A sensitive and sensible well written account of the life story of the immediate family of the author based on memory and on intense research. A quest for meaning and identity as foreground, plus the historical background of Arab and Jewish lives and interrelation in Egypt before and after the foundation of Israel.

I found this book to be very educational about the lives and experiences of Levantine Jews, one family in particular. I learned that the cultural affinities of these Jews are more like arabs than Sephardic or Ashkenazi Jews. However, I found the idolization and 'bigger than life' portrayal of the author's father to very tiring after a while.

The memoir is about the author's father, who she idolized despite his many questionable and downright inappropriate behaviors. He cheated on his wife, cheated in business, had favorites among his children which he was very obvious about, and was a tyrant in many ways. Some of this can be accounted for by culture, but other behaviors are just plain wrong (eg. putting phony tags in ties that he sold so that buyers would think they were silk ties from France instead of Polyester ties from the Bowery).

I also felt that the author's negativity towards the U.S. health system was over-zealously negative. This same system that neglected her father was the system that saved her life. All systems are broken in parts and I agree that our health system needs to be fixed. I think that her anger about her father's unhappy last days was displaced onto a system because there was nothing left with which to fix him. Anger is a large part of grief.

I liked learning about the culture, the family history and the triumphs and travails that the Lagnado family experienced. I would have liked to know more about Edith, the author's mother, who is merely a shadow figure in this book. She endured so much and so quietly - - and was put through so much pain and disrespect by her husband. Perhaps the author, her father's favorite, reveled in this and found it difficult to see beyond his special treatment of her. The reader, however, can see things with different eyes. It appears that the splitting of the family had a lot to do with the author's father and his delegation of different statuses and degrees of respect to his children and wife.

Overall, this book was okay. A lot was repetitive. By the end, I thought I could not bear to hear the street name, 'Malaka Nazli', one more time. It appeared to be a remembrance of things past, a dream that would never come again. For the author to go on in life, she needs to move forward to what is and what will be. All that she attributes to that street is a dream. That same street is where she was treated abhorrently for her religious beliefs and forced to seek political asylum in another country. The people she views as so kind and caring when she returned to Egypt were happy enough to see her leave Cairo decades before.

The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit is an extraordinarily moving and well-written memoir that speaks to the immigrant experience that built America. The focus is on author Lucette Lagnando's family, particularly her father, Leon. Leon was a prosperous Cairo businessman. A lover of Cairo's nightlife, Leon did not consider marriage until spying 20 year old Edith at an outdoor cafe in 1943.Within a few weeks, they become engaged, and wed shortly after.

Devout Jews, the Lagnado family lived in harmony with their Moslem and Christian neighbors in a spacious apartment on a bustling Cairo boulevard, Malaka Nazli. The Lagnado family has servants. The children attend the finest schools, and wear the finest clothes, and are often treated to excursions to Cairo's most renowned cafes and pastry shops. The family vacations each year by the sea, and visits with their extended family are routine.

This magical life ends when Nasser comes to power, and the Jews of Egypt are forced to leave with only whatever clothing they can take-no money, no jewelry, nothing that would help them begin a new life. The family spends a year living in Paris, then comes to New York, all with the assistance of international refugee aid organizations. Eventually, the Lagnado family ended up in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, amidst a small community of Egyptian Jews.

Over the years, the different family members react to their new circumstances in different ways. As Leon and Edith age and become more infirm, their children become more distant, and more American. Leon and Edith never really become American.

The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit is a love letter to a time gone by, and also a sad and realistic depiction of how immigrants become American. As all traces of their old life disappear, some become stronger, and other are destroyed.

I highly recommend this fine memoir, and look forward to reading more of Lucetter Lagnado's work.

I enjoyed reading this book. When I'm anxious to get back to reading a book that shows how good it is. Some books I wish they would finish. Not this one. I was sorry when it ended. It was very informative. I learned facts that I didn't know before. I like that. Always want to learn new things.

