Book Review: Mother Tongue by Joyce Kornblatt
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In 2013, forty-five year old Australian writer Nella Gilbert Pine is teaching refugees how to speak and write English hoping to enable them to “reclaim the voice they often lose when they leave their native language behind, in the choices they make to save their lives and the lives of their families.” Recent events in her own life inspire her to pen her thoughts and share her story.
A few years ago Nella had discovered, from a letter left for her by her late mother Eve that the woman she had known as her mother all her life had not been her biological mother. Neither is her real name “Nella” nor is “Eve” her “mother’s” real name. Eve aka Ruth Miller was a nurse who kidnapped a three-day-old baby, Naomi Gordon, from the obstetrics ward of a hospital in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1978. Following the kidnapping, she changed her identity and relocated to Australia building a new life for herself and Naomi under new names with fictitious backstories. Needless to say, this revelation shatters Nella/Naomi’s reality leaving her “hardened and numbed”.
“Can you piece together a shattered glass? Zen masters teach: This glass is already broken. Our lives are already broken, birth a shower of shards beyond the gestures of ordinary repair. Give up the glue of habit; it won’t hold. To be wholly broken: that’s Eve’s bequest to me.”
In her letter, Eve/Ruth claims she was “compelled” to do what she did providing details of Nella’s biological parents and the truth about her family history dating back to WWII-era Europe. Nella agonizes over Eve’s actions unable to comprehend what could have driven Eve/Ruth to commit such a heinous crime. As the narrative progresses, we get to know more about Eve’s past life and how she built a life for herself and Nella in Australia and Nella’s true parentage and background. Nella attempts to establish contact with her biological family and find out as much as possible about the secrets that have been kept from her.
“Or has she stolen from me a second past—the one I lived with her erased along with the one I would have lived with the Gordons?”
The novel examines the devastating effect of the kidnapping of a newborn baby on all those whose lives are irrevocably changed by the incident- the victim, the perpetrator, and the family of the child. The major part of the narrative is shared between Nella /Naomi with segments from the letter left by her “mother” Eve/Ruth. We also get to know how Nella’s kidnapping impacted the lives of her biological sister Leah, and her mother each of whom shares their experiences of both the aftermath of Nella/Naomi’s kidnapping and the effect her reaching out to them after almost fifty years has had. The novel touches on the themes of love, loss, intergenerational trauma, family and identity with the utmost compassion. The author also introduces subplots focusing on forced adoptions of unwed mothers, discrimination, and the search for one’s true identity.
Though this is a relatively short novel, it is not an easy read. It is impossible to read this novel and not be affected. Beautifully written, evocative, well-paced and immersive, Mother Tongue by Joyce Kornblatt is the kind of story that stays with you.
“I have decided that all coincidences are compasses, mirrors, maps, treasure hunt clues. Who can say how we find our way home, before we even know we are lost?”
**Many thanks to Publerati and NetGalley for the digital review copy of this powerful novel. All opinions expressed in this review are my own.**
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