Go On Pretending
1939. Rose Leventhal is a writer/producer on the Guiding Light radio program in New York City when Jonas Cain enters her life. After a perfect telephone audition for a top role on a spinoff radio show, she hires him immediately, and when they meet in person, she is surprised to see he is African American. Jonas quickly becomes a fan favorite, and he and Rose fall in love. When the show becomes a television program, Jonas’s part is recast with a white man. Then the Soviet Union comes calling. Aware that Rose joined the Communist party and fought in the Spanish Civil War as part of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in 1929, they invite the couple to produce a play in the Soviet Union. They are an instant hit and decide to stay.
In 1985, their daughter Emma is not as enamored with Socialism as her mother, but goes along to keep the peace, until she accepts a marriage proposal, leaves for America, and watches from afar as the Soviet Union falls in 1991. In 2012, Emma’s daughter Libby, in the tradition of her grandmother, travels to Syria to join the Women’s Revolution and fight against ISIS.
This is an eye-opening look at different political systems and their flaws. Rose has a hard time seeing the hypocrisy in the Soviet Union, where everyone is supposed to be equal, but she gets special living arrangements and access to better food as a famous playwright, or “party member in excellent standing.” In the United States, everyone is supposed to be free, but there is rampant racism, and the rich can sometimes take away freedoms from the poor. In Syria, Rose, Emma, and Libby face important truths about themselves and each other. Bold, enlightening, and true in every time. Recommended.