THIS STORY SHOWS HOW HARD IT IS TO ADJUST TO A NEW WAY OF LIFE.THE PAST AND ONE'S OWN HISTORY PLAYS A LOT IN HOW WE AND OUR FAMILIES TAKE TO NEW PLACES, PEOPLE AND EXPERIENCES.

BOOK BLOG
Silverstar Red Crow © 2009
The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit by Lucette Lagnado


Jews have been on the move since Abraham. From the Tigris and the Euphrates to the Exodus from Egypt to the present Iraq War, Jews have not had time, just time, to mentally and physically escape being despised, envied, looted and exiled. Studying the Sephardic Diaspora, now almost 2,000 years old, has been a life-long passion. I know many facts and historic details, but true understanding of the possible explanations for being hated so consistently for so long, have eluded me. So, when I stumbled upon The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit, a Jewish Family's Exodus from Old Cairo to the New World by Lucette Lagnado, I pounced on it and devoured it, one big bite at a time.

This carefully crafted family memoir spans 100 years: from Syria, to Cairo, to Paris and finally to Brooklyn, New York. Just the thought of it is exhausting: herding a large traditional Jewish family with Arabic training and sensibility from one place to another. The exhausting reality played out in the first 200 pages of this book, with its tedious character building and incessant use of French and Arabic. But, by the time I read page 201, Lagnado's multi-lingual familial tone made sense and gained power and speed. It took days to read the first 200 pages and only a few hours to complete it. I miss it already.

I am holding myself back, not wanting to share many details for fear of spoiling the outcome for others. I want to share the ending, to tell you of my tears when finishing the last paragraph, but I won't because this family diary reads more like a mystery novel and more details would simply take away from the book as a whole. Buy it, read it, give it as a gift. If this subject is a passion, you will not be disappointed!

The Man in The White Sharkskin Suit provides a unique view of emmigration - in most reports of Jews leaving a country because of persecution or anti-Semitism and going to America, the US is painted as the land of hope. In this book, the America that welcomed the Lagnado family did not open her arms wide and gather them in. It is a similar tale to the one I heard growing up from my own parents who came to the US as survivors of the Holocaust. While Egypt of the 40's no longer exists, I dreamed of going to the Cairo of Lucette Lagnado's memoir. I could taste the cakes, hear the music and smell the roses.

Very well written, a moving story that almost any-age reader can enjoy. My 84 year old mother who often falls asleep reading,stayed up until the 2 AM to finish the book and then called me in the morning and asked that I read this so we could discuss. My children will read this next. You don't need to be Jewish or of Middle Eastern descent to enjoy the poignancy of their story.

A well written glimpse into the Levantine experience as the world around them changed the from the 1940s to present time.

arrived on time with no problems; it's nice to save a few dollars here and there

Lucette Lagnado's Man in the White Sharkskin suit is a lovely and heartfelt elegy to Cairo's Jewish community of the 1940s and early 1950s.

Lagnado's father, a skilled and wealthy merchant and boulevardier, is the last patriarch of the Cairo branch of a distinguished Syrian Jewish clan. After taking a wife some 20 years his junior, Lagnado builds a three-generation family in a romantic Cairo of the years immediately following World War II. In his daughter's hands, this Cairo becomes the stuff of dreams, evoking lavish lifestyles amidst an urban streetscape of rose petal peddlers, produce vendors, seamstresses, synagogues, doctors and mystical healers. Would that we all might experience the beauty of this Cairo. The Lagnado family's place at the epicenter of this remarkable richness sets the tone for Man in the White Sharkskin Suit.

The second half of the memoir sets the Lagnado family afloat, cut from Cairo by the growing anti-Semitism of Nasser's Egypt. Accompanied by nothing other than trunks of beautifully made clothing-- ultimately unused-- the Lagnado clan leaves Egypt for an increaasingly precarious existence in Paris and then Brooklyn.

Many have framed this journey as the depiction of a family collapse. I saw it differently. While the Lagnado family fortune was captured by the Nasser government, leaving the family to emigrate penniless, the indomitable spirit of Lagnado's father continues to shine in France and, ultimately, in America. The Lagnados continue to value their heritage and honor it, more perfectly than not. That Lucette Lagnado so beautifully captures her father in this memoir is a tribute to the indomitability of his spirit, as well as to Cairo's lost Jewish community.

