reviews - Jewish Book Council
reviews - Jewish Book Council
reviews - Jewish Book Council
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
Spring 5770/2010 Vol. 28, Number 1<br />
FEATURES<br />
4 National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Awards<br />
22 Hear, O Israel...<br />
Maron L. Waxman<br />
AUTHOR/BOOK PROFILES<br />
30 Children in Flight<br />
Marcia Weiss Posner<br />
36 Figures Lie, Liars Figure<br />
Noel N. Kriftcher<br />
38 The Psycho-Resilient <strong>Jewish</strong> Soul<br />
Audrey Freshman<br />
46 <strong>Jewish</strong> South Africa in Fiction<br />
Lauren Kramer<br />
Malvina D. Engelberg<br />
52 In the Grasp of the Shoah: Tales of Travail<br />
and Its Aftermath<br />
Marcia Weiss Posner<br />
54 “Curb” Couple Memoirs<br />
Jaclyn Trop<br />
REVIEW HIGHLIGHTS<br />
26 AMERICAN JEWISH STUDIES<br />
26 The Baseball Talmud: A Definitive Position-By-<br />
Position Ranking of Baseball’s Chosen Players<br />
Howard Megdal<br />
Reviewed by Maron L. Waxman<br />
26 We Remember with Reverence and<br />
Love: American Jews and the Myth of<br />
Silence After the Holocaust, 1945–1962<br />
Hasia R. Diner<br />
Reviewed by Michael N. Dobkowski<br />
28 AUTOBIOGRAPHY & MEMOIR<br />
28 The 188 th Crybaby Brigade<br />
Joel Chasnoff<br />
Reviewed by Jessica B. Horwitz<br />
31 Curriculum Vitae<br />
Yoel Hoffmann; Peter Cole, trans.<br />
Reviewed by Bob Goldfarb<br />
37 BIOGRAPHY<br />
37 Bob Dylan: Prophet, Mystic, Poet<br />
Seth Rogovoy<br />
Reviewed by David Cohen<br />
37 CONTEMPORARY JEWISH LIFE<br />
37 The Art of Giving: Where the Soul<br />
Meets a Business Plan<br />
Charles Bronfman and Jeffrey<br />
Solomon; James Wolfensohn, fwd.<br />
Reviewed by Stephen G. Donshik<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
42 Jews, God, and Videotape: Religion<br />
and Media in America<br />
Jeffrey Shandler<br />
Reviewed by Jeff Bogursky<br />
44 Why The Dreyfus Affair Matters<br />
Louis Begley<br />
Reviewed by Bob Goldfarb<br />
40 COOKBOOKS<br />
41 <strong>Jewish</strong> Slow Cooker Recipes<br />
Laura Frankel<br />
Reviewed by Danièle Gorlin Lassner<br />
44 EDUCATION AND JEWISH IDENTITY<br />
44 Sowing the Seeds of Character<br />
Judd Kruger Levingston<br />
Reviewed by Jeffrey Schein<br />
45 FICTION<br />
45 36 Arguments for the Existence of God:<br />
A Work of Fiction<br />
Rebecca Newberger Goldstein<br />
Reviewed by Margaret Teich<br />
51 HISTORY<br />
51 Dancing in the Dark: A Cultural<br />
History of the Great Depression<br />
Morris Dickstein<br />
Reviewed by Bill Brennan<br />
53 HOLOCAUST STUDIES<br />
54 The Death of the Shtetl<br />
Yehuda Bauer<br />
Reviewed by Carl J. Rheins<br />
55 HUMOR<br />
55 I Drink for a Reason<br />
David Cross<br />
Reviewed by Joshua Daniel Edwin<br />
55 ISRAEL STUDIES<br />
56 Lone Soldiers: Israel’s Defenders<br />
From Around the World<br />
Herb Keinon<br />
Reviewed by Gil Ehrenkranz<br />
56 Start-Up Nation: The Story of Israel’s<br />
Economic Miracle<br />
Dan Senor and Saul Singer<br />
Reviewed by Peter L. Rothholz<br />
57 MODERN JEWISH THOUGHT<br />
AND EXPERIENCE<br />
57 The Seder Night: An Exalted Evening:<br />
The Passover Haggadah With a<br />
Commentary Based on the Teachings<br />
of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik<br />
Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik;<br />
Rabbi Menachem Genack, ed.<br />
Reviewed by Wallace Greene<br />
58 POETRY<br />
58 Beads for the Messiah’s Bride: Poems<br />
on Leviticus<br />
Yakov Azriel<br />
Reviewed by Deborah Schoeneman<br />
59 These Mountains: Selected Poems<br />
of Rivka Miriam<br />
Rivka Miriam; Linda Stern Zisquit, trans.<br />
Reviewed by Hara E. Person<br />
59 VISUAL ARTS<br />
59 The <strong>Book</strong> of Genesis<br />
Robert Crumb; Robert Alter, trans.<br />
Reviewed by Elliot Fox<br />
60 Reinventing Ritual: Contemporary Art<br />
and Design for <strong>Jewish</strong> Life<br />
Daniel Belasco; Contributors:<br />
Arnold M. Eisen, Julie Lasky,<br />
Tamar Rubin, Danya Ruttenberg<br />
Reveiwed by Arlene B. Soifer<br />
61 WOMEN’S STUDIES<br />
61 Mitzvah Girls: Bringing Up the Next<br />
Generation of Hasidic Jews in Brooklyn<br />
Ayala Fader<br />
Reviewed by Shelomo Alfassa<br />
62 CHILDREN’S<br />
DEPARTMENTS<br />
2 Editor’s Note<br />
24 JBW <strong>Book</strong> Club Recommendations<br />
25 Emerging Voices: David Sax<br />
Laurie Gwen Shapiro<br />
62 Children’s<br />
67 Barbara Bietz Chats with<br />
Zachary Shapiro<br />
69 <strong>Book</strong>s of Note<br />
75 Now in Paperback<br />
76 Contributors<br />
79 Index<br />
CORRECTION: <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World regrets the following errors in the Winter, 2009 issue:<br />
The reviewer of the Doll Shop Downstairs (Yona Zeldis McDonough) is Naomi Morse.<br />
The correct subtitle for Business Mensch is Timeless Wisdom for Today’s Entrepreneur.<br />
Winter 5770/2009 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 1
EDITOR’S NOTE<br />
The massive earthquake<br />
that devastated<br />
Haiti on January 12<br />
triggered an equally massive<br />
global response. The<br />
swift worldwide outpouring<br />
of humanitarian and<br />
financial aid in reaction<br />
to Haiti’s horrific suffering and urgent need<br />
demonstrated once again that catastrophes<br />
often give rise to teachable moments.<br />
What, exactly, is a teachable moment? It is<br />
“a moment of educational opportunity, a time<br />
at which a person is likely to be particularly disposed<br />
to learn something or particularly<br />
responsive to being taught or made aware of<br />
something” (MSN Encarta). President Obama,<br />
whose use of the phrase has popularized it, said<br />
about the earthquake, “In the aftermath of disaster,<br />
we are reminded that life can be unimaginably<br />
cruel. That pain and loss is so often<br />
meted out without any justice or mercy. That<br />
‘time and chance’ happen to us all. But it is also<br />
in these moments, when we are brought face to<br />
face with our own fragility, that we rediscover<br />
our common humanity. We look into the eyes<br />
of another and see ourselves.”<br />
In the continuing aftershock of Haiti’s catastrophic<br />
earthquake, Rabbi Jill Jacobs’ new<br />
book, There Shall Be No Needy: Pursuing Social<br />
Justice through <strong>Jewish</strong> Law & Tradition (see<br />
review, p. 43), is particularly relevant and<br />
timely. A comprehensive exploration of the<br />
concepts of tzedakah and tikkun olam, the<br />
book stems from the principle that in Judaism<br />
healing the sick and providing for the poor are<br />
not choices but obligations. Rabbi Jacobs,<br />
who is rabbi in residence at <strong>Jewish</strong> Funds for<br />
Justice, goes deeply but comprehensibly into<br />
classical <strong>Jewish</strong> sources, contemporary policy<br />
debate, and real-life stories to explore aspects<br />
of social justice as well as stories about repairing<br />
our broken world, each from a deeply <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
perspective.<br />
2 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Winter 5770/2009<br />
Amidst the worldwide flood of support for<br />
Haiti, Israel stood out for its ability to quickly<br />
set up a field hospital in a Port-au-Prince soccer<br />
field and begin performing surgery while<br />
other nations were still waiting for supplies.<br />
Within three days, Israel had ten tons of medical<br />
equipment, 40 doctors, 24 nurses, medics,<br />
paramedics, x-ray equipment and personnel, a<br />
pharmacy, an emergency room, two surgery<br />
rooms, an incubation ward, a children’s ward,<br />
and a maternity ward up and running. It was<br />
no accident that the <strong>Jewish</strong> State got there<br />
first; it was no public relations stunt, either.<br />
The reason Israel had the know-how and<br />
capability to do what was needed in Haiti is a<br />
reflection of something deep in the nation’s<br />
character, a central <strong>Jewish</strong> value that demands<br />
engagement in public life and a sense of obligation<br />
to each other.<br />
Special envoy to Haiti former President<br />
Bill Clinton pointed out that the response to<br />
great tragedy can be predictive of the future.<br />
Israel’s quick and thorough response in helping<br />
to alleviate Haiti’s suffering was an example<br />
of our Biblical mission to be a light unto<br />
the nations. Our core values, our belief in<br />
tzedakah, justice, and tikkun olam, demand<br />
that we come together whenever and wherever<br />
necessary to bring light and hope to those who<br />
are in need. In the words of Rabbi Jacobs, “we<br />
understand giving beyond our immediate<br />
community as a means of increasing peace<br />
and of emulating the divine quality of mercy.”<br />
As Jews we have brought upon ourselves<br />
some of the problems in the way the world<br />
perceives us. But in the broader scales of justice,<br />
Israel’s speedy and effective response in<br />
Haiti is a glimpse into our core, of which we<br />
can , and should, be proud.<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong><br />
<strong>Book</strong> World<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong> is a not-for-profit organization<br />
founded in 1943 to promote the publishing, writing, and<br />
reading of quality books of <strong>Jewish</strong> interest. In sponsoring<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World the <strong>Council</strong> aims to meet the need for a<br />
journal devoted to providing thoughtful <strong>reviews</strong> of new <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
books and features on the author and literary scene. It is<br />
our hope that <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World will be a valued resource in<br />
