A Mother’s Secret: A Novel of the Jewish Autonomous Region by Alina Adams

This book is about a topic and place that I had no idea even existed, before reading this book. This book partially takes place in Birobidzhan, a region between Russia and China, promised to the Jews of Russia as the first Jewish State.

The story begins with Lena, a young woman stuck in a marriage that she thought was ok, until it wasn’t. Hr father is dying, and cryptically says something on his death bed that makes no sense to Lena at the time — until she finds research and documentation her father was…