This is one of many books telling the heart breaking experience of egyptian jews suffering after 1948. It tells about the elegant fascinating life in egypt at that time.
however, it was not fair enough to tell the true status of egyptian jews and the attitude of egyptians toward them.
Before zionist movemnt, Egyptian jews enjoyed very high esteemed position in the society. they occupied high rank status in the government and many of them were successful rich bussiness people. Amazingly to say that more than 35% of big bussiness in Egypt was run by Jews. There were never discrimination neither persectuion against them.
Ironically, there were many zionist offices in Egypt to collect donation and help for poor jews of the world and help jews persecuted in Germany. Evenmore, Haeim Wizman visited Egypt to collect donation and support. The tragedy against jews started when the zionist movement declared frankly to sweep out Palestainian and creat a state by force.
At that moment many jews in Arab world were misjudged as spys to state of israel and as having loyality to israel. Long time agao, there were clubs, magazines, schools, hospitals and many social activities for the jews in Egypt and they enjoyed the highest standards in life.
But everything changed after the evil side of zionizm show its face

I enjoyed this book but wish the author had toned her Oedipal romanticism concerning her father and his playboy lifestyle during the years when they lived in Cairo. Glamorizing his adulterous and selfish behavior during the early years of his marriage was overdone. That part of the book would have benefitted from judicious editing. There is too much repetition, especially about the rumor that he had once had an affair with a popular Egyptian entertainer.The daughter is obviously imagining a father; this part gets out-of-control. Once the family leaves Nasser's Egypt and the father turns his affections towards the narrator,his daughter, the story takes on a new honesty and from there on through their years in New York, the book is totally absorbing and quite believable. I have read many immigrant sagas and this is one of the best.

I could barely put this book down. Not only are the events of the author's life interesting, but the details and descriptions are so breathtaking, emotionally real; I learned to much about a country I find fascinating, but also about a peoples who though "oriental" Jews, are of the same ethnic background of myself, a child of Ashkenazi Jews. So much of the story, though different than mine, appeals to the human side of life, my life anyway. You find yourself loving these people, knowing them, understanding them, feeling for them. The final chapters caused me to cry. This is one of my favorite books, and I will purchase it! I've already recommend this book to several Egyptian Muslim friends, to Jewish friends (some of whom, like myself, harken from Brooklyn).

A very moving real story, typical and representative of new immigrants experience. I learned a lot about the life of Jews in Egypt. Highly recommended.

This book is a very compelling read. It mostly told through the eyes of a child living through her families heart wrenching need to leave their home that they loved. They lived in Cairo when Jews were only tolerated there. But due to the father's smarts and savy they were able to live well and enjoy the best possible life in Cairo. You learn all about their family trials and tribulations. The family relationships and tolerance in this story are very captivating. I do not wish to spoil this story for anyone that would like to read this memoir. This is a must read.

This is a well written book. It is a family history, portrayed through the eyes of a litle girl who ages as the story progresses. She worships her father--the Man in the White Sharkskin Suit--, yet is not blind to his lapses and frailties as a human being.

Every family has a history, and a cast of characters. The tragic relative; the family member who died young, the braggart, the ne'er do well, the one about whom we do not speak, the patriarch, the rich uncle, the apostate--all comprise our individual families. We all have a story, but here the author makes hers come alive. It is easy to visualize her family's migration and trials as a screenplay or movie.

We learn about the author's parents' post-war courtship in Cairo, and the relative prosperity and freedom they enjoyed in the country ruled by King Farouk. We see the upheaval following the Suez Crisis and Nassar's ascendency, and the family's reaction and adaptation. We are witnesses to their daily triumphs and tragedies in the face of rising anti-semitism. Leon's reliance on his faith, his wife's coping skills and issues of illness, and death.