navigating today’s exciting <strong>Jewish</strong> literary scene. The <strong>Council</strong><br />
is also the sponsor of <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Month, the National<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Awards, the <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> NETWORK, the Sami<br />
Rohr Prize for <strong>Jewish</strong> Literature, and other programs and<br />
activities.<br />
Staff<br />
Carol E. Kaufman Editor<br />
Naomi Firestone Managing Editor<br />
Lisa Silverman Children’s <strong>Book</strong> Editor<br />
Barbara Goelman Editorial Assistant,<br />
Children's <strong>Book</strong>s<br />
Sean Kennedy Art Director<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong><br />
Lawrence J. Krule President<br />
Harry I. Freund Vice-President<br />
Judith Lieberman Vice-President<br />
Mimi S. Frank Secretary<br />
Henry Everett (z”l) Honorary Chairman<br />
of the Board<br />
Carolyn Starman Hessel Director<br />
Miri R. Pomerantz Dauber Program Director<br />
Joyce Lit Program Associate<br />
Libi Adler Program Associate<br />
Board of Directors<br />
Steven D. Burton Myra Kraft<br />
Edith Everett Carmel R. Krauss<br />
Paul A. Flexner Ruth Legow<br />
Ellen Frankel Dan Levine<br />
Samuel G. Freedman William Liss-Levinson<br />
Sharon Friedman Stuart Matlins<br />
Ari L. Goldman Deborah Miller<br />
Shelley Goldseker Marcia W. Posner<br />
Matthew F. Golub Julie Potiker<br />
Blu Greenberg Steven Siegel<br />
Stephan Gross Livia S. Straus<br />
Rae Gurewitsch Joseph Telushkin<br />
Miriam Holmes Alan J. Wiener<br />
Altie Karper Bernard Weinflash<br />
Francine Klagsbrun Jane Weitzman<br />
Warren Kozak<br />
Editorial Board<br />
Altie Karper Nessa Rapaport<br />
Michael Monheit Arlene Soifer<br />
Marcia W. Posner Ted Solotaroff (z”l), ex officio<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World (ISSN: 1083-8341) is published quarterly<br />
by the <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong>, 520 8th Avenue, 4th floor, New<br />
York, NY 10018, (212)201-2920; www.jewishbookcouncil.org;<br />
email: jbc@jewishbooks.org. The subscription rate is $36.00<br />
a year or $12.50 for an individual issue. Copyright © 2009,<br />
by <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong>. Postmaster: Please send address<br />
changes to <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong>, 520 8th Avenue, 4th Floor,<br />
New York, NY 10018.<br />
The articles and opinions expressed herein do not necessarily<br />
represent the view of the Editorial Board, Board of<br />
Directors, or any member thereof or any particular editor<br />
or Staff member.<br />
Advertising in <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World does not necessarily<br />
imply editorial endorsement.<br />
To advertise in <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World, please call<br />
(212) 201-2921 or email naomi@jewishbooks.org<br />
Claims on orders that have not been received must<br />
be made within two months of the date of publication.
Now available from the<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong><br />
ONLY $160<br />
(including shipping)!<br />
It is a perfect gift for<br />
loved ones. Or, why<br />
not donate it as a<br />
gift to your local<br />
synagogue or senior<br />
citizen home?<br />
For more information,<br />
call 212-201-2920<br />
or email<br />
jbc@jewishbooks.org<br />
Now with Liner Notes!<br />
the SAMI<br />
ROHR<br />
LIBRARY<br />
of RECORDED<br />
YIDDISH BOOKS<br />
The historic compilation of<br />
Yiddish classics, read aloud<br />
by native Yiddish speakers<br />
at Montreal’s <strong>Jewish</strong> Public<br />
Library, and presented by the<br />
National Yiddish <strong>Book</strong> Center ,<br />
preserves complete, unabridged<br />
books on CD.<br />
Thirty titles are now available,<br />
including works by: Sholem<br />
Aleichem, Sholem Asch, I.L.<br />
Peretz, Mendele Moykher<br />
Sforim, and I.B. Singer,<br />
among others.<br />
This project is supported by a generous grant from the Rohr family of Miami.
59 NATIONAL<br />
The National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong><br />
Awards is the longest running<br />
North American awards program<br />
of its kind and is recognized<br />
as the most prestigious. The<br />
TH 59 NATIONAL TH<br />
awards, presented by category,<br />
are designed to give recognition<br />
to outstanding books, to stimu-<br />
late writers to further literary<br />
creativity and to encourage the<br />
reading of books of merit.
JEWISHBOOKAWARDS<br />
The following synopses of the NJBA winners and finalists were written by either<br />
the Members of the judging panels in each category or the publisher of the title.<br />
EVERETT FAMILY FOUNDATION<br />
2009 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> of the Year Award<br />
LOUIS D. BRANDEIS:<br />
A LIFE<br />
Melvin I. Urofsky<br />
Pantheon <strong>Book</strong>s<br />
During the half-century<br />
from 1890 to<br />
1940, the pre-eminent<br />
Jew in American public<br />
life was without doubt<br />
Louis D. Brandeis. And<br />
almost 70 years after his<br />
death in 1941 he remains<br />
an iconic figure well<br />
worth close examination.<br />
Happily, Melvin Urofsky<br />
has now provided us with a<br />
comprehensive, deeply<br />
researched and highly readable<br />
biography of this man<br />
who occupies so significant<br />
a place in the history both of our nation and of American Jewry.<br />
In the pages of Urofsky’s Louis D. Brandeis: A Life, we meet the secular<br />
Jew from Louisville whose path takes him from Harvard Law<br />
School to a highly successful career as a young lawyer in Boston and<br />
then, unpredictably, to fame as an idealistic advocate who brilliantly<br />
deploys his legal skills as the champion of reform in municipal affairs,<br />
labor relations, banking, and big business. We watch as Brandeis<br />
becomes the close advisor of Woodrow Wilson and we witness the furious<br />
battle in the U.S. Senate over his nomination as the first <strong>Jewish</strong> justice<br />
of the U.S. Supreme Court and the two decades of distinguished<br />
service on the Court that followed. In the midst of this already crowded<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
and stormy career, again utterly unexpectedly, we see Brandeis take up<br />
the cause of Zionism and the leadership of the nascent, fragile Zionist<br />
movement in America, famously declaring that “to be good Americans<br />
we must be better Jews, and to be better Jews we must be Zionists.”<br />
Finally, in this account of the public and private life of the man that<br />
FDR called “Isaiah,” we meet an amazing cast of historic figures with<br />
whom Brandeis worked or fought—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Felix<br />
Frankfurter, Dean Acheson, Chaim Weizmann,<br />
Arthur Balfour, Robert Lafollette, Herbert Hoover,<br />
Stephen Wise, and many others. In short, this is a<br />
vivid biography of a man who, by force of intellect,<br />
energy, and passionate idealism had a transforming<br />
effect on America, on the story of Jews in America,<br />
and on the historic course of Zionism.<br />
JEWISH BOOKCOUNCIL<br />
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD<br />
RUTH GRUBER<br />
INSIDE OF TIME: MY JOURNEY FROM ALASKA TO ISRAEL<br />
(Basic <strong>Book</strong>s)<br />
AHEAD OF TIME: MY EARLY YEARS AS A FOREIGN CORRE-<br />
SPONDENT<br />
(Wynwood)<br />
EXODUS 1947: THE SHIP THAT LAUNCHED A NATION<br />
(Crown)<br />
DESTINATION PALESTINE: THE STORY OF THE HAGANAH<br />
SHIP EXODUS, 1947<br />
(Current <strong>Book</strong>s)<br />
HAVEN: THE DRAMATIC STORY OF 1000 WORLD WAR II<br />
REFUGEES AND HOW THEY CAME TO AMERICA<br />
(Coward-McCann)<br />
I WENT TO THE SOVIET UNION<br />
(Viking Press)<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 5<br />
Virginia Commonwealth University
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
ISRAEL TODAY: LAND OF MANY NATIONS<br />
(Hill and Wang)<br />
RAQUELA: A WOMAN OF ISRAEL<br />
(Coward, McCann & Geoghegan)<br />
RESCUE: THE EXODUS OF THE ETHIOPIAN JEWS<br />
(Atheneum)<br />
WITNESS: ONE OF THE GREAT CORRESPONDENTS<br />
OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY TELLS HER STORY<br />
(Schocken <strong>Book</strong>s)<br />
Ruth Gruber is a true 20th century hero of the <strong>Jewish</strong> people. A gifted<br />
writer and a woman of great courage and determination she<br />
has devoted her life to rescuing her fellow Jews from oppression. Her<br />
journey began with a series that she did for the New York Herald Tribune<br />
about women under communism and fascism. It was her skill as a<br />
young journalist that called her to the attention of the then Secretary<br />
of the Interior, Harold Ickes. Gruber’s life defining moment came in<br />
1944 when Mr. Ickes, impressed by her work, asked her to take on a<br />
special and dangerous mission: secretly escorting a group of 1,000<br />
refugees from Italy to America. Later, while in Jerusalem she learned of<br />
a former American pleasure boat, renamed the Exodus, which had been<br />
attempting to deliver 4,500 <strong>Jewish</strong> refugees. Her moving photographs<br />
and stories of these events remain an important chronicle of <strong>Jewish</strong> history.<br />
In her latest work, Witness: One of the Great Correspondents<br />
of the Twentieth Century Tells Her Story,<br />
Gruber writes about what she saw and shows us,<br />
through her haunting and life-affirming photographs—taken<br />
on each of her assignments—the<br />
worlds, the people, the landscapes, the courage, the<br />
hope, the life she witnessed up close and firsthand.<br />
AMERICAN JEWISH STUDIES<br />
Celebrate 350 Award<br />
Winner:<br />
WE REMEMBER WITH REVERENCE<br />
AND LOVE: AMERICAN JEWS AND<br />
THE MYTH OF SILENCE AFTER THE<br />
