Forgiven

A Covo Family Saga

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Black Rose Writing
Published by: Black Rose Writing
Release Date: November 13, 2025
Pages: 314
ISBN13: 978-1685136734

 
Synopsis

Every family has its peculiar struggles. So, too, with the Covo family. Nicky - a Holocaust survivor and Brooklyn psychiatrist - is shattered by a malpractice lawsuit. Nicky's wife, Helen, wrestles with the impending death from cancer of her daughter, Sarah. Nicky's daughter, Kayla, a gifted composer, confronts the death of her muse. And Kayla's biracial son, Jackie, raised as an Orthodox Jew, is mortified when Kayla finds his hidden icon of Jesus.

In the midst of these calamities, the family visits the women's monastery in Greece where Nicky's baby sister, now known as Sister Theodora, has lived since childhood. As the family reunites, the Theotokos (the Mother of God) intervenes once again to save lives, and the family learns to forgive, to move on through loss and gain, doubt and faith, dark and light.

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Praise

“Bruce J. Berger is a writer of epic stories about family and place, stories that extend beyond generations within the tradition of Faulkner and Milan Kundera. I know his craft, his language, but beyond all this, I admire the dignity he brings to his books, his compassion and understanding of the human spirit. I have read his novels and heard him read from them, and with each experience I have felt my heart expand with greater love for the world.”
-David Keplinger, author of Ice

“Forgiven, Bruce J. Berger’s new book in the Covo family saga, authentically captures the impact of the Holocaust on successive generations of a family. He explores how family members, faced with their own personal challenges, struggle to rely on each other – and sometimes outside forces – to accept forgiveness and find purpose. I was particularly struck by Kayla, a former concert pianist who must trust in herself and others to find a way back to her music. Forgiven is an important and powerful read.”
-Bonnie Suchman, author of Stumbling Stones

“Forgiven by Bruce J. Berger is a layered, emotionally resonant novel about family, faith, and the difficult paths to healing. The story follows the Covo family, each member bearing private grief and unresolved conflicts. Nicky is a Holocaust survivor and respected Brooklyn psychiatrist who is rocked by a malpractice lawsuit that threatens his identity and career. His wife, Helen, wrestles with the looming loss of her daughter, Sarah, to cancer. Daughter, Kayla, is a gifted composer, left adrift after the loss of a personal source of inspiration. Her biracial son, Jackie, is being raised as an Orthodox Jew, but hides a secret icon of Jesus and is terrified of what his mother might think. Seeking a way forward, the family travels to a women’s monastery in Greece, where Nicky’s long-lost sister, now Sister Theodora, has lived since childhood. In this place of austere beauty and deep spirituality, the Theotokos (or the Mother of God) steps in to alter the course of their lives. Through moments of revelation, grace, and confrontation, the Covos begin to face their grief, reconcile their differences, and discover the transformative power of forgiveness. Berger’s novel is at once a moving family drama and a meditation on love, loss, and the resilience of the human spirit.

Bruce J. Berger has crafted a brilliant book that’s easy to fall into and hard to leave, resulting in a tender, deeply human exploration of family and faith. It’s a notably deep read with challenging ideas and complex emotions thrown into the mix from honest, bold characters whom readers will grow to love. Berger writes with empathy, nuance, and sharp lyricism to achieve this incredible characterization, and the Covo family’s struggles feel achingly real with every moment of vivid dialogue and strong, emotive description. The author strikes a finely tuned balance of intimate drama and spiritual depth, while the Greek monastery setting is rendered with a beauty and reverence that perfectly match this tone. Every scene is illuminated by culture, history, and faith, so that it feels like poetry to read, but digs much deeper with its detailed storytelling. Berger also interweaves personal and historical trauma with grace, never resorting to gimmicks. The novel digs into the fragility and resilience of humanity, even when life is at its most trying. Forgiven is the rare novel that is both heartbreaking and uplifting, and I would highly recommend it as an emotive read that takes audiences through a lot of feelings, but ultimately leaves the reader with a renewed sense of hope.”
- 5-Star Review by K.C. Finn for Indie Today

“Forgiven: A Novel … insightfully navigates the intricacies of relationships and depth of various theologies.”
-Rabbi Michael Werbow

 

