The Goddess of Small Victories: Library Edition

Princeton University, 1980. A young and unambitiouslibrarian named Anna Roth is assigned the task of retrieving the records ofKurt Gödel-the most fascinating and hermetic mathematician of the twentiethcentury. Her mission consists of befriending and ultimately taming the greatman's widow, Adele, a notoriously bitter woman set on taking belated revengeagainst the establishment by refusing to hand over these documents ofimmeasurable historical value.But as Anna soon finds out, Adele has a story of her own totell. Through descriptions of Princeton and Vienna after the war, theoccupation of Austria by the Nazis, the pressures of McCarthyism, the end ofthe positivist ideal, and the advent of nuclear weapons, Anna discoversfirsthand the epic story of a genius who could never quite find his place inthe world-and the private torment of the woman who loved him.