To & Fro

As you might imagine, given my current role on this website, I read a lot. I also read more widely across genres than I used to, which has been a real gift to my personal growth as a writer. It’s engaging and informative, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world, but it also means I’m fairly hard to surprise when it comes to what a book can and cannot do. So I was delighted when To & Fro, a literary novel that is actually two separate stories, by Leah Hager Cohen, managed to subvert my expectations at every stage of the reading process.

This novel was mysterious from the get go. It appeared on my radar when someone filled out our Suggest A Book form, but unlike most forms which are filled out by either the author or their publicity and/or marketing teams, this form came from an unidentified fan who had seen early versions of the novel. May we all have critique partners and early readers who are so dedicated to our work. Or rather, may we all write such wonderful stories as to inspire the kind of devotion that has the reader going online and spending the time to fill out forms recommending the story to reviewers.

Then came the physical book itself. When I said earlier that To & Fro comprises two stories, I was not kidding. When I slid the book out of its packaging envelope I saw a lovely blue cover featuring a mirror. Then I flipped it over to read the back cover copy and instead found the exact same cover, only with a yellow background. What was going on? Turns out this is two mirrored narratives each starting from a different end of the book – you literally have to flip it over to read the next one – and they meet in the middle. There was also a little note explaining how the book came to be published, including a description of how Cohen tried to force the narratives to be interlocking in a bid to please traditional publishers, only to find her acceptance with an editor who gently suggested they be printed separately, as she had originally intended.

In one narrative, conveniently labelled “To,” we follow a young girl named Ani who is living in circumstances that are obviously fictional. In fact, she is meant to be living inside Kafka’s parable “My Destinaition,” following the man on the horse who hears the bugles call. Ani’s journey is full of what the reader recognizes as unusual kindness from strangers, but Ani’s past is so full of unusual cruelty and misplaced guilt it takes her a while to get on the same page as the rest of us. She is not given any particular religion, nor are the people around her, but when she finds herself in a study house full of people debating and arguing an endless story, of which we are all part, the parallels to Judaism are unmistakable. As is the resemblance of Ani’s past to a gender flipped biblical story of Ishmael.

By contrast, the other story, “Fro,” follows Annamae, who is very obviously Jewish, and rapidly approaching puberty in Manhattan. Annamae is no less lonely or searching than Ani is, but she has both family and a community around her. When Annamae’s struggles to express herself and be understood reach a critical level her mother finds that while medical professionals and school counselors are not helpful, a Rabbi is. Rabbi Harriet first met the family upon the occasion of Annamae’s father’s passing, and is exactly what Annamae needs. Not for spirituality per se, but because Annamae thinks about the world in ways which are most amenable to discussion with a gentle Rabbi who slurps her soup but has the best stories about creation and the Torah.

You can only read a book for the first time once, and by pure chance I started with the “To” narrative. I got a small thrill every time an artifact from “To” suddenly appeared in “Fro” and I found myself linking the stories together, finding how the narratives can be interlocked and interpreted – both separately and together. I was also inspired with so many different ways to write and treat narrative structure in my own work. However, I am deeply curious as to how this book would have felt had I read it the other way round.

That’s not something I can experience on my own. And with that realization, my reading of the novel became communal. If I truly want to know what the experience is like starting from “Fro” I am going to have to find someone who read it in that order. (The cover copy is very clear that starting from either side is acceptable and encouraged). Perhaps that person and I will end up discussing the varying points in the two journeys. We might argue what the significance of say, the ferryman’s wings, is. Indeed we could spend hours on this, much like the members of the study house Ani encounters. The beauty of this is not lost on me.

To & Fro is at its heart a story about loneliness and seeking. It features two girls, in the most vulnerable part of their lives, who are both seeking similar things, in similar ways, despite their dissimilar background and worlds. You can read almost anything you want into this story, but in doing so you join the narrative. It is a book about loneliness that ultimately forms a community from its readers. And that is a feat I have not seen before. I thoroughly enjoyed being surprised by it and look forward to debating it with other readers -perhaps even some of you!

Note: BookishlyJewish received a free arc of this book after requesting one from the publisher.

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