RaveLos Angeles Review of BooksRachel Barenbaum’s ambitious second novel Atomic Anna moves seamlessly through time and space, from the Russian Revolution to late-20th-century Philadelphia. It’s propulsive and intimate and surprisingly relevant to these past two years, when time has so often felt sharp and amorphous all at once ... Barenbaum doesn’t linger. Time is precious ... This novel triples down on the author’s ability to see history through the lens of the fantastic as much as the human, to go, like her characters, \'beyond what logic dictates.\' It’s a leap, and she lands it ... The story moves with precision and purpose between timelines and characters ... The language moves with elegant urgency. Decades pass in a paragraph, but the prose never feels rushed; it is precise, lyrical, and imbued with emotional clarity ... Moments between characters are achingly intimate without being sentimental or slowing the pace ... With Barenbaum’s care and focus, Atomic Anna is about moving through uncertainty and navigating trauma as much as it is about moving through time.
