Booklist Review
On vacation in Budapest, global traveler Fischer visited an antique shop and found a small leather book filled with delicate drawings, beautiful watercolors, and encouraging poems and messages. It was a memory book, a keepsake album kept by a young girl at the turn of the century. Back at home in New York, she could not let go of the mystery of the girl's identity and undertook nine years of investigation and travel, poring over old maps and history books, and enlisting other researchers and translators. She learned the book was owned by Amalka, a young girl who came of age during the tumult within the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. The book begins about 1906 and includes endearments from friends and family, with sparse entries during WWI, then ends in 1919. The book offers a portrait of life at that time and place, what Fischer calls the ultimate travel story. Fischer intersperses entries from the memory book with her own impressions of Hungary as she retraces Amalka's life and offers her own very engaging look at modern Hungary, its food, culture, and folklore.--Bush, Vanessa Copyright 2014 Booklist