The Scrapbook

Reviews / Votes

An ambitious, stirring debut * People * Clark, in prose at the same time richly philosophical and light of touch, accomplishes a double feat. She has written both an aching love story and an incisive examination of the politics of memory * Literary Review * An incredibly smart novel, with an intricate and perfectly paced depiction of a delicate and intense relationship. It's as if a Sally Rooney novel merged with Richard Linklater's film, Before Sunrise * Booklist * Clark uses her first novel to explore a highly literary and highly troubled relationship... At once a rich historical novel and a philosophical study of how much influence past generations have on our affections * Los Angeles Times * Phenomenal... Worthy of reading and rereading * Bookpage * Offer[s] a flying tour of literary representations of the Holocaust and its legacy-a lightly annotated reading list that includes fiction writers such as Tadeusz Borowski and W. G. Sebald-as well as a meditation on the cost of political crimes to a nation's trustworthiness and honor, even generations later * New York Times * It's a wonderful novel; highly literary, yet page turning... It's the sort of book you press on everyone you know, and spend hours discussing, once they've read it too * Irish Examiner * A swiftly-moving, molecularly perceptive, singular portrait of intoxicating young love. Clark captures the psychological nuances and emotional currents of two youthful intellects wrestling with the weight of history and questions of legacy, moral responsibility, and the blinders and dissonance of a complicated romance -- Aube Rey Lescure, author of River East, River West An elegant, unsettling novel about the burden of history and the illusions of love. With a biographer's eye for detail and a novelist's grasp of human frailty, The Scrapbook traces the fault lines between past and present, between nations and individuals, revealing how history lingers-not in grand narratives, but in intimate entanglements -- Sana Krasikov, author of The Patriots Through an exquisitely observed love affair, Clark explores how the Nazis' lingering legacy can still haunt the lives of those born long after the war. A stunningly good novel. -- Julia Boyd, author of A Village in the Third Reich Puts the ferocity and obsession of young love into play with huge historical forces -- Leslie Jamison Heather Clark's The Scrapbook is a masterpiece. This beautifully crafted, quietly devastating love story reminds us of the epic impact of the Second World War across continents and through generations, its scars perhaps most poignantly felt in the intimate interactions between two solitary people -- Rebecca Donner, author of All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days Ingeborg Bachmann once asked, "When will the war be over?" Heather Clark's debut novel, The Scrapbook, offers an answer to this timeless question in a work of searing tenderness. An intimate portrait of youthful romance, haunted by the shadow of the second world war, Clark meticulously captures the melancholy inheritance of a generation trying to find their place amidst the rubble of the past. The initiations of first love, the scars it leaves behind, The Scrapbook reminds us that we're never as far from history as we'd like to imagine, and it reminds us just how much we must give up in order to move on. Beautifully written, brilliantly researched. A stunning quiet work you won't be able to put down -- Samantha Rose Hill, author of Hannah Arendt Historical fiction strikes a complicated balance, between a need to recreate with some accuracy events in the past while at the same time communicating the relevance of those facts to the present. Heather Clark situates a contemporary love story in the shadow of - and with capacious insight into - German history both during and immediately after the Second World War. Clark navigates difficult conceptual ground with remarkable ease, making the complex legacy of the war appreciable to readers in the present -- Matthew Longo A revelation * Publishers Weekly (starred review) * Clark has achieved an impressive feat in this beautiful and powerful novel examining the nature of intergenerational trauma, inherited guilt and all consuming love * Jewish Chronicle * In her elegant, calmly unsettled debut novel, Heather Clark illustrated how the cold shadow of German history bleeds constantly into the present, even in the most intimate spheres... a novel of beautiful surfaces and uneasy depths * Times Literary Supplement * Clark grapples with history, latching onto inspiration from her grandfather's World War II scrapbook. This intense story explores first love between American and German university students who must uncover and reconcile the past to forge a future * Boston Globe * Immersive... Clark is interrogating whether past misdeeds implicate future generations-and whether they should * Washington Post * Finely wrought... The Scrapbook is a fascinating tangle of yearning, history, and legacy * Shelf Awareness * Examines the moral implications of the past for those living in the present... Anna and Christophe's restlessly intelligent conversations raise juicy questions about the extent to which individuals are complicit with a nation's history * Daily Mail * Gripping from the start, written with confident concision and directness * The Herald * A full and interesting story of the generational reverberations of the Holocaust. It is a mediation on what it means to be a good person in the face of a national crime; something our own children will no doubt be thinking about in years to come * Lit Hub * Stunning... the poignant love story between the proud granddaughter of an American G.I. who witnessed the liberation of Dachau and the inscrutable grandson of two Wehrmacht soldiers * Washington Independent Review of Books *