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Excerpt

Complications

An Ongoing Concern

When the phone rang at nine in the morning, Helen Blanco Covo was momentarily unsure where she was. She lifted her head from the pillow – the pain of a rare hangover making her wish she’d not indulged in an extra glass of red wine the night before – still thinking she was in her house in Highland Park. Then, she blinked and realized she was in Nicky’s apartment, in his bed, in their bed, and that she had stupidly overslept. What was it she’d been intending to do? She dimly remembered Nicky getting up early to drive to his office in Brooklyn. He’d said something to her she couldn’t recall, something about the streets being treacherous? A glance out the window showed a dark sky and raindrops beaded on the pane. Right. A day of heavy rain had been forecast. She picked up the receiver, and it was Nicky.

“Helen …” She rubbed her eyes, which only intensified her discomfort. “Oh, Nicky, my head is killing me. I …”

“We’ve got trouble. I’m being sued. Some yoyo process server just pushed a summons into my hands. Gamóto!”

“This couldn’t wait until you got home?”

“A patient killed himself. I don’t even remember him. Jesus, I don’t believe this.”

Helen swung her legs out of the bed, whispering her usual prayer upon awakening, “Modah ani l’fanecha, Melech chai v’kayam, she’hechezarta bi nishmati b’chemla, rabah emunatecha.” (I thank you, Living and Forever King, for returning my breath to me in your great faithfulness.) Doctors get sued all the time, she thought, and Nicky hadn’t escaped the occasional malpractice claim. He’d been luckier than most psychiatrists, and his insurance carrier had managed to settle the few lawsuits against him. He’d given a few depositions, but had never had a case go to trial.

“Well, we can talk about it … where are my slippers?... oh … let’s talk when you get back this evening, can’t we, and …”

“You don’t understand, Helen. Listen. This complaint claims I knew this patient was going to kill himself and deliberately did nothing to prevent his death. His parents are suing.”

Helen stuck her feet into her slippers, wondering if she would need to barf. “Your lawyers will take care of it though, won’t they? Like before?”

“I can’t concentrate on seeing patients today. What if these charges are true? What if these things happened and I’ve blocked it out of my mind because …”

“Nonsense.” With difficulty, she stifled a major, sour burp. “Come home. Cancel your appointments. Come home.”

“But the name is somehow familiar.”

“What name?”

“Yahon. The patient – the alleged patient – who died. His last name was Yahon. I know it somewhere, but I can’t for the life of me remember …”

“You checked your files?”

“Immediately. No one by that name.”

“I think you’ve mentioned it. It’ll come to me.”

“I’ll see what I can cancel and call to let you know when I’ll be back. Oh, God. Why me?”

“Get hold of yourself, Nicky. Lawyers file all kinds of nonsense cases. Against doctors and against social workers too. It’s one of the worst diseases of our country, of our society. So we’ll talk.”

Helen took two Tylenol capsules with a smidgen of water, sat perfectly still for ten minutes, and finally decided she would not throw up. As she dressed in blue jeans and a Mets sweatshirt, thinking about Nicky’s call, Helen debated whether she should call Kayla, his daughter, or Max, his son, who was a lawyer but not one who handled medical malpractice cases as far as she knew, let alone psychiatric. Perhaps Nicky wanted to tell them about this himself. He had been unusually upset. Maybe his angst was due in part to the fact he’d been slowly reducing the number of patients he saw in preparation for retirement later in the year. The lawsuit would obviously force him to keep his mind wrapped up in his practice, even if he did retire, unless it could be resolved quickly.

Suicide. It was an ongoing concern, not only for psychiatrists, but for social workers. Helen recalled at least two of her own clients who had killed themselves, one of whom had been in the middle of therapy. She hadn’t been sued, Baruch Hashem. And even though Helen felt these suicides were not preventable – both clients had consistently denied having suicidal ideations – she had still felt guilty. She had wracked her brain for clues she might have missed, hints she might have ignored. She had even seen a therapist herself a few times after the first of these tragedies. But then she’d been able to move on and, in doing so, continue to help others as the committed social worker she’d been.

A lawsuit filed against him would make it much harder for Nicky to move on, at least until it was resolved. And what if, against all odds, this was a case that actually went to trial? And what if, Hashem forbid, the case went against her husband? Nicky’s fragile ego could shatter.
Suicide. Nicky had twice tried to kill himself. Twice that she knew of.