HOLOCAUST, 1945–1962<br />
Hasia R. Diner<br />
New York University Press<br />
In We Remember with Reverence and Love,<br />
Hasia Diner singlehandedly topples a<br />
central pillar in our understanding of<br />
American <strong>Jewish</strong> behavior in the years following<br />
the Holocaust. In a book that will<br />
profoundly alter debate and discussion<br />
about post-war American Jewry, Diner demonstrates that far from<br />
sublimating the tragedy until the 1960’s as many previous historical<br />
accounts would have us believe, in the years immediately following the<br />
end of the war American Jews went to great lengths to mourn and<br />
memorialize their fallen kin, succor struggling survivors, educate<br />
themselves and the American public, and confront the perpetrators of<br />
the tragedy. Diner convinces us that this was not a marginal phenomenon<br />
within the American <strong>Jewish</strong> world. Jews and <strong>Jewish</strong> organizations<br />
across the religious, social, and political spectrum engaged with<br />
the Holocaust in a variety of meaningful ways. In compelling and pas-<br />
6 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
sionate prose, Diner reveals that memory of the Holocaust came to<br />
infuse American <strong>Jewish</strong> life, present in its poetry and popular culture,<br />
its polemics and internal debates, and in its post-war worldview and<br />
programs of political action. The author marshals a vast quantity of<br />
new and exhaustively gathered evidence from numerous untapped<br />
sources—summer camp journals, archival records of landsmanschaftn<br />
and sisterhood groups, sermons, and speeches—capturing<br />
the voices of a generation that sought to<br />
remember it with reverence and love. This monumental<br />
volume shows incontrovertibly that our<br />
understanding of American <strong>Jewish</strong> post-war response<br />
to the Holocaust has not only been wrong, but<br />
extraordinarily and unfairly so.<br />
Finalists:<br />
ORTHODOX JEWS IN AMERICA<br />
Jeffrey S. Gurock<br />
Indiana University Press<br />
Agreat story teller, Professor Gurock<br />
masterfully tells the tale of how Jews<br />
in America fashioned an Orthodox lifestyle<br />
that both mirrored and shaped their understanding<br />
of themselves as American Jews.<br />
What did it mean to be an Orthodox Jew<br />
in America—as a young <strong>Jewish</strong> mother in a<br />
small town without reliably kosher food, a<br />
peddler traveling long distances by foot to<br />
make it to synagogue for Yom Kippur, or a businessperson socializing<br />
with Gentile colleagues? Weaving together personal narrative, anecdotes,<br />
sermons, and social observations in this richly textured book,<br />
Gurock paints a fascinating picture of the variety of Orthodox behavior,<br />
belief, and aspirations. Readers will gain a deeper understanding of<br />
how each generation of Orthodox Jews established institutions and<br />
norms that they hoped would enable them to flourish in America while<br />
ensuring <strong>Jewish</strong> survival. Gurock also demonstrates<br />
how outside forces, such as feminism, compel Orthodox<br />
Jews to constantly redefine and reimagine the<br />
extent to which modern culture and religious life can<br />
be compatible. Gurock’s work is an enormously valuable<br />
contribution to the field by American Orthodoxy’s<br />
preeminent historian.<br />
JEWISH IMMIGRANTS AND AMERICAN CAPITALISM,<br />
1880–1920: FROM CASTE TO CLASS<br />
Eli Lederhendler<br />
Cambridge University Press<br />
Eli Lederhendler’s bracing scholarly study challenges much of what we<br />
thought we knew about East European <strong>Jewish</strong> immigration to the<br />
United States. Jews, Lederhendler argues, brought little in the way of<br />
human capital with them from the Old World. Characteristics like Jews’<br />
middle class affinities and left-liberal biases, that others trace back to Eastern<br />
Europe, he shows to be “at the most, sets of acquired ideas that developed<br />
among Jews in the United States after immigration.” For Lederhendler,<br />
economics, rather than identity, culture, or politics propels the<br />
story of <strong>Jewish</strong> immigration forward. By focusing on the economic discontinuities<br />
between Eastern Europe and the United States, he sheds new light<br />
on the uniqueness of the American <strong>Jewish</strong> experience as a whole.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
ANTHOLOGIES AND COLLECTIONS<br />
Winner:<br />
RETHINKING EUROPEAN<br />
JEWISH HISTORY<br />
Jeremy Cohen and Moshe Rosman, eds.<br />
The Littman Library of <strong>Jewish</strong> Civilization<br />
This volume represents the second in a<br />
new series of conferences and publications<br />
entitled “New Perspectives on<br />
European Jewry,” a project of the Goldstein-Goren<br />
Diaspora Research Center at<br />
Tel Aviv University. The editors explained<br />
the purpose of this volume in the<br />
Acknowledgements: “As the field of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
history positions itself at the beginning of a new century and a new<br />
millennium, ‘New Perspectives’ will grapple afresh with the theoretical,<br />
topical and methodological issues that nourish the relationship<br />
between the <strong>Jewish</strong> present and the <strong>Jewish</strong> past.”<br />
This volume, edited by two of the leading historians of the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
past, is divided into four sections. Each section focuses on a different<br />
aspect of this “new perspective” on the <strong>Jewish</strong> past and includes essays<br />
from leading historians and scholars. The first section is entitled “Reorienting<br />
the Narrative” and includes essays reevaluating such central<br />
themes as anti-Semitism and the role of women. The second section is<br />
called “From the Middle Ages to Modernity” and contains essays that<br />
attempt to set an agenda for the study of the <strong>Jewish</strong> past and to redefine<br />
what is meant by modernity in <strong>Jewish</strong> history. The third section, “On<br />
the Eve of the Spanish Expulsion,” includes essays that re-examine some<br />
of the categories and dynamics of the experience of the Jews in 15th century<br />
Spain. The last section is entitled “From Europe to America and<br />
Back” and explores the relationship between Europe and America both<br />
prior to World War II and in the post-<br />
World War II generation.<br />
The essays in this volume, which<br />
are written in a scholarly yet accessible<br />
manner, will hopefully take a prominent<br />
place in the study of the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
past during the 21st century.<br />
Finalists:<br />
PLACE AND DISPLACEMENT<br />
IN JEWISH HISTORY AND<br />
MEMORY: ZAKOR V’MAKOR<br />
David Cesarani, Tony Kushner, Milton Shain, eds.<br />
Vallentine Mitchell<br />
This book is a collection of twelve<br />
essays which analyze the concepts of<br />
history, geography, and migration,<br />
whether forced or voluntary, in a diverse<br />
range of <strong>Jewish</strong> communities and individuals<br />
and their effect on the formation of<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> identities and “sense of place.” The<br />
case studies cover a wide range of geographic populations including<br />
those in parts of Europe, North and South America, Australia, North<br />
and South Africa and the Far East over the time periods from the early<br />
modern era to the early 21st century. The essays originated at an inter-<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
national conference held at the University of Cape Town, South Africa<br />
in January, 2005 comprised of 30 scholars from around the world.<br />
The essays explore the meaning of place in the formation of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
identities as the varied peoples interact with their places of origin, and also<br />
when they leave them. After their migrations, the effect of memory of<br />
home and the passage of time are examined as these influence their new<br />
community experiences and resettlement. The <strong>Jewish</strong> experience, in terms<br />
of adaptation to the worlds in which Jews find themselves, are ongoing<br />
issues critical to the future of the <strong>Jewish</strong> people. The book will increase the<br />
insights and understanding<br />
of these experiences,<br />
not only for<br />
scholars, but for all readers<br />
who are concerned<br />
about the challenges to<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> continuity.<br />
JEWISH MUSICAL MODERNISM,<br />
OLD AND NEW<br />
Philip V. Bohlman, ed.<br />
University of Chicago Press<br />
This volume is an important study of<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> music from the late 19th century<br />
to the end of the 20th within the context<br />
of social, cultural, political, and scientific<br />
change. <strong>Jewish</strong> music ranges in definition<br />
from art music to folk music; from synagogue liturgy to political<br />
cabaret, and in languages and harmonies that reflect the <strong>Jewish</strong> Diaspora<br />
and the State of Israel. An overview of the subject is given in the<br />
Forward and Introduction. Subsequent chapters provide vivid examples<br />
of the ways in which <strong>Jewish</strong> music responded to the challenge of<br />
modernism: an account of how a small Sephardic community in Vienna<br />
reacted to its cosmopolitan environment; the history of the long and<br />
difficult relationship of Germans to Jews and to <strong>Jewish</strong> music with its<br />
climax in the Shoah. The third example is the ongoing story of the Beta<br />
Israel people of Ethiopia, whose founding myth and liturgy were utterly<br />
