It is the winter of 1905 and sixteen-year-old Rachel, her sister Nucia and Nucia's husband Jacob, and the orphan Menahem arrived eight days ago in San Francisco. They have just been released from quarantine. Rachel and Nucia's mother and father are dead: her father murdered during the Kishinev pogrom in Russia while her mother died from from consumption in China. The four of them are searching for the lodging house the woman at the Eureka Benevolent Society had marked on the paper map.
A month later both Rachel and Nucia are working as maids at the Haas home on Franklin Street in the upscale neighbourhood of Pacific Heights.The Haas family were Bavarian Jewish immigrants who own a prosperous dry goods store. Although the Haas are Jewish they practice some American customs like Christmas and Easter. Nucia works as the upstairs-maid wearing a white uniform and meeting with the mistress of the house every day. Rachel however, works downstairs wearing a black uniform like the other maids. The Haas also have a Chinese servant, Wah who does their laundry.
After work Rachel and Nucia walk home to their boarding house on Sixth Street where they live in a second floor flat at the back of the house. They are met outside by Jacob and Menahem. Jacob announces that he has taken out a loan from the Hebrew Free Loan Association to start his own business as a vendor selling food from wholesalers to restaurants and shops. This upsets Nucia who believes his steady job at the Standard Shirt Factory is safer and she worries if his business fails. Rachel, however supports Jacob's plan believing that they should take risks to improve their lives.
Menahem attends Spring Valley School and struggles to be accepted. Rachel finally buys him some new clothes but they are much different that what he is used to wearing. Boys in America wear short pants with high socks, not the long pants Menahem is used to wearing in Russia. In a letter to Sergei, Rachel tells him that Gentiles live peacefully with Jews and that Jews can become prosperous in America.
Rachel, Nucia, Jacob and Menahem begin to settle into life in San Francisco. They attend synagogue at Temple Sherith Israel along with Mr. Bloom and his wife Esther. The service is a Reform Sabbath and Rachel notes that it is very different from the services in Russia and China. They form a strong friendship with the Blooms who invite them over for Saturday dinner, and who often give Nucia leftover meat and fish from their kosher store. Rachel and Nucia also attend free English classes for new immigrants at the First Chinese Baptist Church. Rachel finds that she is beginning to understand English. Jacob with his job as a vendor also becomes proficient in English. In order to better fit in with his new classmates, Menahem decides to change his name to Marty. Rachel also begins taking high-school English and mathematics classes two nights a week. She hopes to obtain her high school diploma in three years. She hasn't given up on her dream of becoming a journalist.
In a remarkable twist, Rachel meets Anna Strunsky in the large bathhouse at the Sutro Baths located at Lands End. Anna is a Russian Jewish immigrant who came to America when she was nine-years-old and is now a journalist. She is planning to return to Russia later this year to cover women's stories for San Francisco Bulletin and California Women's Magazine. She wants to cover the worker's strikes. Rachel states that Russia is not safe for Jews as there have been riots and over five hundred Jews have been killed. And people in St. Petersburg are being shot by the Cossacks and police when they demonstrated for better working conditions. Anna believes she will be safe because she is an American reporter. Anna offers to help Rachel with her English, if she will help her relearn Russian.
Rachel meets up with Anna at a cafe called Coppa. There, Anna shows Rachel some articles about the movement to free the Russian people. She tells Rachel that she has read about the terrible lives of the Russian peasants, about the factory workers' strikes and the massacres of Jews. Rachel explains how her father lost his life in the massacre that happened in her town of Kishinev and how it was instigated by the lies published by the newspaper editor in the village. She tells Anna, "I dream of being a writer, like you, to tell the truth and make sure people don't forget what happened to us." Rachel also tells Anna about Sergei Khazhenkov, who is fighting for the workers in Petersburg. Anna asks Rachel to write down details about him so that when she returns to Russia she can try to locate him. Rachel reveals that she cares for him but because he is Gentile they cannot be together. Anna tells her that things are changing and that she is seeing someone who is not Jewish.
