Who She Left Behind by Victoria Atamian Waterman
If you love The Sandcastle Girls by Chris Bohjalian, Orhan’s Inheritance by Aline Ohanesian, Rise the Euphrates by Carol Edgarian, or All The Light There Was by Nancy Kricorian, then this book is for you!
Who She Left Behind is a captivating historical fiction novel that spans generations and delves into the emotional lives of its characters. Set in various time periods, from the declining days of the Ottoman Empire in Turkey in 1915 to the Armenian neighborhoods of Rhode Island and Massachusetts in the 1990s, the novel completely immerses its reader in a lesser-known era and the untold stories of the brave and resilient women who became the pillars of reconstructed communities after the Armenian Genocide. It is a story of survival, motherhood, and love based on the recounted stories from the author’s own family history. The narrative is framed by a mysterious discovery made almost six decades later of a pair of Armenian dolls left at a gravesite, which leads her on a quest for redemption as an immigrant, wife, sister, and aunt.
“Victoria Waterman’s captivating debut is a searing, multi-generational account of one family’s legacy of love, trauma and resilience. With events unfolding in Massachusetts, modern Turkey and the Syrian desert, Who She Left Behind, is a harrowing tale of the Armenian Genocide which highlights the female voices long since erased or forgotten from history. Waterman breathes life into her characters, mothers and daughters separated and displaced by war, who join forces to uncover and heal historical and familial wounds. Her sumptuous writing and uncommon wisdom about the human spirit will haunt readers as much as it beguiles them. Who She Left Behind is a book about the beauty and terror of what it means to be human.” — Aline Ohanesian, author of Orhan’s Inheritance
“Who She Left Behind is a multi-generational, multi-decade tale of love and courage, an homage to perseverance and inner strength, a record of horrifying reality yet uplifting and a page-turner. I celebrate and treasure it as a testament to strong women and the often unacknowledged and un-celebrated roles they play in creating enduring culture as the machinations of men seek to destroy it.”— Susan Colantuono, author and founder of Leading Women
Victoria Atamian Waterman is an Armenian American storyteller and speaker who draws inspiration from the quirky multigenerational, multilingual home in which she was raised with her grandparents, survivors of the Armenian Genocide. Her empowerment of today’s women and girls makes her voice ideal for telling the little-known stories of yesterday’s women leaders. Her TED Talk, “Today’s Girls are Tomorrow’s Leaders” has been seen by thousands of viewers. When she is not writing and speaking, she is reading, puzzle-making and volunteering. Victoria lives in Rhode Island and is enjoying this chapter of life with her husband, children, and grandchildren. What She Left Behind is her first novel.
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