My Name is Asher Lev by Chaim Potok

Have you ever read a book and thought, "this must end well. Sure, it is tragic and sad and slightly depressing right now, but by the end everything will have worked out"? I have, and then been disappointed in my hopes. Perhaps I should have been tipped off by the New York Times Book Review that graced the cover. "A novel of finely articulated tragic power. . . Little short of a work of genius." Perhaps I should have remembered the less-than-joyous endings of the other two books I have read by this author. Yet, I couldn't help but hope for some happiness in the life of a character that I had come to love. Could I? Still, I must admit that the book would be less perfect, less complete, had it ended happily. Sometimes there cannot be a "happily ever after." If you ever need to be reminded of the power words can have--the power of a well-written book--just read My Name is Asher Lev. Read The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Read Hamlet. Read and know that even in tragedy there is beauty. "The world is not pretty," said Asher Lev. "No," I agree, "but it is beautiful."