transformed by contact with Europe and with Israel. They now call<br />
themselves <strong>Jewish</strong> Ethiopians, the remnant of the lost tribe of Dan. The<br />
last example is a persuasive analysis of the work of Charlotte Salomon,<br />
a German <strong>Jewish</strong> artist who composed an arresting series of 769 paintings<br />
entitled Leben? oder Theater? (Life? or Theatre?). Seemingly autobiographical,<br />
the paintings may also reflect the social and cultural mores<br />
of her North German background. These studies are brought to a close<br />
with an epilogue offering a conceptual framework for understanding<br />
the pattern of <strong>Jewish</strong> music during the past century and a half, and the<br />
burst of creativity at the end of this period. Even in Theresienstadt,<br />
Viktor Uhlman composed his opera “Der Kaiser Von Atlantis.” Art<br />
music, folk music, Yiddish songs, theater and cabaret, klezmer,<br />
Sephardic, and Ashkenazic liturgy—music from the widespread <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Diaspora and music from Israel with its Hebrew texts all testify to the<br />
vibrant energy of the creators and performers of <strong>Jewish</strong> music. An<br />
appendix discusses <strong>Jewish</strong> popular music, illustrated in the CD that<br />
accompanies this beautifully produced book.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 7
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
BIOGRAPHY, AUTOBIOGRAPHY, AND MEMOIR<br />
In Memory of Simon & Shulamith (Sofi) Goldberg<br />
Winner:<br />
THE FALL OF A SPARROW: THE LIFE<br />
AND TIMES OF ABBA KOVNER<br />
Dina Porat; Elizabeth Yuval, trans. & ed.<br />
Stanford University Press<br />
Abba Kovner’s picaresque life reads<br />
like that of a character in a <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
novel: partisan, poet, writer, kibbutznik,<br />
and Israel Prize winner. Kovner was an<br />
active participant in both of the major<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> events of the 20th century: the war<br />
against the Jews during World War II and<br />
the War of Independence to establish the<br />
State of Israel. Born in Sevastopol in 1918, a descendant of the Vilna<br />
Gaon, he made Vilna his home. Kovner was the first to recognize<br />
Hitler’s designs to murder all the European Jews and was a defender<br />
of the Vilna ghetto. Escaping immediately before the ghetto was liquidated,<br />
Kovner organized a partisan group and fought the Nazis from<br />
the woods. While there, he formulated the tripartite strategy of bricha<br />
(exodus from Europe), hativa (uniting the survivors) and nakam<br />
(revenge). Kovner realized all three, including a fantastic plan to poison<br />
large numbers of Germans, which resulted in him being deported<br />
to Israel. He was an officer in the Givati Brigade and later became a<br />
member of kibbutz Ein Hahoresh, living until 1987. Dina Porat, the<br />
head of the Stephen Roth Institute for the Study of<br />
Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism at Tel<br />
Aviv University and translator Elizabeth Yuval, have<br />
rendered an engrossing portrait of a thoughtful, traumatized<br />
man of action whose life encapsulated the<br />
perpetuity of the <strong>Jewish</strong> people. This is a story that<br />
every Jew should know.<br />
Finalists:<br />
ROSENFELD’S LIVES: FAME, OBLIVION,<br />
AND THE FURIES OF WRITING<br />
Steven J. Zipperstein<br />
Yale University Press<br />
In Rosenfeld’s Lives: Fame, Oblivion, and<br />
the Furies of Writing, Steven J. Zipperstein<br />
makes an impassioned and convincing<br />
case for the importance of Isaac Rosenfeld,<br />
a brilliant but anguished and sadly<br />
forgotten 20th century writer of fiction,<br />
essays, and literary criticism. Adopting the<br />
unusual strategy of exploring why Rosenfeld,<br />
a lifelong friend—and rival—of Saul Bellow’s,<br />
never fully achieved his promise, Zipperstein sheds<br />
light on an entire generation of New York <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
intellectuals and why Rosenfeld alone among them<br />
fully embraced his <strong>Jewish</strong> identity in his writing.<br />
Rosenfeld’s Lives is a moving tribute to a writer who<br />
deserves to be honored alongside his peers.<br />
8 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE: MY<br />
FAMILY’S JOURNEY TO AMERICA<br />
Kati Marton<br />
Simon & Schuster<br />
Kati Marton’s unforgettable book is less<br />
a memoir of the post-war world of the<br />
1940’s and 1950’s, and more a candid,<br />
courageous, and unsparing joint biography<br />
of her brilliant and witty journalist parents,<br />
Endre and Ilona Marton—prominent and<br />
patriotic Hungarian Jews, who barely survived<br />
the Nazis, but maintained a penchant<br />
for dangerous risk-taking. For their brave and honest coverage of events<br />
in Stalinist Hungary, and for their close and sometimes even reckless<br />
relationships with many Americans in the diplomatic corps, the Martons<br />
were subject to twenty years of total surveillance by the Hungarian<br />
Secret Police (the AVO, which reported directly to the Soviet Secret<br />
Service) who were aided by a wide circle of informers—including family<br />
members recruited through intimidation. In 1955, the Martons<br />
were imprisoned and interminably interrogated on trumped-up<br />
charges of espionage. Miraculously released in 1956, apparently<br />
through intense diplomatic pressure from the West, the Martons<br />
rejoined eight-year-old Kati and her sister who had been living with<br />
paid care-takers, and went back to work, covering the abortive Hungarian<br />
revolution. Soon thereafter the family escaped to the U.S., where<br />
they continued to live under the watchful eyes and pressures of the<br />
AVO. Kati Marton has scoured the recently opened files of the AVO<br />
and has used her findings to tell a disturbing story of life under totalitarianism.<br />
Enemies of the State is comparable in its<br />
psychological intensity to Arthur Koestler’s novel<br />
Darkness at Noon, and in its philosophical sobriety to<br />
George Konrad’s memoir, A Guest in My Own Country:<br />
A Hungarian Life. She has written one of those<br />
very rare works which combines meticulous research,<br />
clear prose, and the authentic feel of a thriller.<br />
CHILDREN’S AND YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE<br />
Winner:<br />
THE OTHER HALF OF LIFE:<br />
A NOVEL BASED ON THE TRUE<br />
STORY OF THE MS ST. LOUIS<br />
Kim Ablon Whitney<br />
Knopf <strong>Book</strong>s for Young Readers<br />
In this captivating story based on the true<br />
voyage of the MS St. Louis, Kim Ablon<br />
Whitney takes young readers into a world<br />
fraught with danger, espionage, and above<br />
all, uncertainty about the future. It is 1939<br />
and fifteen-year-old Thomas has to leave his<br />
parents in Germany. His father, a Jew, has<br />
been deported and his mother, a Christian, can no longer keep him safe<br />
and their money is gone. Aboard ship, Thomas meets Priska, who is also<br />
fleeing Germany but with her family intact. Thomas joins Priska’s<br />
wealthy family for meals in first class and finds out “how the other half”<br />
lives. They have many adventures en route to Cuba struggling to figure<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Billy Bustamante
out whom they can trust. In addition to tangling with a Nazi officer and<br />
a spy, Thomas learns something of the <strong>Jewish</strong> heritage<br />
his parents had not shared with him. Through Priska’s<br />
family and the rabbi on board the ship, Thomas is<br />
exposed to faith and hope. Turned away in Cuba, the<br />
ship returns to Europe and a very uncertain future for<br />
the passengers. We find out what happened next in<br />
postscripts 10 years and 70 years later.<br />
Finalists:<br />
CURSING COLUMBUS<br />
Eve Tal<br />
Cinco Puntos Press<br />
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
The year is 1908. This book continues<br />
the story of Raizel Altman, her Papa,<br />
and now her Mama, her brothers Lemmel<br />
and Shloyme, and baby Hannah, all of<br />
whom are challenged in an America whose<br />
streets were supposed to be paved with gold.<br />
Raizel hopes to be a teacher but this<br />
dream is endangered by their poverty and<br />
her mother’s lack of understanding of<br />
what an education can do to change their<br />
lives in a free society.<br />
Lemmel drops out of school and disappears; Papa tries to find and<br />
keep a job. Mama struggles to keep their <strong>Jewish</strong> traditions, as she<br />
cooks and cleans, not knowing English and not wishing to know it.<br />
Each character in the story has a compelling voice and a gripping story<br />
to tell. And when Raizel finds a fellow spirit in an<br />
attractive boy, their hopes for a better life in America<br />
and love face many barriers.<br />
This book provides a colorful picture of a piece of<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> history in America as well as the story of the<br />
hopes and dreams of Raizel, her family, and her community<br />
in that time and place.<br />
CLAY MAN: THE GOLEM OF PRAGUE<br />
Irene N. Watts; Kathryn E. Shoemaker, illus.<br />
Tundra <strong>Book</strong>s<br />
In the time of the Blood Lie, the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
citizens of the Prague Ghetto feared for<br />
their lives. As the Passover and Easter holidays<br />
of 1590 approached, the community,<br />
led by the great scholar Rabbi Judah Loew,<br />
searched for a way to protect themselves.<br />
Rabbi Judah and his son Jacob had the same<br />
dream of forming a “man not like other<br />
men” out of the red clay of the Vltava River.<br />
And thus Joseph the Golem is created.<br />