Jewish Visitors

Sister Theodora sat on her cot, rereading the letter she’d received a few days earlier from her brother. It was late afternoon in early March 1991. The weather had been cold and cloudy, and the light in her cell was barely sufficient for her to make out the writing, but thoughts about Nicky’s letter had interrupted her immersion in daily prayer. She finally decided to stop praying and figure out what in Nicky’s letter bothered her so much. On its face, it was a typically chatty missive, just the thing she’d come to expect from Nicky in the few months she’d been back at the monastery following her visit to America, although it did bear bad news.

My Dearest Kal,
So much has happened here I wanted to tell you about. You’ll be most interested in Jackie. He keeps asking about you and insists we must visit you in Greece. A seven-year-old doesn’t quite understand what a monumental trip that would be, but Kayla and I told him – we had to in order to placate him – we’d think about it for this summer. I hope, if we visit, we will be able to spend a good deal of time with you and that our visit won’t inconvenience you or the monastery. Jackie keeps talking about Abbess Fevronia and how you took her back to Greece in a box. He knows the word coffin, but keeps saying box. One thing he hasn’t mentioned recently is how you believed he was the reincarnation of Jesus. Just as well he forget that. He’s making good progress in his clarinet playing, by the way, and wanted me to tell you.
The worst news is that Helen’s daughter Sarah has had a recurrence of her ovarian cancer. Things don’t look great. I’ve tried to be supportive of Helen and her family. It’s downright scary to think this wonderful young woman, with three children, might be taken from us. She’s only 42. If you can say a prayer for her, please do. Now, you’ll think that’s an odd request, coming from an atheist. Yes, I still think of myself as such, and yet, knowing of the miracles you undoubtedly wrought, the miracle that saved my life, I can’t help but ask you to seek divine intervention for Sarah. Thank you in advance for doing so.
And the last news is about Max, and maybe about a nightmare for him. Max is scheduled this summer to assist in a major trial in Chicago. It’s so important for him, a new partner in the firm, and he’s only second chair, but, as he tells me, that means he does most of the work and gets most of the blame if the case goes poorly. So the anxiety and stress are eating him up. I don’t know how much you’re aware of our crazy legal system here in America, but, to listen to Max, juries don’t care about facts and only want to make sure someone gets the money otherwise sitting in the bank accounts of large corporations. We could do well without lawyers. I’d like to say I hate them, but I hate only the plaintiffs’ lawyers. Max is one of the good guys.
Kayla will probably need a lot of help watching after Jackie when Max is gone. She hasn’t been feeling well herself lately. She seems irritable, but, yes, I think she’s still taking her meds. At least I hope so.
With that, I wish you well.
All my love,
Nicky”

Theodora wondered what in Nicky’s letter worried her most. Sarah’s illness? Theodora had talked quite a bit with Sarah, a lovely person, at Helen and Nicky’s wedding the previous fall. Sadly, she was dying unless a miracle occurred. Theodora should have offered up a prayer to the Lord Jesus Christ for Sarah’s healing, and she regretted not having done so yet. She’d thought about it and had come close to trying, but something had prevented her, something she could not explain. Perhaps that bothered her.

Or maybe it was Nicky’s reference to her strong conviction that Jackie was the incarnation of the Second Coming. Nicky wanted Jackie to forget, as if God’s message to Theodora, the message she’d misinterpreted but that led her to visit America, was something to be embarrassed about. Then why ask her to pray? What sense did it make for Nicky to deny God, yet try to have her do the difficult work of beseeching God to save a life?

Or maybe what gnawed at Theodora was the possibility the Holy Monastery of St. Vlassios might receive Jewish visitors from America in the coming months. Who exactly? Certainly Nicky and Helen, Jackie and Kayla. Theodora loved them all, but how long would they want to stay and what effect would their visit have on her daily prayer? Since her visit to America, Theodora’s prayer had deepened, and she often felt herself at one with her Lord. She prayed often at Fevronia’s gravesite, next to the stream Microdermis, a place where Theodora experienced the greatest peace.

Would the visit of her American relatives disrupt that blessed state?