This is my wife, Svetlana.
Punishment Without Crime is the story of her family.
"Families are like little nations. They mold themselves from people and circumstances. Their joy and sorrow alternate with a curious and fascinating constancy, sometimes caused by family members, sometimes by chance that picks them as unexpected participants, often dispensing hardship for no apparent reason but for belonging to a particular lot. And, like nations, families are a mixed breed."
Svetlana's family had been molded from amazing people and circumstances.
"A boy appeared on a street of Olshana, where tailor Abram’s house faced the synagogue. He probably cut across vegetable gardens as he came from the woods, which surrounded the place like guards. The street was not very long, and the boy walked toward its crowded part. The long shadows made by the setting sun started to crawl, hugging the small houses facing the street, hugging the trees and bushes. This time of day, the street was full of playing kids. The boy walked slowly and deliberately until he stopped in front of a house where a little girl sat on a bench by the door, consumed with eating a pancake. A sudden pull on it startled her. She looked up and saw her pancake disappearing into a boy’s mouth so quickly she could not believe it was possible. Tears were just about to roll from her eyes when the boy, finished with the pancake, started to make funny faces and jump around her like a street clown. The girl’s lips moved in a second from crying to giggling. The boy was funny, and she could not stop laughing."
This is how the family story begins in the middle of the nineteenth century. Follow grows and pitfalls of the family members, their sadness and happiness, terrifying lows and exciting highs.
(Available on Amazon)