The Escape Artist - Tapa dura

When a Jewish diamond dealer visits 1910s Poland looking for a wife, the parents of Sofia Teitelbaum jump at the opportunity to marry her off. But on arrival in Buenos Aires, Sofia is put to work as a prostitute for the dealer's sister. How to escape from a bordello in a foreign country? By the author of Running Fiercely Toward a High Thin Sound.

Set in the brothels and gangster dens of Jewish Buenos Aires at the beginning of the twentieth century, The Escape Artist catapults us into the lives of Sofia Teitelbaum (tricked into prostitution and away from the modest gentility of her Eastern European family), and a handsome, mysterious magician, Hankus - formerly Hannah - Lubarsky (enjoying the freedom of South America after the pogroms of Poland), as they somersault, tumble, and spin their way into an imagined lesbian future together. Written with the bent notes and dizzying rhythms of a klezmer tune, The Escape Artist is a breathtaking, delightful tale, full of spills, chills, and lush language.