This is one family's journey from Cairo to Paris to Brooklyn, the constancy of their faith and culture and the rise and fall of their fortunes. It is a human story. The locale may change, but it is a story that is part of all of us.

This is a wonderful book, always interesting, and successful in conveying Lagnado's feelings about her family and the worlds she inhabited, now as an adult looking back, but especially her feelings as a child. Lagnado had a rich vein of material to explore thanks to the facts of her childhood and the characters who peopled it, especially her father and maternal grandmother. Their personalities come across as vividly as in a fine work of fiction. Lagnado begins her life as an upper class Jewish Egyptian, but spends much of her childhood as a poor immigrant in New York City, with a sojourn in Paris in between, during which the family survived as a ward of charities. Not only does Lagnado write very well, but she is disciplined in what to include and not include. A little too disciplined: I would have loved to know a bit more about her sister's adult life, but I can see how this would not fit. Even so, I recommend reading the acknowledgements, for what additional insight they bring. And according to the internet, if you get to New York, you can still visit the bakery mentioned in the book on Kings Highway, Brooklyn.

A speculation: is it possible the reason Lucette's doctor was so angry with her father and warned Lucette not to follow her father's advice, was because he feared she would be unduly influenced in choice of treatment option, and didn't trust her father's motives?

This book details the survival of an Egyptian Jewish family after leaving Egypt and contrasts it with what seemed to be a charmed life before leaving. The author writes well and gives the narrative much charm and many important details ; some of the details seemed to me skewed by the age of the writer as child and some perceptions seem unrealistic . But it is a very enjoyable and edifying description of the life of expulsion and resettlement that refugees go through.

This is a true story about a proud family patriarch, his relationships and most notably the one with his youngest daughter, who is the author of the book. This prominent Egyptian family is forced to leave their home when Jews were no longer able to live safely in Egypt. The story focuses on the difficult choice to abandon all that is familiar, for a journey into the unknown. The family lands in Paris, and eventually settles in New York. This is a family that had wealth and importance but becomes dependent on social services and the Jewish community for daily living. It is a slow read, but stays with the reader.

My parents were actually Egyptian Jews living in Cairo and Alexandria in the 1950s and fled in the mid 50s due to Nasser's tyranny. My mother has been reading the book the past week and has goose bumps reading essentially the same story, addresses, schools, bakery, cafes etc. of her life. True, every family's story is slightly different, but the facts are essentially identical. My mother and her family lived this story and actually knew some of the people in the story. Well done to Lucette on shedding light on a part of history that many do not know - only the Holocaust is focused on. So many Egyptian Jews lost their livelihood, fortunes, property and dignity simply because of their religion.

The first part of the book in Cairo, as others have mentioned before me, was intriguing for a reader like me who loves to read about people and places outside of my sphere of experience. And especially I seem to be drawn to Middle Eastern/African settings.
The elegant Cairo of a long gone era was very interesting as were the family members.
But the book went downhill in the second half. I kept hoping for a larger understanding from the author and a comprehension and conclusions drawn about her family and their situation that would raise it above the whine level.
And as an animal lover as much as I tried the nagging thoughts of how the cats who were so much a part of their family were cast aside so easily became symbolic of the family's ethics in general.
So basically I ended the book feeling more sorry for the abandoned cats than the family members who I increasingly found harder to like.

I found the book very interesting and the story well told. Her conclusion that that the bureaucrats who wavered about bringing her father over should be pleased that he was a good credit risk is totally wrong. Yes, he paid back the JEWISH relief agency for their passage, but sold ties under the counter, for cash so never had to report any income and pay any taxes to this country. His family had large medical expenses paid for by the welfare system of this country. None of his children served in the military of this country. So as far as the United States is concerned all this family did was take. They also seem to have no appreciation for the large economic burden they placed on the citizens of this country.

What a wonderful book. In may ways it is a book that anyone who's family has immigrated from another country can identify with and enjoy. She is a wonderful writer, you will find yourself laughing out loud at some passages and terribly sad at others, but it is worth reading. I enjoyed every page and have already passed it on to others who feel the same way. Don't pass this one up.