This is an unusual story of two people orphaned and forced to immigrate at very young ages and decades apart who eventually wind up together. Samuel is the son of Jewish parents living in Nazi-occupied Austria. When his father is sent to a concentration camp, Samuel’s mother manages to get him on a train transporting Jewish children out of the country before she herself is captured. Samuel is eventually adopted and raised in England and then immigrates to the USA finally settling in Berkeley. Now, eight decades later, Anita is separated from her mother at the Arizona-Mexico border due to the immigration policy of 2019. Her case worker, Selena manages to enlist the help of a San Francisco based attorney named Frank to secure asylum for Anita and they convince Anita’s distant cousin, Letitia to agree to foster her while they search for her mother. Coincidentally, Letitia is the live-in caregiver of the now 86 year old Samuel who readily agrees to take Anita into his large home in Berkeley.
Isabel Allende is one of my favorite authors. I’m not surprised that she took on such a major current political issue and developed a realistic and compelling story around it. The border policy of separating children from parents is a stain on our history and Samuel summarizes this atrocity well when he compares it to slave owners selling children and Native American children being separated from families throughout US history. The current complications of immigration and the horror of human trafficking are described and explored very well in this book. The duel and closely related journeys of Samuel and Anita (traumatic abrupt removal from parents, multiple foster placements and finally stable permanent adoption) is such a creative storyline - so well done! I enjoyed the book very much but I did miss the more epic nature of the stories that we usually get from Allende. There were a few aspects that just seemed out of place and unnecessary such as certain romantic relationships (no spoilers) and I would have liked better character development and background information that the author usually provides.
#NetGalley #RandomHouse-Ballantine

I love books like this that span large chunks of time and cross borders into many countries. What this book does especially well is prove that while we think the world is huge, it’s actually quite small and our life stories cross more than we think they do.
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Separated by over 70 years and in vastly different parts of the world, two children are separated from their families. This is their story. War, immigration, family - this book addresses it all.
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@allendeisabel has written a stunning story and the translation is perfection. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to complete her backlist but everything of hers I have read has been amazing.
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“No, we’re not lost. The wind knows my name.”
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✨ Review ✨ The Wind Knows My Name by Isabel Allende; Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini, Maria Liatis

Wow - Allende does it again!

In this beautiful, thoughtful book, she brings together the stories of a 6-year-old boy (Samuel Adler) who fled Vienna after Kristallnacht on the kindertransport trains to England in 1938 and a blind 7-year-old girl (Anita Diaz) separated from her mother in Arizona in 2019 after crossing the US-Mexico border in their flight from El Salvador.

While I was initially skeptical that anyone could pull off this kind of parallel narrative with the necessary care and compassion, I was impressed by Allende's efforts. Stitching together their stories, she reveals depths about losing family and building family and seeking refuge. She brings in a cast of supporting characters including a social worker and lawyer helping Anita and Leticia, who immigrated to the U.S. when she was young after surviving a massacre where most of her family was killed.

One of the things I was most impressed by was how she drops us into stories so we can see the impact of people who helped these children. While they might just be two children among hundreds of thousands experiencing horrible circumstances, she shows that even efforts to help just one child matter. I also found her narrative of Kristallnacht in Vienna to be really powerful, moving beyond historical narratives where you don't always see the direct human impact.

Finally, I really appreciated how she also wove in femicide and violence against women in Central America to the story, and the ways this reflects on contemporary circumstances. This was another moving book by Allende!

content note: in addition to violence and child separation, this book also continues into the covid era.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫 (4.5)
Genre: historical fiction
Setting: Vienna, UK, Arizona, El Salvador, California, etc.
Pub Date: June 6, 2023

Thanks to Ballantine Books, PRHAudio, and #netgalley for advanced e-copies of this book!

Once again I read through an Allende novel and once again, i just feel sad. Sad that people can't see we are still horrible to each other. People sending away, or being separated from their families has happened all throughout history yet we have lived through it recently.
Told in two timelines: we learn that parents are still being separated from their children for political reasons. That is not right for any period in history. AND the author uses amazing, rich, detailed, characters to deliver this important lesson to society without coming off as preachy.
I think this novel could have been even longer, since we have a collection of characters, we need more time to become acquainted with.