To help Rachel in her quest to become a journalist, Anna advises that she must read more. At the public library at City Hall she loads Rachel down with copies of Uncle Tom's Cabin, Wuthering Heights, Ten Days in A Madhouse, and Around The World In Eighty Days. Rachel has her letter about arriving in San Francisco published by the Jewish newspaper, Emanu-El complete with her full name. Rachel becomes interested in the women's suffrage movement after attending a meeting of the National Council of Jewish Women at Temple Emanu-El. With four hundred women in attendance, Rachel learns that men in California voted against suffrage because many women involved in the suffrage movement were also involved in the temperance movement and the men did not want to lose their right to drink alcohol. This leads Rachel to send an article to the Israel's Messenger in Shanghai for publication. While the Editor-in-Chief publishes her article which she wrote in Yiddish, he encourages her to focus on writing in English for American newspapers.
On April 18, Rachel, Marty, Jacob and Nuncia flee their flat in the early morning hours. As the buildings around them topple. they escape unscathed. They watch as the Wells Fargo Bank crumbles to the ground. The falling bricks from the dry goods store injure some and kill others. As they flee down the street, sunken in some places by several feet, they see twisted streetcars and watch as the broken gas lines, catch fire. Buildings along Market Street catch fire, one after another. The smoke makes Marty cough and he beings to struggle to breathe.
In the morning Jacob learns that everything south of Market Street is gone including synagogues, the Haas Brothers store. Four days later, Rachel and her family visit their runined boarding house and decide to walk to Golden Gate Park where people are being assigned tents to live in. Rachel takes Marty to a hospital where he is diagnosed with asthma and is treated by the doctor. Rachel and Marty spend several weeks at Mr. Levison's home, to allow him to recuperate. There, Rachel helps Nathan Pearce care for his baby daughter, Ruthie, after his wife was killed in the earthquake. Although Rachel feels a growing attachment to Nathan, she decides to refuse his offer to work for him as a nurse for Ruthie and opts to return to Jacob and Nuncia who are still living in a tent. Back in Golden Gate Park, Rachel wonders if she will ever achieve her dream of becoming a journalist. The earthquake seems like such a setback for all her plans to finish her schooling and attend university.
During this time from 1905 into early 1906, Rachel's friend, Sergei has fled St. Petersburg after the deadly march on the Tsar's Winter Palace and has slipped onto a train to Moscow. He is a fugitive, a member of the secret revolutionary group, the Combat Organization, wanted in the murder the Interior Minister of Russia, Viacheslav von Plehve. He had supported the anti-Jew pogroms including the one that killed Rachel's father. When he's caught on the train after falling asleep, a stranger, Dimitri Kalyayev bribes the police officer, telling him Sergei is his son. Dimitri explains that he helped Sergei because he recognized him from the newspaper and he provides Sergei with directions to a safe house.
The two storey wood house on Volgogradsku Prospekt belongs to the writer, Maxim Gorky. Shortly after he arrives, Boris Savinkov, the leader of the Combat Organization in Petersburg, and the architect of the von Plehve assassination, arrives. Gorky doesn't believe the tsar will give the Russian people more power or freedom. Sergei agrees to help distribute the newspaper Iskra to every factory in Moscow to encourge the workers to fight for better wages and working conditions.
Two weeks later, many Moscow factories are on strike: thirty thousand workers on strike demanding a democratic government and better working conditions. Food is scarce. Gorky wants to form a soviet council like that in Petersburg that is intent on "obtaining democracy for all Russian people." While Savinkov believes that the bombings and assassinations have helped their work towards democracry Sergei does not and neither does Gorky who believes "The pen is the mightiest weapon, much more powerful than any bomb." He believe words give people the courage to fight and so Gorky proposes they distribute leaflets.
On October thirtieth, the tsar signs an Imperial Manifesto supposedly "guaranteeing civil liberties for all Russian people and legal power for the Duma." but as Gorky suspects, the tsar has the power to veto legislation passed by the Duma and citizens can still be arrested for speaking out against the government.
Sergei is involved in getting dynamite for the Moscow revolution on December 5th. Savinkov organizes the securing of weapons while Gorky orders the distribution of signs to get more people involved. They build barricades across Tverskoi Boulevard. The intent is to block off all of Moscow's main streets from the Russian troops. Barricades are also being constructed on the circular street around the Kremlin.
