A review by christythelibrarian
If I Told You Once by Judy Budnitz

3.0

Budnitz writes in magical realism intended often as social commentary. The first third of this novel is extraordinary. At one point, the main character, who was born in a East European village goes to a port city in Western Europe, hoping to find her lover. Instead she finds the city deserted. She runs to the docks, and the ocean is dry with the tall sailing ships resting lopsidedly on the ocean floor. She flees in terror, later finding her lover in a different city. She tells him of this place she went to and he dismisses it as a dream. The rest of the book does not quite live up to the atmospheric attraction of this first section, but is still intriguing in its own way as it follows the main character's daughter and granddaughter.