"Elegy plus comedy is the only way to express how we live in the world today, says a character in Sigrid Nunez's ninth novel. The Vulnerables offers a meditation on our contemporary era, as a solitary female narrator asks what it means to be alive at this complex moment in history and considers how our present reality affects the way a person looks back on her past. Humor, to be sure, is a priceless refuge. Equally vital is connection with others,...

"According to the writer, the major purpose of this particular novel was to ponder the philosophical questions of freedom and slavery and faith and godlessness. The novel shows the historical reality of a routine Jewish life and reflects on the fate of the Jewish people and humanity in general"--

"From the award-winning, internationally bestselling author, a romp of a novel, at once intimate and panoramic, about the adventures and misadventures of a 19th-century zelig. One man, many lives . . . Cashel Greville Ross experiences more of everything than most, from the rapturous to the devastating, from surprising good luck to unexpected loss. Born in 1799, Cashel seeks his fortune across the turbulence of multiple continents, from County Cork...