The revolution begins but Sergei is ordered back to Gorky's house. Despite controlling some areas, they have lost men so Savinkov tells Sergei they want to bomb the headquarters of the secret police (Okhrana). However, Sergei doesn't want to be involved in another bombing but he finally agrees to instruct the bombers, fifteen yea old Victor and sixteen year old Arkady. However, the bombing doesn't go as planned with one of the bombers, Viktor shot and killed.
On December 17th, Sergei and more revolutionaries are at Krasnopresnenskaya Street with loaded rifles, facing a large number of government troops included the Semenovsky Regiment. Gorky gives a speech and then the fighting begins. For hours Sergei and the other revolutionaries fire at the soldiers. However, when the government begins shelling them Sergei and the others are forced to flee through the streets. Sergei is quickly captured and taken to Taganka Prison in Moscow. An elderly man in the prison who has been exiled before tells Sergei he will languish in prison on March and without a trial will be exiled. That is what happens: Sergei is exiled for five years to Chita in Siberia, thirty-eight hundred miles from Moscow. Will Sergei ever survive to leave Russia and find Rachel?
The question remains, will Rachel's hope to be reunited with Sergei come to pass and if so, do they have a chance at a future together?
Discussion
Rachel's Hope is a engaging and well-written conclusion to the Rachel Trilogy. In this third novel, Rachel and Sergei's stories are told beginning in the Winter of 1905 through to Winter of 1908. The author makes use of two alternating narratives, that of Rachel Paskar and Sergei Khazhenkov to describe the event of this period. In San Francisco in America it is a time of recovery from the devastating earthquake of 1906, while for those in Russia, it is a period of social and political upheaval that sees the seeds of revolution sown.
Life in San Francisco is described through the eyes of Rachel Paskar, a new immigrant and refugee from the Jewish pogroms in Russia. When she goes shopping at a store for Menahem and herself, she is treated with respect as a customer. However, she remembers what it was like in Russia, "The colorful fabrics reminded her of the thread store her mother had loved in Kishinev. Rachel recalled the last time she'd gone to that store for her mother, when the owner had called her "a stupid yid."
Rachel finds that that the Jewish community are less strict about their practice of Judaism than in Russia and China. In the Sherith Temple, Rachel is amazed at the opulence of the temple, a sign that in America one can show pride in being Jewish, something not possible in Russia. "In San Francisco, Jews could build grand buildings like Sherith Israel with its plush red-velvet seats, impressive organ, and bright stained-glass windows. Here, one could show pride in being Jewish." She observers that men and women sit together instead of being segregated, and the rabbi tells them that married women do not have to cover their hair with a headscarf, both of which trouble Nuncia. Mrs. Bloom counters that she likes "...being able to choose how I want to be Jewish.". Mr. Bloom who is Jewish is selling both kosher and non-kosher food as even Jews are eating non-kosher foods. While Mr. and Mrs. Bloom support the loosening of restrictions, Nunia expresses concern. "These traditions are the only link we have to Russia...By holding onto them, we are keeping our memories alive." However, Rachel points out to Nucia just how different everyone looks and the different languages they hear on the street. "Don't you see how different people look from one another here?...You can dress however you like, speak in any language, practice any religion, be who you want to be here in America."
Rachel, Jacob and Nuncia struggle to understand why some immigrants want to change their names. Menahem announces that he wants to change his name and in fact is already going by "Marty". He tells his family that the teacher struggles with the name. Nuncia reminds Menahem that his parents gave him his name and it is the name of his grandfather but he isn't convinced. Mr. Bloom explains that many immigrants have long names that are difficult to pronounce and so it's not unusual for them to use a simpler name.
She also finds that women have more opportunities in America than women in Russia, but still not as many as men. When Anna tells her about women in America working to get the right to vote, Rachel remarks, "Back in Russia I would have been happy with permission to go to university, or to travel without a note from my father." Rachel finds school different in America where students can voice their own opinions. "In Russia, teachers spoke and students listened. Personal views didn't matter unless you were a grown man. To speak your mind as a student had not been acceptable."
