Archive - October 8, 2023

  In an Amber Chamber, Stories Carrie  Messenger (Moldova 1994–96) Brighthorse Books 260 pages August, 2018 $16.95 (paperback) Reviewed by Eugénie de Rosier (Philippines 2006-08)   Carrie Messenger’s short stories paint dark and disturbing settings for people who lived in Eastern Europe under strangling communism. Romania and Moldova are noted. The former’s Ceaușescu brutalized his country. Famine was a scourge in the 1940s and in the 1980s, deprivation was widespread; and state enforced-pregnancy led to too many children that couldn’t be supported by their parents. The government opened orphanages which were run by people who seemed unaware of children’s needs. Themes of despair, loss, and vulnerability run through these 18 stories, but there are also uplifting moments . . . when a child’s laugh can be heard, a dog’s bark echoes in frolic, the surprise of a holiday in a new free country. About the stories In Edgewater, three Romanian . . .