For her latest, Bloom (Away) offers something unrepentantly quirky, a madcap romp complete with road trips, secret identities, aspiring Hollywood starlets, and a tarot card-reading fake psychic. Like many screwball comedies, it starts off during the Great Depression, but it reaches its emotional climax during World War II. Eva and Iris are half sisters who flee the Midwest for California only to find themselves on the road again, heading east with their father. Along the way, they pick up strays such as German American Gus, creating a family of misfits. Gus is eventually sent to an internment camp and later repatriated to Germany, leaving Eva to hold together the remains of her patchwork clan after big sister Iris flees to England. VERDICT At its core, this is a novel of resilience, with the war serving as both a life-changing event and no more than the background noise of an impoverished existence. Full of intriguing characters and lots of surprises, it's not for those who have taken a stand against offbeat characters, but readers of literary fiction and 20th-century historicals, as well as fans of wacky humor, will find it an excellent choice. [See Prepub Alert, 2/10/14.]--Pamela Mann, St. Mary's Coll. Lib., MD (c) Copyright 2014. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.