When Rachel attends a meeting of the National Council of Jewish Women at Temple Emanu-El regarding women's rights, she notes that a meeting attended exclusively by women would never be allowed in Russia. And unlike Russia, Rachel can read whatever she wants, choosing books from the library that Anna Strunsky takes her to. It's important to note however, as Sanders writes in her Historical Note, that Jewish immigrants to San Francisco faced a much easier time than Jews in other American cities. "The broader integration of Jews into the host society is what set San Francisco apart from other major cities at the time, where Jews continued to exist in more ghetto-like conditions"
Rachel's Hope is a study in contrast between America and Russia in the early 1900's. While America is seen as a land where most immigrants had the opportunity to better their lives, Russia is being torn apart by rebellion and revolution as its people, most of them destitute, fight for basic rights. Workers in Russia are the lowest paid in Europe. There are demonstrations for better living conditions, better wages, safer working conditions in factories, and more say in the governance of the country. As the people struggle to obtain change, their peaceful demonstrations are met with force and violence. Sergei remembers the demonstration at the Winter Palace. "Just a few days earlier, he and thousands of other factory workers, women, and children had marched to the Winter Palace, the tsar's home in Petersburg, to protest for better working conditions, increased wages, and an end to the catastrophic Japanese-Russian war. It had been planned as a peaceful demonstration, but when they arrived, the Russian military opened fire, killing and injuring thousands of protestors." As the government and the tsar resist any change, the people of Russia resort to bombings and assassinations.
Sergei's description of life in Moscow is in marked contrast to the shops and restaurants in San Francisco. While Rachel experiences her first meal in a restaurant where she can choose what she wants to eat, life is very different in Moscow. Sergei notes: "...he moved past the closed-down shops with empty shelves...Food had been scarce since the railway workers' strike. Supplies couldn't get into the city. Shops had been drained of food, clothing, and necessities. The lack of medicine forced the hospital to close." People are starving, among them Sergei notes, are many hungry children. Four days into the rebellion, Sergei observes the children in Moscow who are helping build barricades, how they do not have warm clothing. "Not one wore clothing suitable for the frigid winter air. The girls had threadbare, stained shawls around their shoulders. The boys had coats that were either too small with sleeves halfway up their forearms, or too large leaving space for the icy air to seep through."
His experiences in Russia change Sergei forever and in ways that eventually lead him to realize he can never be with Rachel. His conscience is troubled because he was involved in the assassination of a government official. He witnesses the death of many people during the unsuccessful revolution. At Gorky's house, Sergei is still haunted by the murder of von Plehve. "I will never be free from guilt, he thought as he wiped his brow. Even though I am not behind bars, guilt is suffocating me, destroying me from the inside." When he finally does escape Russia and makes his way to San Francisco, his reunion with Rachel is not what either of them were expecting.
In Russia Rachel and Sergei could not be together because he is Russian and Rachel is a Jew. But in America they still cannot be together but this time it is different. Sergei tells Rachel, "Much more divides us now...Too much has happened to me. Too much time has passed." He explains that he doesn't want to bring back memories of the past with his presence and that he does not fit into her world. Athough Rachel still believes he is the good person she knew in Kishinev, Sergei tells her, "You don't know that. You don't know anything about me. You don't know what I had to do to get here. You don't know the nightmares that keep me up at night, what I wish I could change about my past." Rachel and Sergei are a study in contrasts, Rachel a survivor who is thriving, Sergei a survivor but deeply scarred.
Despite the tragedy of Rachel and Sergei, the novel ends on a hopeful note. Rachel is moving forward with her dream of becoming a journalist by attending university and has met a man, Alexander who is in love with her.
A mark of good historical fiction is the ability of the author to develop the setting. Author Shelly Sanders' portrayal of life in both revolutionary Russia and early 20th century San Francisco feels authentic. The chcaracters are well crafted and included a few real-life characters of Maxim Gorky and Anna Strunsky. The author realistically portrays several historic events that occur in the novel: the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and the 1905 Russian Revolution. Readers are directed to Sanders' Historical Note at the back.
Although this trilogy was written over ten years ago, it is an important and timely work, considering the rise of anti-semitism in America, Canada and Europe. Highly recommended.
Book Details:
Rachel's Hope by Shelly Sanders
Second Story Press 2014
ebook
482 pp.
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