Hoffman is one of my favourite authors, but this novel disappointed me. It felt too much as though she was recycling many of the themes from previous novels without finding anything new to say about them. One of the hallmarks of her writing for me is a depth and an emotional honesty that I felt was missing here. The characters of the sisters felt hollow, and I was more emotionally involved with the secondary characters of Pete, Annie and Natalia. Even Madame Cohen was more compelling for me than Elv or Claire. I wanted to be reading those stories instead.This isn't a bad book. If it were by another author I might've liked it better. But coming from Hoffman it's just so much less satisfying than much of her other work.
