HBI Conversations Bethesda/DC: An Innovative Author Series Focusing on Jewish Women’s Literature

Bernstein mines the emotional depths of her childhood and invites us into her family’s private world. A fantastic set of characters populates the Bernsteins’ lives, including the Kennedys, Mike Nichols, John Lennon,  Richard Avedon, Stephen Sondheim, Jerome Robbins, and Betty (Lauren) Bacall.

Set in Czarist Russia with WWI fast approaching, fierce, headstrong Miri is on the verge of becoming one of Russia’s only female surgeons while her brother Vanya hopes to solve the final puzzles of Einstein’s elusive theory of relativity. When war is declared, their fate is uncertain as Vanya goes missing, along with Miri’s fiancé, and Miri braves the firing squad to go looking for them both. As the solar eclipse that will change history darkens skies across Russia, not only the safety of Miri’s own family but the future of science itself hangs in the balance.