The Puzzle King

Book excerpt: This “compelling” novel of three sisters—and the immigrant who invented the jigsaw puzzle—“captures the squalor and bustle of early 20th century New York” (The Miami Herald). Lively, beautiful Flora was sent to America from Germany by her family to find a better life. Brooding, studious Simon came from Lithuania with the same goal. An improbable match, they meet in New York City and fall in love. Simon—inventor of the first mass-market jigsaw puzzle—eventually makes his fortune. But now that they have achieved wealth, Flora and Simon become obsessed with rescuing those they left behind in Europe. Inspired by the author’s own family lore, and interweaving the stories of Flora’s two sisters, one the mistress of a wealthy WASP and the other struggling back in the old country, this is “a work of genealogical fiction from the late 19th century to the eve of World War II . . . It balances the Jewish immigrant experience in New York—both the achievement of the American dream and the curdling of it—against the insidious anti-Semitism of Germany and Eastern Europe” (Los Angeles Times). “Everybody loves an inspiring rags-to-riches story, and The Puzzle King delivers that in spades.” —San Francisco Book Review