Tomorrow night, as part of MACC’s annual JAAMM Festival, Julie Orringer will be in town. For some of you, these acronyms may be unfamiliar – as might Orringer’s name. JAAMM is the annual book festival hosted every autumn by the Mizel Arts and Culture Center (MACC), and Orringer is one of the writers JAAMM is bringing to Denver, where she’ll be speaking at the Denver Jewish Community Reads event about crafting her WW II saga, The Invisible Bridge.
Craft is the right word, because Orringer’s tale spans two decades, a World War, two families, three professions, several love affairs and two European capitals. And she makes it work.
The story begins in 1937 at the Budapest Opera House, the night before Andras Levi, the story’s central character, leaves for Paris to study architecture. Accompanying him is older brother Tibor, a medical student who himself also has dreams of studying abroad.
Even at its very start, when the characters are at their most hopeful, a dark shadow hangs over the two brothers. One of the reasons Andras is leaving for Paris is because, as a Jew, he’s unable to study architecture in Budapest. It’s 1937 Europe, and even though war hasn’t yet erupted, the situation for Jews are worsening across the continent.
Like any story featuring Jewish characters and opening in the late 1930s, The Invisible Bridge is not a happy tale, and as the story develops, so do the hardships and tragedies. As readers, we all know where this story will end; but the suspense lays in the fact that Orringer’s characters don’t. Orringer does an excellent job of portraying how even in the face of unbelievable hardship, people continue to live, love and hope.
Orringer’s epic follows Andras to Paris, where he falls in love with an older, sophisticated Hungarian expatriate, and back to Budapest when visa restrictions are put in place for Jewish students. Intertwined are the stories of Tibor, the selfless doctor, and Matyas, a flamboyant and energetic younger brother who dreams of treading the boards in the United States.
At its heart, Orringer’s epic is a love story, as much about romantic as familial love. And while some of the romance storylines can be over-dramatic, heavy-handed and somewhat unrealistic, we found the depictions of the love between child and parent, and among siblings, to be the book’s most powerful and emotionally charged.
Orringer’s tale traverses love, life, tragedy, survival and death. The Invisible Bridge is an epic romance of grand proportions, the kind of book where the reader develops an emotional and intimate relationship with the characters. Anywhere from 500 to 800 pages, depending on what version you buy, the book certainly asks for a certain level of investment, both in terms of time and emotion. It’s worth it.
