book, Home, was released in September 2012. Her latest book, A Favorite Son, was released in December 2012.
Apart From Love is her debut novel. Her next book, Home, was released in September 2012. Her latest book, A Favorite Son, was released in December 2012.
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