North of Ithaka: A Granddaughter Returns to Greece and Discovers Her Roots 
Product Description: In North of Ithaka, Eleni Gage returns to the remote Greek village of Lia, where her father was born and her grandmother murdered, to rebuild the ruins of her namesake s home and come to terms with her family s tragic history. In doing so, she leaves behind a sparkling social life and successful career to continue the tale of a family and a place which her father, Nicholas Gage, made famous over twenty years ago with his international bestseller, Eleni. Along the way she survives humorous misadventures, absorbs fascinating folklore, and comes to understand that memories of the dead can bring new life to the present. Part travel memoir and part family saga, North of Ithaka is, above all, a journey home.
Customer Ratings: - superficial. I had high hopes for this book in view of the rich experiences of Nicholas Gage and his two fine books so worthy of that experience. Sadly, this book struck me as superficial and, as often happens these days in writers who drawing on personal experience, narcissistic. I gave the book a chance, but really had to stop before I was half finished.
It s not enough to be a good writer, you need to have a mature sensibility and not leave the impression that you ve spent too much of your life shopping. Disclosure: I am of Greek descent and we need more worthy attention to be paid to Greece in the modern era, books like those by Miller and Patrick Leigh Fermor are an antidote to this one. - What an excellent book!. As a Greek-American, I ve been looking for a memoir about the Greek-American experience that I could identify with. Over the past few years, I ve read several memoir-style books, but none really hit home...until now. Even thought my family is not from Epiros, I did not grow up in Massachusetts, and my family did not have such a traumatic post-WWII experience, I could totally identify with Eleni Gage s story of straddling two countries and exploring the duality of her persona. This struggle to fit in in both Greece and America is something that I have dealt with and am continuing to deal with, and Eleni is able to describe the emotions and process more eloquently than I ever could!
Eleni s elegant prose makes this book easy to read, and I especially enjoyed the sprinkling of folk lore and traditions that she included. By the end, I wanted to read more, to find out what happened afterwards...always a sign of a great book!
I will recommend this book to all my friends, Greek and non-Greek alike! Bravo, Eleni! - A magificent book. This book is a rare treat.
I loved reading it - I was mesmerized by it and during this snowed-in weekend when I read it, I was transported to Lia, where I lived under its magnificent sky with the changing sunset colors (enjoyed from the vernada of the Haidis house), observed up close the house reconstruction project, and came to know an entire village, feeling if not a Liotan myslef, at least like a frequent visitor.
What also springs out of the book, perhaps more than Lia and its people, is the author herself: nice, smart, mature, perceptive and talented.
And a note to her father: you re a great author but she is at least as good a writer as you, not to say better. So please give up the comparisons with her at the Thanksgiving table, there are genetics out there and there is also evolution -- and she has both aplenty. I m sure you glow with justified pride having her as a daughter. Anyone would!
Bottom Line: A SUPERB BOOK - NOT TO BE MISSED! - the granddaughter speaks. The star is still her grandmother, Eleni, killed during the Greek Civil War for trying to save her children. In a word, it s the story of Eleni returning to Lia, the family village, to remember her grandmother close up and rebuild the family house. Without the memory of reading ELENI by her father, Nick Gage, I would never have read or understood NORTH OF ITHAKA. So that s the review: first read Nick s book about his mother, most likely the most riveting and compelling of my 55 year reading career. You should read ELENI, and you must have to understand NORTH OF ITHAKA.
- a moving follow up in the Eleni series. As a half-Greek American, I was moved when reading Eleni and A Time For Us, two books by Eleni Gage s Dad (Nicholas Gage) that detail the atrocities committed against her family during the Greek civil war, which was fought immediately post-World-War-2. Eleni s grandmother (also named Eleni) was ultimately murdered by the communists who were trying to take control over Greece during that war (thank God they did not win) -- she was executed for the crime of helping her children to escape war-torn Greece and ultimately to emigrate to America. North of Ithaka is a timely follow-up to this family s story.
Eleni recounts leaving her lucrative job in New York City (around the 2001-2002 timeframe) to move to her family s remote village of Lia, in the province of Epiros in northwestern Greece. There, with financial backing from her Dad, she undertakes rebuilding her grandmother (and namesake) Eleni s home, which was used as a prison during the Greek civil war and had fallen into disrepair over the years.
This book illustrates how even small village life can hold love and meaning to modern, cosmopolitan Americans. I do recommend reading her Dad Nicholas s book Eleni before reading North of Ithaka, since many events discussed in North of Ithaka relate to the story of her grandmother s murder, to her family s hardships in Greece, and to their eventual emigration to America. However, it is not essential to read Eleni prior to reading this book.
As a bonus, there is a collection of traditional Greek recipes at the end of the book. I bought a briki (Greek coffee pot) and now make 1-2 cups of traditional Greek coffee every day! As Eleni mentions, we call this coffee Greek, never Turkish.
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North of Ithaka: A Granddaughter Returns to Greece and Discovers Her Roots (ID: 031234029X)
