What Happened To Anna K.: A Novel (Touchstone Books)

Amazon Best of the Month, August 2008: With her fresh reinvention of Anna Karenina, Irina Reyn finds her tragic heroine in the Russian-Jewish immigrants of New York's outer boroughs. As in the Tolstoy, an impetuous woman wasting in a sterile marriage succumbs to a destined-for-disaster love affair with a dashing young man, and is bitterly condemned by a society fraught with hypocrisy; like citizens of19th-century Russia, modern-day Bukharians don't take kindly to wifely infidelity. With an ear for witty dialogue and a knack for imagery both sharp and sensuous, Reyn gives a pixel-perfect depiction of Anna's world. Those caught in her undertow are equally multidimensional, most with their own struggles between loyalty to self and longing for community acceptance. Even those who haven't experienced Tolstoy will be rapt. --Mari MalcolmA mesmerizing debut novel that reimagines Tolstoy's classic tragedy, Anna Karenina, for our time

Vivacious thirty-seven-year-old Anna K. is comfortably married to Alex, an older, prominent businessman from her tight-knit Russian-Jewish immigrant community in Queens. But a longing for freedom is reignited in this bookish, overly romantic, and imperious woman when she meets her cousin Katia Zavurov's boyfriend, an outsider and aspiring young writer on whom she pins her hopes for escape. As they begin a reckless affair, Anna enters into a tailspin that alienates her from her husband, family, and entire world.

In nearby Rego Park's Bukharian-Jewish community, twenty-seven-year-old pharmacist Lev Gavrilov harbors two secret passions: French movies and the lovely Katia. Lev's restless longing to test the boundaries of his sheltered life powerfully collides with Anna's. But will Lev's quest result in life's affirmation rather than its destruction?

Exploring struggles of identity, fidelity, and community, What Happened to Anna K. is a remarkable retelling of the Anna Karenina story brought vividly to life by an exciting young writer.