"The Illusion of Separateness"

Simon Van Booy's "The Illusion of Separateness" is a great novel.  I just finished reading it but it is so familiar that I think I may have read it before but maybe not finished it -- maybe wrote about it and maybe not?

The book tells the stories of a deformed German infantryman, a lonely British film director, a young woman who is a blind museum curator, two Jewish American newlyweds separated by war, and a caretaker at a retirement home for actors in Santa Monica.

Each chapter talks about a different character -- sometimes returning more than once to that individual but what we learn in the end is that all these individuals lives have intersected in some way at some point -- all around events during and after World War II.

It was a joy to read -- sad at times but for the most part uplifting.  pazt