"Katalin Street," by Magda Szabo

    This is the third book I have read by Magda Szabo, the Hungarian auther, winner of many prizes in Europe. The first two--noted earlier in my blog--are "The Door" and "Iza's Ballad"--both of which I enjoyed,  and both of which I admired as excellent pieces of fiction.
      The novel covers three families that live together on Katalin Street in Budapest--the widowed Major and his son Balint and his housekeeper (perhaps more than housekeeper): the Elekeses--he a head teacher, with his wife, and two daughters--Iren and Blanka: and the Helds--a Jewish dentist and his wife and daughter, Henriette.       
      The families are all friendly--in and out of each other's houses, the children performing plays together, and Iren growing up desperately in love with Balint, who reciprocates in the earlier years (or does he have a soft spot for Henriette?), but after his prisoner of war experience in Russia there are problems...
       The novel is broken down into the events of years: 1934, 1944 (when the Helds disappear, and Henriette is killed), 1952, 1956 (the year of the uprising), 1961, and 1968. And we see the developments in the story through a number of different eyes.  As in the two earlier novels, there is a great deal of analysis of what is going on in the minds of the characters. In addition, Henriette comes back from the dead, as a wraith and observer, and once actually in the flesh, when she meets with Balint and he does not recognise her.
     We have the complexity of human relationships, love, jealousy, despair, mingled with the changes that occur over the courses of intertwined lives. Strongly recommended.