As Joseph patrols the Ghetto, the narrator,<br />
nine-year-old Jacob, becomes his constant companion, leading the<br />
reader through various scenarios demonstrating the Golem’s strength<br />
and vigilance. He is frustrated with life in the Ghetto and does not<br />
want to follow in his father’s footsteps by becoming a rabbi; he yearns<br />
to search for the world beyond the gates. Joseph becomes his silent<br />
confidant and friend.<br />
This 84-page retelling of an age-old legend brings to life the story of<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
the Maharal and the beauty of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
mythology and folklore. The accompanying<br />
black and white charcoal illustrations<br />
convey the extraordinary powers<br />
of a protector and the roles he fills in a<br />
time of need.<br />
LOST<br />
Jacqueline Davies<br />
Marshall Cavendish<br />
Sixteen-year-old Essie has the nagging<br />
feeling that something is missing, but<br />
she can’t think about it now. She must concentrate<br />
on her sewing at the Triangle Shirtwaist<br />
Factory to help support her fatherless<br />
family, but the secretive new worker, Harriet<br />
Abbott, needs her help, and her friendship,<br />
too. Who is this mysterious young woman,<br />
so different from anyone Essie has known?<br />
In this powerful and richly populated story of immigrant life in the<br />
early 1900’s, we meet Mama, the embittered, struggling widow,<br />
brother Saulie, running wild on the streets of the Lower East Side, and<br />
Zelda, the lively little sister Essie has raised and indulged and loves so<br />
fiercely. Jimmy Eagan, the attractive law student next door, is Essie’s<br />
friend and confidant—and he proves his devotion<br />
when trouble comes.<br />
Essie tells the story in her voice—intelligent, strong,<br />
and life affirming. But something menacing is behind<br />
Essie and she won’t look back. This gripping story will<br />
hold the reader until its finish when we learn exactly<br />
what has been lost and what has been found.<br />
CONTEMPORARY JEWISH LIFE AND PRACTICE<br />
Winner:<br />
SAVING ISRAEL: HOW THE JEWISH<br />
PEOPLE CAN WIN A WAR THAT MAY<br />
NEVER END<br />
Daniel Gordis<br />
John Wiley & Sons<br />
In a tumultuous world in which the<br />
media and the press detour our experiential<br />
vision, we need an “awakening.”<br />
Saving Israel shows us an Israel that is not<br />
a “garden of roses” but demands a new<br />
interpretation. Saving Israel is an invitation<br />
to question and to answer.<br />
Once again Daniel Gordis, an American who chose to make<br />
Aliyah, allows us to look at Israel with new lenses.<br />
This book is a call of responsibility to all of us to tell<br />
the truth, the real story. This book will help Jews<br />
defend the right of this tiny country to be part of the<br />
global map. Challenge your mind, confront reality,<br />
prepare to test your soul, and journey through these<br />
pages and commit your might to Save Israel!<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 9<br />
Russell J.C. Kelly<br />
Provided by Kathryn E. Shoemaker<br />
Zion Ozeri
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
Finalists:<br />
FAR FROM ZION: IN SEARCH OF A<br />
GLOBAL JEWISH COMMUNITY<br />
Charles London<br />
William Morrow<br />
Ayeka? Where are you? That is the<br />
question Charles London seeks to<br />
answer in his thoughtful and compelling<br />
book Far From Zion. By seeking out <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
communities in the farthest reaches of the<br />
Diaspora, culminating in a trip to Zion<br />
itself, London explores the ways <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
identity transcends geographic and political<br />
boundaries, while also examining his own <strong>Jewish</strong> identity as stirred<br />
by his experiences in these outposts of <strong>Jewish</strong> life. While it has become<br />
common to speak of the importance of <strong>Jewish</strong> journeys, London gives<br />
new meaning to the phrase by introducing us to<br />
places and people who powerfully remind us that the<br />
great experiment of <strong>Jewish</strong> existence continues in<br />
laboratories of life throughout the world. In responding<br />
to the question Ayeka? London answers with a<br />
resounding—Hineini! We are here and, as London<br />
points out, ‘here’ is everywhere.<br />
JEWCENTRICITY: WHY THE JEWS ARE<br />
PRAISED, BLAMED, AND USED TO<br />
EXPLAIN JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING<br />
Adam Garfinkle<br />
John Wiley & Sons<br />
In his well-written book, Jewcentricity:<br />
Why the Jews Are Praised, Blamed, and<br />
Used to Explain Just About Everything,<br />
Adam Garfinkle makes a novel, logically<br />
constructed argument about the world’s<br />
apparent obsession with all things <strong>Jewish</strong>.<br />
He begins by looking at the historical and<br />
cultural roots of anti-Semitism and philo-Semitism, from Hellinism to<br />
Napoleonic France to the American Civil War, and comes up with a<br />
simple matrix that can be used to identify and explain the four quadrants<br />
of interest in <strong>Jewish</strong> life. Through this matrix he is able to de-mystify<br />
the perennial question, Why the Jews? or, depending on the reader’s<br />
perspective, Why Us? His analysis uncovers both positive and negative<br />
exaggerations, and helps the reader to look more objectively at the reasons<br />
Jews seem to be blamed or adulated for everything from war, to<br />
scientific advancement, to global financial health. Garfinkle’s compelling<br />
style makes his book easy to read and absorb, even as he tackles<br />
ultimately disturbing realities. The tone is at times humorous, at times<br />
poetic, and always scholarly. He weaves in metaphors<br />
for the <strong>Jewish</strong> condition, from the burning bush that<br />
is continually aglow yet never consumed, to flotsam<br />
on the sea which is able to control neither the weather<br />
nor the tides. Jewcentricity is grounded in history,<br />
logic, and insight making it an important addition to<br />
the literature explicating <strong>Jewish</strong> life.<br />
10 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
FICTION<br />
JJ Greenberg Memorial Award<br />
Winner:<br />
GRATITUDE: A NOVEL<br />
Joseph Kertes<br />
Thomas Dunne <strong>Book</strong>s<br />
The experiences of Jews under Nazi<br />
rule have often been represented in<br />
spare, fragmentary narratives that reflect<br />
the utter incomprehensibility of the Third<br />
Reich’s brutal policies. In Gratitude, Hungarian-Canadian<br />
novelist Joseph Kertes<br />
approaches the catastrophe very differently,<br />
chronicling the ordeal of an extended<br />
family of Hungarian Jews between March<br />
1944 and Mach 1946 in vivid, classically realistic detail. Yet his novel<br />
expresses as clearly as the tersest testimony the horrors perpetrated in<br />
those years, and the courage of those who resisted and persevered.<br />
The Nazi invasion of Hungary shocks the prominent Beck family,<br />
stripping them of their wealth and professional positions as mayor,<br />
doctor, dentist, or lawyer. The war forces some of them into hiding,<br />
summons others to acts of generosity, spurs others to heroism. Kertes<br />
depicts with equal precision the bravery of Paul, who<br />
works alongside the Swedish humanitarian Raoul<br />
Wallenberg to save Jews, and the mounting despair<br />
of his sister Rozsi. Compelling in its drama and<br />
astonishing in its breadth and polish, Gratitude represents<br />
the darkest years of modern history responsibly<br />
and unforgettably.<br />
Finalists:<br />
THE LAST EMBER<br />
Daniel Levin<br />
Riverhead<br />
Jonathan Marcus, a young American<br />
lawyer and a former doctoral student in<br />
classics, has become a sought-after commodity<br />
among antiquities dealers. But when he is<br />
summoned to Rome to examine a client’s<br />
fragment of an ancient stone map, he stumbles<br />
across a startling secret: a hidden message<br />
carved inside the stone itself. The discovery<br />
propels him on a perilous journey<br />
from the labyrinth beneath the Colosseum to the biblical-era tunnels of<br />
Jerusalem in search of a hidden 2,000-year-old artifact sought by empires<br />
throughout the ages. As Marcus and a passionate UN preservationist, Dr.<br />
Emili Travia, dig more deeply into the past, they’re stunned to discover<br />
not only an ancient intelligence operation to protect the artifact, but also<br />
a ruthless modern plot to destroy all trace of it by a mysterious radical<br />
bent on erasing every remnant of <strong>Jewish</strong> and Christian<br />
presence from the Temple Mount. With a cutting-edge<br />
plot as intricately layered as the ancient sites it explores,<br />
The Last Ember is a gripping thriller spanning the highstakes<br />
worlds of archaeology, politics, and terrorism in<br />
its portrayal of the modern struggle to define—and<br />
redefine—history itself.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
PICTURES AT AN EXHIBITION<br />
Sara Houghteling<br />
Knopf<br />
Born to an art dealer and his pianist<br />
wife, Max Berenzon is forbidden to<br />
enter the family business for reasons he<br />
cannot understand. He reluctantly attends<br />
medical school, reserving his true passion<br />
for his father’s beautiful and brilliant<br />
gallery assistant, Rose Clément. When<br />
Paris falls to the Nazis, the Berenzons survive<br />
in hiding. They return in 1944 to find<br />
that their priceless collection has vanished: gone are the Matisses, the<br />
Picassos, and a singular Manet of mysterious importance. Madly driven<br />
to recover his father’s paintings, Max navigates a torn city of corrupt<br />
