The Boston Girl: A Novel

Anita Diamant

Dec 2014 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

New York Times bestseller!

An unforgettable novel about a young Jewish woman growing up in Boston in the early twentieth century, told “with humor and optimism…through the eyes of an irresistible heroine” (People)—from the acclaimed author of The Red Tent.

Anita Diamant’s “vivid, affectionate portrait of American womanhood” (Los Angeles Times), follows the life of one woman, Addie Baum, through a period of dramatic change. Addie is The Boston Girl, the spirited daughter of an immigrant Jewish family, born in 1900 to parents who were unprepared for America and its effect on their three daughters. Growing up in the North End of Boston, then a teeming multicultural neighborhood, Addie’s intelligence and curiosity take her to a world her parents can’t imagine—a world of short skirts, movies, celebrity culture, and new opportunities for women. Addie wants to finish high school and dreams of going to college. She wants a career and to find true love. From the one-room tenement apartment she shared with her parents and two sisters, to the library group for girls she joins at a neighborhood settlement house, to her first, disastrous love affair, to finding the love of her life, eighty-five-year-old Addie recounts her adventures with humor and compassion for the naïve girl she once was.

Written with the same attention to historical detail and emotional resonance that made Diamant’s previous novels bestsellers, The Boston Girl is a moving portrait of one woman’s complicated life in twentieth century America, and a fascinating look at a generation of women finding their places in a changing world. “Diamant brings to life a piece of feminism’s forgotten history” (Good Housekeeping) in this “inspirational…page-turning portrait of immigrant life in the early twentieth century” (Booklist).

Ratings and reviews

If you are a quick reader, you will devour this in one sitting like I did. If you are a slow reader, you can enjoy this over a few days. In only 336 pages, Diamant manages to tell the very full of life - but not too heavy - story of Addie Baum; a Jewish girl who lives her whole life in Boston. I love how the old woman tells her granddaughter her life story - a very ordinary life, but unique and full. I found myself misty-eyed at the end of most chapters and laughed out loud many times throughout. If I wove all my grandmothers stories together it might sound something like this - only Midwestern and Christian - and I would read it over and over again!

Enjoyed reading about this period in time in Boston, but otherwise very bland writing.

I loved the relationship of the grandmother and granddaughter. Reminded me so much of my mother and my daughter I loved the subtle humor and many words of wisdom

About the author

Anita Diamant is the bestselling author of the novels The Boston Girl, The Red Tent, Good Harbor, The Last Days of Dogtown, and Day After Night, and the collection of essays, Pitching My Tent. An award-winning journalist whose work appeared in The Boston Globe Magazine and Parenting, and many others, she is the author of six nonfiction guides to contemporary Jewish life. She lives in Massachusetts. Visit her website at AnitaDiamant.com.