I get so excited when I see a new Isabel Allende. My Chilean friend introduced me to her books years ago and I was immediately hooked. She has a magical way of detailing without going overboard.

I did not feel that way with The Wind Knows My Name. It was so unnecessarily wordy. There were several times that I considered DNF. I was extremely surprised. Her views on US politics were also very evident and there were several inaccuracies. It was disappointing.

I love Isabel Allende's books so was happy to receive an eARC from NetGalley. But this one was all over the place, so it was hard to tell what the story was at first or how all the different threads would come together. It almost read like a collection of short stories connected by the themes of being a refugee and separated from one's family. Ultimately an important story but my least favorite Allende book to date.

Thank you Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for this arc.

If you are familiar with Isabel Allende’s writing you know how magically she writes a story. In her new sweeping novel, Allende depicts refugees fleeing from danger and children who find themselves lost in conflicts.

In the beginning, I thought the book contained three different stories. I even thought I was reading short-stories about different people and the dangers and trauma they go through, and the different people they meet. I was confused with all those threads but, as the wonderful writer Mrs. Allende is, all the threads brilliantly come together.

Exploring childhood trauma and relating it to migration, to children leaving behind their torn countries, their loved ones, and everything they know, the author writes a beautifully crafted story. These are not nameless children. They are children who went through so much pain and loss, that the wind knows their names. They are not invisible. Quite the opposite, they are seen, and we know who they are.

Isabel Allende knows firsthand what being displaced means. The Wind Knows My Name is a deeply moving novel although I think the ending felt a bit rushed. Overall, I highly recommend this book. Isabel Allende is an auto-buy author for me. I know I can’t go wrong with her novels.

Isabel Allende never, ever, disappoints. In her epic style, we get two stories decades and miles apart that not only have parallels but also intertwine. Samuel and Anita's stories show us the past we should learn from and somehow keep repeating.

A young girl returns to her village from hospital to find her entire community slaughtered. A small boy is thrust into the hands of strangers to seek asylum in England from a Hitler controlled Austria. Another child is ripped from the arms of her mother in America after fleeing a man set to kill her mother in El Salvador. What do all of these children have in common? Will their stories guide their lives, challenge their decisions, motivate their desires?

This book was extremely well written. The beginning is very intense, flowing into a deep narrative web with intertwining stories. Allende is an incredible writer, and The Wind Knows My Name is no exception.

Reflects the horrors that can impact young children with forced migration, whether due to the Nazi's and war in Europe parents trying to save their children to the horrors of politics in El Salvador and the El Mozote massacre. Migration especially forced due to war and politics impacts families and children. As I read the separate situations I kept wanting them to be brought together for some cohesiveness but this did not occur. Understanding the horrors that can happen at borders of countries I think following the people and/or tying to story together would provide for a better look. The way it was presented it Allende wanted to make the maximum impact on the reader, so she crammed a lot of facts about our border situation into the book. At times, it almost came across as if she were reporting on the immigration issue, not writing a novel. The plots felt rushed and incomplete as well as the characters not developed well. I usually enjoy Allende's work but this just felt incomplete, rushed and not well developed thus not conveying the message well that she wanted to pass along.

My thanks to Netgalley, the author and Ballantine Books

Many of Isabel Allende’s books are a nice blend of current issues, usually involving women and children, with a bit of magical realism stirred in. This novel is the perfect example. One storyline starts in Austria with a mother reluctantly putting her 5-year-old son on the train to get him to safety before Hitler’s army advances. The second finds a mother and 8-year-old daughter in current times running from El Salvador to safety in the States. The author deftly brings all of her story lines together for a satisfying conclusion. The historical events included and the timing of her plot are strong points; characterization takes a back seat to them. I did, however, love the story and respect her efforts to shine a light on the horrible ways in which children and parents are separated and the long lasting effects of that separation. And this is one of the most beautiful book covers!

