Author Gigi Scott was born to a Jewish family who left Europe during World War II for Israel, only to return to Czechoslovakia in the 1950s. They soon realized they had made a mistake in leaving Israel because Jews were shunned in post-war Europe. Gigi’s parents sent her to Israel as a young teenager in the 1960s. By the time she reached her late teens, she was in an abusive marriage with an Israeli gangster twice her age.
Life in Israel was not easy for Gigi, even though the country was relatively new and supposedly open to Jews of all backgrounds. But as Gigi soon learned, Israel was rife with tension between Jews from Morocco, Iraq, Eastern Europe, Germany and Austria, and the other countries Jews left after World War II.
Several years after Gigi’s gave birth to her daughter Bella, she endured a traumatic custody battle with her ex-husband. With her young daughter and new husband, a British national, Gigi left Israel for the United States. She settled in Miami and opened a day spa that flourished. Gigi also became a leader in the local Chamber of Commerce and often traveled to Czechoslovakia with the Chamber. After she divorced her British husband, she married an American businessman.
While her editor states in the book’s introduction that Gigi’s writing style reflects the way she speaks, it comes off as unpolished. The Israel section is fascinating, as is her trips to Hong Kong and China with her third husband, but the last part of her story drags. Even with these flaws, the book is a gripping story of survival.
Reviewed by Susan Blumberg for IndieReader