The Piano Bench is a story of survival – of secrets and betrayal, of love and deceit, of the heights of happiness, and the despair of heartbreak.
Born to a middle-class Jewish family family in the late 19th century, Josef Samson grew up believing that the possibilities for his life in his beloved Germany were limitless. His doting parents were ferocious advocates and fearless protectors, encouraging him to pursue his passions and dreams. And when he came of age, on the dawn of the new century, it was a time of swagger and self-confidence, and his Berlin was a tolerant and vibrant city filled with culture and ambition.
Berlin was where Josef fell in love and married, where he prospered, and where his patriotism was stirred. But this would not last. After confronting the horrors of the First World War, Josef is forced to rebuild his life, only to come face-to-face with the terror brought about by Hitler and the Nazis.
A victim of circumstance, he must find his way, having to choose between love and responsibility, home and safety, hoping against hope that his journey will take him closer to a secure future, even as it means bidding a sad farewell to his cherished homeland.
Webster (The Other Mrs. Samson) chronicles in his intriguing if meandering latest the life and times of a German Jewish doctor who becomes an “unintended bigamist.” In the frame story, Josef Samson, 82, lives in 1962 New York City with his third wife, Kaethe. Over the course of the narrative, he recounts in admittedly “long-winded” terms how the two came to be together and the secrets he’s kept since the “golden” interwar years of his native Berlin. In 1912, he marries a distant cousin named Hilda and is devastated when she and their unborn child die from a fall three years later. More than a decade passes before he meets and marries a sculptor named Inge, though his mother’s disapproval of Inge, who’s not Jewish, causes the couple to drift apart. In 1928, Josef begins an affair with his mother’s 18-year-old caretaker, Kaethe. Rather than seek a divorce from Inge, Josef leaves for Paris in 1933 and Kaethe, who doesn’t know he’s married, joins him shortly after. Though Josef’s narration is laden with exposition and repetitive self-justification, Webster pulls off a dramatic account of the couple’s topsy-turvy lives during WWII: interned in 1939 France due to their German background, they’re released following the 1940 German invasion, get married, and flee to the U.S. after the Nazis begin rounding up Jews. Historical fiction fans will delight in this poignant saga. (Self-published)
