Breakaway Books

Authored by Lisa Barr; Published May 2024; Historical Fiction

⭐️⭐️⭐️ / 🏖️

The Goddess of Warsaw, predictably, is a difficult novel to read. It does not shy away from the atrocities of the Holocaust, and that type of graphic cruelty is hard to look at for long periods of time.

The center of this novel is, in a word, revenge. Underneath the glamor of Hollywood is the story of a starlet, Bina Blonski, who cannot bear what has happened to her people, and the way the United States forgave those who did it. The depiction of what happened to her and her family is painful to read, but important for us to know, historically and for the plot. It helps the reader understand how Bina turns into a woman who does not shed tears and coldly executes men.

I appreciated the framing of the novel—a series of interviews with a younger actress—but I wanted more. We got tantalizing glimpses into how Bina saw this younger, presumably privileged actress, but I was ultimately left with more questions. It felt incomplete, in a way. 

Like the rest of the novel, the romantic aspects of the story were jagged and hard, difficult to get through at times. It was enlightening and heart-wrenching to read through Bina’s eyes. In the end, the romance had a quiet, satisfied ending, understated in a way that the rest of the novel, with its dramatic ending, was not.

I do not recommend this as a light read. It is not just Hollywood glitz and glamor with a dark backstory. It is intense—but still worthwhile.