Thanks to NetGalley and Ballantine Books/Penguin Random House for the ARC to read and review.

Immigration compelled by atrocities in one’s country of birth is the main theme in Isabel Allende’s new book, The Wind Knows My Name. The first segment begins in Nazi occupied Europe, where young Samuel Adler is placed on a Kindertransport to England, where he is ultimately living in a new home, with a new language, culture and religion.

Abruptly, the next segment brings us to a devastating massacre in El Salvador in the early 1980s which brings young Letitia Cordero over the US border.

In the year 2019, seven year Anita Diaz and her mother, flee a violent personal attack in El Salvador and are not fortunate enough to make it through the US border. They are apprehended and separated. Anita, who is almost completely blind, retreats to a pretend world when her stress level overloads and dreams of a reunion with her mother.

A social worker , Selena, and a lawyer, Frank, take unusual interest in Anita’s predicament and join forces to help her remain legally in the USA.

And what starts out as an interesting premise goes on and on and on, with an ever changing cast of multiple characters, who are never fully developed, and in circumstances that aren’t always credible ( would a social worker and lawyer devote endless personal hours and finances to help just one out of thousands of abandoned children?)

What resulted was a great beginning, which became disjointed by addressing too many sub plots that combined in an often confusing hodgepodge of social issues including :immigration, violence, women’s rights, and the Covid pandemic. Each taken separately would be worthy of Ms Allende’s talent. No doubt the author wanted to write about an important subject. Most readers would agree that ripping young children away from their mothers is inhumane and cruel. Yet somehow while this book made that point clear, it fell short, because the idea was overstated and felt more like a political diatribe interfering with the fluidity of the story line.

In summary, three stars for a book that worked hard at being important and compelling but never quite achieved its objective My thanks to NetGalley and Ballantine books for providing me with an ARC in return for my honest review.

Courtesy of Netgalley, I received the ARC of The Wind Knows My Name by Isabel Allende. This novel of parallel experiences begins with 1938 Vienna, the young boy Samuel Adler, and the Kindertransport train, and compares his traumatic family experience to that of Anita Diaz, as she escapes a horrific life in El Salvador with her mother, to seek asylum in America 2019. Encompassing themes of commitment, resilience, persistence, adaptability, opportunities for second chances, and created families, this timely story is compelling and heartwarming. Highly recommend!

This book was received as an advance review copy from NetGalley in return for an honest review.
Isabel Allende’s novel about leaving one’s home and the often-harrowing journeys that migrants take could not have been published at a better time. With immigration issues dominating the public discourse (as Title 42 ended in the US in May 2023) this book’s publication could not be more opportune.
Synopsis:
The book weaves together multiple stories centered around migration. In 1938 Samuel Adler is only six years old when he is forced to flee from Vienna as violence against Jews in Nazi-occupied Austria escalates. Arriving alone in the UK, Samuel uses his violin to make a place for himself first in the UK and then in the US.
In 2019, Anita Diaz is also forced to flee her home, in El Salvador, with her mother looking for safety in the US. Arriving at the border she is soon separated from her mother as the family separation policy is put into effect. Waiting for her mother she struggles to deal with traumas chasing her from home as she bounces from migrant shelter to foster care. Her social worker Selena Duran seeks help from a renowned lawyer, Frank Angileri to reunite her with her mother while navigating the US immigration system.
As Selena finds Anita’s distant relative Leticia Cordero in the US, she develops a bond with Samuel Adler who is now eighty-six years old and is being cared for by Leticia. As these stories intersect, the devastating impact of being forced to leave one’s home and the sacrifices our loved ones make for our safety are revealed.

What’s to like:
For readers interested in migration issues/ current affairs and how these impact lives, this book is a great read. The first few chapters are especially interesting as Samuel’s childhood and Leticia’s ancestor’s stories are shared. Through the first half of the book, one wonders how the different stories will come together and that makes the last few chapters even more interesting as the paths of all the characters intersect.
If this is your first Isabel Allende novel, you will also notice how her writing style is so straightforward and refreshing. In a matter-of-fact way, she describes even the most heartbreaking circumstances and yet it does not fail to elicit an emotional effect on the reader.