art dealers, black marketers, Résistants, and collaborators. His<br />
quest will reveal the tragic disappearance of his closest friend, the heroism<br />
of his lost love, and the truth behind a devastating family secret.<br />
Written with tense drama and a historian’s eye for detail,<br />
Houghteling’s novel draws on the real-life stories of France’s preeminent<br />
art-dealing familes and the forgotten biography of the only<br />
French woman to work as a double agent inside the<br />
Nazis’ looted art stronghold. Pictures at an Exhibition<br />
conjures the vanished collections, the lives of the<br />
artists and their dealers, the exquisite romance, and<br />
the shattering loss of a singular era. It is a work of<br />
astonishing ambition and beauty from an immensely<br />
gifted new novelist.<br />
POLYGLOT: STORIES<br />
OF THE WEST’S WET EDGE<br />
Wendy Marcus<br />
Beth Am Press<br />
The lovingly crafted stories in Polyglot<br />
chronicle lives between Washington<br />
state and Vancouver, British Columbia, the<br />
wet edge of North America. The stories,<br />
linked by the advice of a gay Gypsy columnist,<br />
reflect Wendy Marcus’<br />
years in the Northwest<br />
musical, newspaper,<br />
and <strong>Jewish</strong> communities. Her wry and poignant perspectives<br />
on the denizens of this drizzly region include<br />
sprinklings from ten different languages, a reality of<br />
the increasingly diverse Northwest.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Jonathan Sprague<br />
THE LEGEND OF COSMO<br />
AND THE ARCHANGEL<br />
Joseph Kaufman<br />
French Creek Press<br />
Ahigh school pact extends over decades<br />
in this epic novel of spiritual quest, selfdiscovery,<br />
and evolving friendships. As high<br />
school students in Pittsfield, Massachusetts,<br />
Cosmo was their small group’s “charm”<br />
while Nick was its “conscience.” In an LSDinduced<br />
haze at Woodstock, the friends<br />
pledge a covenant of loyalty. But when<br />
Cosmo goes AWOL from the Army and<br />
Nick betrays another member of their group, both Nick and Cosmo<br />
embark on odysseys to find themselves. In Nick’s case, it’s an attempt to<br />
resurrect his standing as the “Archangel,” the golden<br />
boy who would sacrifice himself for his friends.<br />
Cosmo’s quest pursues booze, drugs, revenge, fame,<br />
and, eventually, a different sort of spiritual enlightenment.<br />
Throughout their choices and wanderings, which<br />
stretch across continents, their youthful indiscretions<br />
and expectations haunt their abilities to move forward.<br />
HISTORY<br />
Gerrard and Ella Berman Memorial Award<br />
Winner:<br />
FAMILY PROPERTIES: RACE, REAL<br />
ESTATE, AND THE EXPLOITATION<br />
OF BLACK URBAN AMERICA<br />
Beryl Satter<br />
Metropolitan <strong>Book</strong>s (Henry Holt and Company)<br />
Beryl Satter has written a singular book<br />
in Family Properties. It is at once a<br />
memoir, a family history, and a social history,<br />
all united by the larger-than-life presence<br />
of the author’s father, Mark Satter. A<br />
crusader against housing discrimination in<br />
Chicago during the 1950’s and 1960’s,<br />
when that city was possibly the most segregated in America, Satter literally<br />
worked himself to death when Beryl was just six years old. Her<br />
quest as daughter to rediscover his life fuses in this book with her mission<br />
as a historian to chronicle the bigoted and exploitative practices<br />
of real estate agents in Chicago, who played on black aspiration and<br />
white fear to flip entire neighborhoods from stable places to slums<br />
within a matter of years. As a work of American <strong>Jewish</strong> history, Family<br />
Properties finds Jews prominently on both sides of<br />
the battles—as advocates of social justice and also as<br />
slumlords and real-estate sharks. Mark Satter, it turns<br />
out, himself owned several buildings in what became<br />
one of Chicago’s black ghettos. So this is a book not<br />
only on moral vision but supple thinking, one that<br />
stirs the conscience but resists easy answers.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 11<br />
Rachel Eliza Griffiths
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
Finalists:<br />
JEWISH PROPERTY CLAIMS<br />
AGAINST ARAB COUNTRIES<br />
Michael R. Fischbach<br />
Columbia University Press<br />
Michael R. Fischbach’s book surveys<br />
the losses of <strong>Jewish</strong> personal and<br />
communal property across the Arab world.<br />
Beginning with an examination of the circumstances<br />
surrounding the departure of<br />
Jews from each Arab country in the wake<br />
of the establishment of the State of Israel<br />
in 1948, Fischbach demonstrates the<br />
divergent political processes that led to the demise of Arab Jewry and<br />
caused certain communities, such as Iraqi Jewry, to suffer massive<br />
property losses. Fischbach also explores how <strong>Jewish</strong> property claims<br />
were handled by the Israeli government. In contrast to its championing<br />
of the claims of Nazi victims and survivors, the Israeli government<br />
did not pursue compensation for individual Jews or communities<br />
with claims against specific Arab countries. Instead, it hoped to<br />
establish a global claim for <strong>Jewish</strong> property losses to counterbalance<br />
what Israel might be required to pay Palestinian refugees as compensation<br />
for their losses. Fischbach’s keen ability to conduct intensive<br />
research in hitherto unexplored archives and to write<br />
closely and carefully on such an explosive topic is<br />
remarkable. The committee saw his scholarship worthy<br />
of recognition in its thoroughness, persistence,<br />
and moral commitment to evaluating all the evidence<br />
available on this politically sensitive, yet critically<br />
important topic.<br />
MAJOR FARRAN’S HAT: THE UNTOLD<br />
STORY OF THE STRUGGLE TO<br />
ESTABLISH THE JEWISH STATE<br />
David Cesarani<br />
Da Capo Press<br />
David Cesarani’s Major Farran’s Hat:<br />
Murder, Scandal and Britain’s War<br />
Against <strong>Jewish</strong> Terrorism tells the story of<br />
the murder of Alexander Rubowitz and the<br />
cover-up that took place in Palestine in the<br />
final days of the British Mandate.<br />
Rubowitz was abducted in Jerusalem in<br />
1947 by a “special squad” of the Palestine police, led by Major Roy<br />
Farran, who took him to the woods, interrogated him, and murdered<br />
him. The backdrop to this compelling story is the tenacious campaign<br />
of British forces in Palestine against <strong>Jewish</strong> ‘terrorists.’ Using recently<br />
declassified British government records, David Cesarani conveys this<br />
episode, with all its curious twists and turns. While the author does<br />
not openly compare this botched interrogation to contemporary<br />
efforts to combat terrorists, he provocatively illustrates<br />
why 2009 provides “an opportune moment to<br />
revisit the events that took place in Jerusalem 60<br />
years ago,” because they provide a clear “warning of<br />
everything that can go wrong when young warriors<br />
directed by desperate and unscrupulous politicians<br />
wage war on terror.”<br />
12 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
WE LOOK LIKE THE ENEMY:<br />
THE HIDDEN STORY OF ISRAEL’S<br />
JEWS FROM ARAB LANDS<br />
Rachel Shabi<br />
Walker & Company<br />
Rachel Shabi explores one of the most<br />
significant fissures within Israeli<br />
society in We Look Like the Enemy. Part<br />
history, part reportage, her book chronicles<br />
the experience of Israel’s Mizrachi<br />
Jews, those who came from Arab or Muslim<br />
nations and who today comprise<br />
roughly half of the country’s <strong>Jewish</strong> population.<br />
Traditionally the lesser partner to Ashkenazi Jews,<br />
the Mizrachi population has struggled both for full<br />
inclusion is Israeli society and for the legitimacy of<br />
their Judeo-Arab culture. Herself born in Israel to<br />
Iraqi <strong>Jewish</strong> parents, Shabi writes with both passion<br />
and literary flair.<br />
HOLOCAUST<br />
Winner:<br />
THE UNITED STATES HOLOCAUST<br />
MEMORIAL MUSEUM ENCYCLOPEDIA<br />
OF CAMPS AND GHETTOS, 1933-1945,<br />
VOLUME 1<br />
Geoffrey P. Megargee, volume ed.<br />
Indiana University Press<br />
The United States Holocaust Memorial<br />
Museum Encyclopedia of Camps and<br />
Ghettos, 1933–1945, Volume 1, edited by<br />
Geoffrey P. Megargee is a work of devoted<br />
research, exhaustive study, and scholarly<br />
collaboration. The first of what is to be a seven-volume series on all<br />
the camps and ghettos of the Nazi period, the volume painstakingly<br />
details the early camps set up by the Nazis and police in 1933, as<br />
Hitler came to power, as well as the concentration camps and subcamps<br />
under the rule of the SS-Business Administration Main Office.<br />
The value of this volume is multifold: it lies in its narrative framing—<br />
a scholarly introduction helps the reader to contextualize the entries;<br />
its comprehensiveness—hundreds of main camps and sub-camps,<br />
large and small, are included, ensuring they will not<br />
be lost to history; and its accessibility—the volume<br />
will be of use to both students and scholars, readers<br />
new to the topic and readers steeped in Holocaust<br />
research. Encyclopedia of Camps and Ghettos is sure to<br />
assume an essential and unrivaled place in reference<br />
literature on the Holocaust.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Dafna Kaplan
Finalists:<br />
THE WARSAW GHETTO: A GUIDE TO<br />
THE PERISHED CITY<br />
Barbara Engelking and Jacek Leociak;<br />
Emma Harris, trans.<br />
Yale University Press<br />
The Warsaw Ghetto: A Guide to the Perished<br />
City by Barbara Engelking and<br />
Jacek Leociak, and translated by Emma<br />
