Her First American: A Novel

She’s Ilka Weissnix, a young Jewish refugee from Hitler’s Europe, newly arrived in the United States. He’s Carter Bayoux, her first American: a middle-aged, hard-drinking Black intellectual. At first, their relationship is fueled by lust, but also by a shared sense of displacement, with Ilka having fled her homeland and Carter struggling to find his place in a society steeped in racism and prejudice.

In an effort to assimilate and discover “the real America,” Ilka hurls herself into Carter’s chaotic world, helping him navigate depression, alcoholism, and the ghosts of his past—and present. Will Ilka sacrifice her own needs—and future—for Carter’s, or can she save him from the demons and traumas that are tearing him, and them, apart?

First published forty years ago to universal acclaim, called “wonderful” by People magazine, and “quiet, funny, slyly affecting” in a starred Kirkus review, and now featuring a new introduction by acclaimed novelist Jeffery Renard Allen, Her First American cements its place among the great American novels and introduces a new generation of readers to the brilliant Lore Segal.