What’s not to like:
Some of the side stories can get boring. Selena and Frank’s story did not seem as interesting and although the existence of Anita’s imaginary place, Azabahar, helps the reader learn about her, the relevant chapters describing it could only be skimmed.
Another aspect of the book I did not appreciate as a reader was the recurring mention of infidelity. Samuel and his wife’s relationship seemed very strange and made her particularly unlikeable to me. It always disappoints me as a reader to read about such vices discussed so casually and even normalized.

Isabel Allende can do no wrong! I absolutely loved this touching and emotional novel. This book feels like a love letter to the children of parents who have had to sacrifice during times of war for their children. It is scary how common these themes are for two very different time periods.

The book tells the story of Samuel and Anita. Samuel escapes Austria with only his clothes and violin during World War two. Eighty years later, Anita's family seeks refuge in the United States from El Salvador. With the family separation policy, she ends up alone at a camp. The two stories end up connecting in an interesting way.

I loved how beautifully written this was. This author's writing style is very impactful. I was very emotional while reading this book. These children suffered unspeakable things and I feel like books like this are very important to show society how cyclical history really is.

I highly recommend this book.

Isabel Allende is a brilliant and beautiful author - fans will be thrilled with "The Wind Knows My Name". Her storytelling and imagery are simply unmatched!

Thank you Megan Whalen at Ballantine for providing me with an advanced copy of the beloved Isabel Allende’s latest novel. Although I try not to miss a new Allende release, some of her novels are more successful than others. “The Wind Knows My Name” is a triumphant return to form. In this gripping tale that draws historical and political parallels between Hitler’s Europe and Trump’s America, Allende opens in Nazi-occupied Vienna in 1938. Violin prodigy Samuel Adler is five years old when his father disappears during Kristallnacht. His mother, increasingly concerned with his safety, reluctantly secures a spot for him on a Kindertransport train to England. Like thousands of other children, he makes the journey without his parents, who later die in the Holocaust. Samuel is raised in the foster care system, eventually settling in the Bay Area. Eight decades later, Anita Díaz and her mother flee escalating gang violence in El Salvador and seek refuge in the United States. But their arrival coincides with the new family separation policy, and seven-year-old Anita, who is partially blind, finds herself alone at a camp in Nogales. She escapes her fraught reality through her trips to Azabahar, a magical world of the imagination. Allende has crafted an emotionally charged and intricately plotted tale that weaves history and social commentary.

Pro:
* Character development (as far as it goes)

Con:
* another WW2 story - the market is flooded with them, and the opening to this one feels pedantic in its explanation of the scenario. I feel like we’ve heard this story a million times already
* Multiple points of view/settings are so overdone
* Didactic/heavy-handed
* I get the point: children are the victims of political upheaval - ww2 kindertransport, civil war in 1980s el Salvador, put in cages at the border in 2019
* The prose feels choppy and simplistic, not the lush narration I’ve come to expect from Allende. Translation?
* I’m so disappointed

Thank you to Isabel Allende, Frances Riddle (translator), Ballantine Books, and NetGalley for an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

Once again, Isabel Allende delivers a wonderful novel. I absolutely loved A Long Petal of the Sea and couldn’t wait to read this book!

The book is about two children.

In 1938, Samuel Adams is a 6-year-old living in Nazi-controlled Austria. It is not a safe place to be and his mother manages to send him away to keep him safe. All he has are a few items of clothes and his treasured violin.

In 1919, Anita Diaz a 7-year-old blind girl, arrived in the US from El Salvador. With the new US separation policy, she is separated from her mother.

Two children, separated from their families. The rest of the characters are there for support, like Leticia who is now caring for Samuel who is in his 80s, and the characters who help Anita get through the tangles of US immigration.

It is clever and beautifully written, the way the two children (one now an elderly man) end up connecting with each other.

Oh my God I love Isabel Allende. This book starts off in Vienna during the early days of the Holocaust and ends in Berkeley 2022. I have been close to tears thru the book.5 stars.