Harris, is a dazzling, fascinating, and monumental<br />
work, and the most complete<br />
resource to date on the Ghetto, its inhabitants,<br />
and legendary uprising. Illustrated<br />
with eight full-color maps of the Ghetto in its various phases, the book<br />
is a feat of material research and psychological depth. All imaginable<br />
data (and more) are presented for the serious researcher and general<br />
reader, including a detailed chronology, demographic and topographical<br />
records, and chapters on every conceivable cultural, medical, educational,<br />
economic, religious, commercial and social activity. Adding<br />
vibrancy and multiplicity, the book is haunted by ordinary people<br />
whose experiences and observations—from diaries, journals, chronicles,<br />
letters, newspapers, and memoirs—bring to vivid life the<br />
resourcefulness of lives lived on the edge of poverty, hunger, and<br />
despair. Panoramic and lapidary, to date no book on the Warsaw<br />
Ghetto is more impressive and useful.<br />
THE THIRD REICH IN THE IVORY<br />
TOWER: COMPLICITY AND CON-<br />
FLICT ON AMERICAN CAMPUSES<br />
Stephen H. Norwood<br />
Cambridge University Press<br />
The Third Reich in the Ivory Tower:<br />
Complicity and Conflict on American<br />
Campuses by Stephen H. Norwood is an<br />
insightful and disturbing study of the<br />
eagerness with which America’s elite universities<br />
and colleges greeted and feted the<br />
representatives of the Nazi and Fascist governments<br />
in the 1930’s. It is well researched and organized, and gracefully<br />
written in a style accessible to scholars as well as the general public.<br />
It is a comprehensive examination of the response of major<br />
American universities and colleges to the ethical and professional challenges<br />
posed by the Nazi and Fascist regimes. These college administrations<br />
helped Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy improve their image in<br />
the United States at the very time they were persecuting Jews. Norwood<br />
brings this too little-known history to light.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
ILLUSTRATED CHILDREN’S BOOKS<br />
Louis Posner Memorial Award<br />
Winner:<br />
JPS ILLUSTRATED CHILDREN’S BIBLE<br />
Ellen Frankel; Avi Katz, illus.<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society<br />
Acclaimed storyteller and <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
scholar Ellen Frankel has masterfully<br />
tailored 53 Bible stories that will both<br />
delight and educate today’s young readers.<br />
Using the 1985 JPS translation (NJPS) of<br />
the Hebrew Bible as her foundation,<br />
Frankel retains much of the Bible’s original<br />
wording and simple narrative style as<br />
she incorporates her own exceptional storytelling technique, free of<br />
personal interpretation or commentary.<br />
Included in the volume is an “Author’s Notebook,” in which Frankel<br />
shares with rabbis, parents, and educators the challenges she faced in<br />
translating and adapting these stories for children, such as how she deals<br />
with adult language in the original Bible text and themes inappropriate<br />
for most young readers.<br />
With his enticing, full-page color<br />
illustrations of each Bible story,<br />
award-winning artist Avi Katz ignites<br />
readers’ imaginations. His brush captures<br />
the vivid personalities and many<br />
dramatic moments in this extraordinary<br />
collection.<br />
Finalists:<br />
NACHSHON, WHO WAS AFRAID TO<br />
SWIM: A PASSOVER STORY<br />
Deborah Bodin Cohen; Jago, illus.<br />
Kar-Ben Publishing<br />
All children are afraid of something at<br />
one time or another. Some children<br />
confront those fears and move on, while<br />
others do not. Deborah Bodin Cohen takes an ancient story and artfully<br />
turns it into a modern-day midrash that teaches children about<br />
bravery and overcoming fear in a most captivating way. She tells the<br />
story of Nachson who, although afraid to swim, overcomes his fear in<br />
the face of mortal danger from Pharaoh’s armies. He walks into the<br />
water and, as we know, the rest is history. Although Cohen subtitles<br />
her book “a Passover story,” it is its universal message<br />
that is so compelling. It illustrates in both words and<br />
pictures a powerful theme: children can change how<br />
they feel and act and lead the way for others. Jago’s<br />
beautiful illustrations illuminate the tale in a way<br />
that connects the contemporary reader to ancient<br />
times and yet transcends time and place.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 13
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
THE CHAMPION OF CHILDREN:<br />
THE STORY OF JANUSZ KORCZAK<br />
Tomek Bogacki<br />
Farrar, Straus and Giroux<br />
In 1912, a well-known doctor and writer<br />
named Janusz Korczak designed an<br />
extraordinary orphanage for <strong>Jewish</strong> children<br />
in Warsaw, Poland. Believing that<br />
children were capable of governing themselves,<br />
he encouraged the orphans to elect<br />
a parliament, run a court, and put out their own weekly newspaper.<br />
Even when Korczak was forced to move the orphanage into the Warsaw<br />
Ghetto after Hitler’s rise to power, and couldn’t afford to buy<br />
food and medicine for his charges, he never lost sight of his ideals.<br />
Fully committed to giving his children as much love as possible during<br />
a terrifying time, Korczak refused to abandon them.<br />
In his most beautiful and heartfelt book to date,<br />
with evocative acrylic illustrations and spare,<br />
poignant prose, Tomek Bogacki tells the story of a<br />
courageous man who, during one of the grimmest<br />
moments in world history, dedicated his life’s<br />
work—and ultimately his life itself—to children.<br />
JEWISH FAMILY LITERATURE<br />
In Memory of Dorothy Kripke<br />
Winner:<br />
CELEBRATING THE JEWISH YEAR: THE<br />
SPRING AND SUMMER HOLIDAYS:<br />
PASSOVER, THE OMER, SHAVUOT,<br />
TISHA B’AV<br />
Paul Steinberg; Janet Greenstein Potter, ed.<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society<br />
JPS’s new holiday series is now complete,<br />
with publication of The Spring<br />
and Summer Holidays volume<br />
As we move from season to season, Paul<br />
Steinberg shares with us a rich collection<br />
of readings from many of the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
greats—Maimonides, Rashi, Nehama Leibowitz, Irving Greenberg,<br />
Shlomo Carlebach, Marge Piercy, Elie Wiesel, Martin Buber, Abraham<br />
Joshua Heschel, Arthur Green, and others—and he guides us in<br />
discovering for ourselves the many treasures within each text. Helpful<br />
and informative as well as pleasurable reading, the book’s mixture of<br />
styles ranges from popular, reasoned, conceptual, to more scholarly.<br />
Some of the readings teach us about the history of each holiday, as<br />
well as its theological, ethical, agricultural, and seasonal importance<br />
and interpretation; others give us inspiration and much food for<br />
thought. These stories, essays, poems,<br />
anecdotes, and rituals help us discover<br />
how deeply <strong>Jewish</strong> traditions are rooted<br />
in nature’s yearly cycle, and how<br />
beautifully season and spirit are<br />
woven together throughout the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
year.<br />
14 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Finalists:<br />
JPS ILLUSTRATED CHILDREN’S BIBLE<br />
Ellen Frankel; Avi Katz, illus.<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society<br />
Acclaimed storyteller and <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
scholar Ellen Frankel has masterfully<br />
tailored 53 Bible stories that will both<br />
delight and educate today’s young readers.<br />
Using the 1985 JPS translation (NJPS) of<br />
the Hebrew Bible as her foundation,<br />
Frankel retains much of the Bible’s original<br />
wording and simple narrative style as<br />
she incorporates her own exceptional storytelling technique, free of<br />
personal interpretation or commentary.<br />
Included in the volume is an “Author’s Notebook,” in which Frankel<br />
shares with rabbis, parents, and educators the challenges she faced in<br />
translating and adapting these stories for children, such as how she deals<br />
with adult language in the original Bible text and themes inappropriate<br />
for most young readers.<br />
With his enticing, full-page color<br />
illustrations of each Bible story,<br />
award-winning artist Avi Katz ignites<br />
readers’ imaginations. His brush captures<br />
the vivid personalities and many<br />
dramatic moments in this extraordinary<br />
collection.<br />
SACRED PARENTING: JEWISH WISDOM<br />
AND PRACTICAL GUIDANCE FOR<br />
YOUR FAMILY’S EARLY YEARS<br />
Elaine Rose Glickman<br />
URJ Press<br />
Parenting can be lonely, isolating, and<br />
confusing. Yet parenting is also holy<br />
work. In this comprehensive volume, a<br />
rabbi and mother of three shares the treasures<br />
of <strong>Jewish</strong> teaching and <strong>Jewish</strong> thought<br />
on parenting.<br />
Using the words of Genesis and Deuteronomy,<br />
the songs of the Psalmist, the instructions of Proverbs, and the wisdom<br />
of ancient and modern sages, Sacred Parenting guides readers to<br />
parent with spirituality, mindfulness, and partnership with God. Its<br />
methods are multifaceted, grounded in <strong>Jewish</strong> tradition, contemporary<br />
parenting best-practices, and real-world experience. Topics include bedtime,<br />
discipline, transmitting values, and much more.<br />
In addition to providing a spiritual outlook and<br />
practical guidance, Sacred Parenting invites readers to<br />
delve more deeply into <strong>Jewish</strong> living. The book contains<br />
