Crown Heights, Brooklyn

Crown Heights is the neighborhood in which Asher Lev and his family live for most of the novel, until Asher moves on as a young man.

Yudel Krinsky’s Store

Yudel Krinsky, a Russian Jew who was exiled to Siberia for eleven years before Aryeh Lev arranged for his escape, owns a stationery store and befriends the young Asher. Asher spends much of his free time in the store, helping Krinsky with small tasks, questioning him about Russia and Stalin, and learning about the tools for making art. Asher buys all of his art supplies from Krinsky, and once steals tubes of oil paints from the store, which he then returns out of guilt.

Russia

Soviet Russia plays a central part in “My Name is Asher Lev”, which is set in the 1950s, a time when Stalin persecuted Jews and forced them into “gulags,” labor...