a treasury of prayers for myriad occasions, an<br />
accessible explanation of <strong>Jewish</strong> holidays and milestones,<br />
and suggestions for meaningful, age-appropriate<br />
observance of <strong>Jewish</strong> occasions.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
JBW 28.1_JBW 28.1 1/29/10 12:26 PM Page 15<br />
MODERN JEWISH THOUGHT AND EXPERIENCE<br />
Dorot Foundation Award In Memory<br />
of Joy Ungerleider Mayerson<br />
Winner:<br />
COVENANT & CONVERSATION, A<br />
WEEKLY READING OF THE JEWISH<br />
BIBLE, GENESIS: THE BOOK OF<br />
BEGINNINGS<br />
Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks<br />
Maggid <strong>Book</strong>s (Koren Publishers) with the OU<br />
Press<br />
Rabbi Sacks has contributed an important<br />
and enlightening commentary<br />
on the book of Genesis.<br />
In his introduction, he describes the<br />
parashat hashuvua as a “weekly encounter<br />
between the now and then, the moment<br />
and eternity, which frames <strong>Jewish</strong> consciousness and gives us the<br />
unique sense of living out a narrative, the biblical story, to which we<br />
ourselves are writing the latest chapter.” In Covenant and Conversation,<br />
Rabbi Sacks succeeds in continuing the conversation that has existed<br />
for thousands of years on the weekly portion by offering a clear and<br />
sophisticated commentary. His gift to his readers is his lucid explanations<br />
that make use of stories from the <strong>Jewish</strong> tradition, scholarly<br />
explanations, and his personal philosophies in a humane and kind<br />
tone that illustrates his intense love and knowledge of his topic and his<br />
deep respect for the reader. He educates by weaving<br />
definitions, his personal philosophy and moral<br />
insights, classic biblical commentaries, and contemporary<br />
philosophical references into his explanations<br />
of each weekly portion of Genesis. The result is a<br />
fresh look at the text and an original contribution to<br />
the ongoing conversation of our tradition.<br />
Finalists:<br />
NEHAMA LEIBOWITZ: TEACHER<br />
AND BIBLE SCHOLAR<br />
Yael Unterman<br />
Urim Publications<br />
Here is an extensive study of the life of<br />
a great Torah scholar, teacher, and<br />
commentator. Nehama, as she always<br />
requested to be addressed, rose to prominence<br />
in a male dominated sphere of<br />
scholarship and earned respect through her<br />
brilliance of mind, clarity of thought and<br />
inspired teaching methodologies. She was a modern Orthodox woman<br />
educated both in secular and <strong>Jewish</strong> studies, and her teaching reflected<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
this blend of influences.<br />
This book manages to bring together, in one volume, a scholarly<br />
discourse and a biographical profile of Nehama Leibowitz. Yael Unterman<br />
has produced a book that will enlighten, inspire, and educate the<br />
reader on many levels. The serious Torah student will find a wealth of<br />
relevant commentary and insights while the casual<br />
reader will delight in the accessible, articulate narrative<br />
style of this biographical work. Nehama was<br />
quoted as saying; “I’m not worth writing about—go<br />
and learn Torah instead.” Thank you, Yael Unterman,<br />
for writing about Nehama and giving us the<br />
opportunity to learn Torah at the same time.<br />
THE MURMURING DEEP:<br />
REFLECTIONS ON THE<br />
BIBLICAL UNCONSCIOUS<br />
Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg<br />
Schocken <strong>Book</strong>s<br />
The Murmuring Deep: Reflections on the<br />
TBiblical Biblical Unconscious by Avivah, Avivah<br />
Gottlieb<br />
Zornberg “explores the enigmas of<br />
communication as they are articulated in<br />
twelve biblical narratives, and refracted in<br />
midrashic and Hasidic readings of those<br />
narratives.” She hears the “subconscious”<br />
of the text “as Deep calls unto deep” (Ps. 42), adding to the rabbinic<br />
understanding of the human heart a psychoanalytic and poetic dimension.<br />
She probes the voice within, the place where the conscious and<br />
unconscious meet, and gives voice to those haunting emotions that<br />
have no specific name. She begins her study with the material that God<br />
uses to create the world, the tehom, the murmuring<br />
deep, which underlies everything, external and internal<br />
and ends with Ruth who shines with the possibilities<br />
of the future, of family, community, and the<br />
charged and fiery revelation at Sinai. Zornberg’s first<br />
book, Genesis: the Beginning of Desire, won the<br />
National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Award in 1995 for non-fiction.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 15<br />
Debbi Cooper
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
THE KOREN SACKS SIDDUR:<br />
A HEBREW/ENGLISH PRAYERBOOK<br />
Chief Rabbi Lord Sacks<br />
Koren Publishers<br />
The Koren Siddur is a landmark<br />
achievement for Chief Rabbi Lord<br />
Jonathan Sacks, Eliyahu Koren, and the<br />
Orthodox Union.<br />
This new Orthodox, Ashkenazic rite<br />
prayerbook features:<br />
• Koren’s beautiful, clear fonts<br />
for prayers and Bible texts<br />
• innovative Hebrew-English pagination (with the book<br />
open, Hebrew appears on the left, English on the right,<br />
and both texts flow outward from the center)<br />
• passages of Hebrew and English text laid out in meaningful<br />
phrases<br />
• special symbols for grammatical vocalization (sh’va na,<br />
meteg, kamatz katan)<br />
• instructions for women’s Zimmun at Grace After<br />
Meals, Ceremony of Zeved HaBat (celebrating the birth<br />
of a daughter)<br />
• explanatory notes accompanying the text<br />
• a useful appendix of month-by-month practices and<br />
customs<br />
• a table of variant texts “endorsed by practice or noted<br />
halakhic authorities”<br />
• an English translation which is consistently faithful,<br />
original, engaging, and clear<br />
• Rabbi Sacks’ superb introductory essay, “Understanding<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Prayer”<br />
But this prayerbook is much more than the sum of its parts. It integrates<br />
perfectly the finest esthetic elements of book-craft with a rich national<br />
heritage and personal engagement in <strong>Jewish</strong> prayer.<br />
As Dr. Moshe Sokolow, one of the contributors to<br />
this project, said, “The siddur actually functions as a<br />
kind of liturgical time machine, transporting one<br />
from ordinary weekdays to Shabbat” and to other<br />
special days and occasions.<br />
What other book does that?<br />
POETRY<br />
Winner:<br />
THE BOOK OF SEVENTY<br />
Alicia Suskin Ostriker<br />
University of Pittsburgh Press<br />
Alicia Ostriker is one of the finest<br />
poets writing today in America.<br />
She is known for her commentary on<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> women writers and <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
women of the Bible as well as for her<br />
poetry. In one of her poems, “West 4th Street,” she calls herself a “fool for beauty”—but<br />
she is also a fool for wisdom.<br />
<strong>Book</strong> by book, she grows better and bet-<br />
16 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
ter; she has had to shed many skins to get here, but<br />
she is—finally—here. She has humour, scholarship,<br />
knowledge, and the courage of a woman at the<br />
height of her power looking lovingly and quizzically<br />
at the world.<br />
Finalists:<br />
EZEKIEL’S WHEELS<br />
Shirley Kaufman<br />
Copper Canyon Press<br />
Passionate and breathtakingly direct, Shirley Kaufman maps the<br />
territory of aging and blindness with clarity and courage:<br />
“Nobody’s story but my own/coming to an end.” There is no self-pity<br />
and nothing trivial in these stark, wise, beautiful lyrics. Kaufman’s<br />
questing spirit interrogates everything, tasting life with undiminished<br />
appetite. A poet who has been writing and publishing for decades,<br />
Kaufman wastes no time and no words. Lucid, truthful, pared down<br />
to powerful understatement, these are poems to read over and over.<br />
DOOR TO A NOISY<br />
ROOM<br />
Peter Waldor<br />
Alice James <strong>Book</strong>s<br />
The insurance industry now has poet<br />
Peter Waldor to add to its ranks along<br />
with Wallace Stevens. This first book is<br />
spare and yet bountiful and delicious, ending<br />
with “Warmth”:<br />
“The ones I love/<br />
strip shirts,...<br />
I lift the old<br />
clothes/... to feel the<br />
warmth/ still in<br />
them./<br />
Who will tell me/ to<br />
put them down?”<br />
STUPID HOPE:<br />
POEMS<br />
Jason Shinder<br />
Graywolf Press<br />
Stupid Hope is Jason Shinder’s last<br />
book, published after his untimely<br />
death in 2008, at the height of his lyric<br />
power. These poems from a life shortened<br />
by illness are startlingly open and emotionally<br />
daring. Unsparing<br />
with himself, facing<br />
the loneliness of his fears<br />
and failures with clarity and an undertone of wry wit,<br />
Shinder is fully alive and still willing to risk desire.<br />
The poignancy of “stupid hope”—for life, for love—<br />
is that these poems are filled with both.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
J.P. Ostriker<br />
Brad Fowler
SCHOLARSHIP<br />
Nahum M. Sarna Memorial Award<br />
Winner:<br />
SUBVERSIVE SEQUELS IN THE BIBLE:<br />
HOW BIBLICAL STORIES MINE AND<br />
UNDERMINE EACH OTHER<br />
Judy Klitsner<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society<br />
In weaving together traditional exegesis,<br />
modern scholarship, and her own original<br />
interpretations, Klitsner has created an<br />
enormously enjoyable and rewarding<br />
book. Predicated on the central theme that<br />
looking at later biblical narratives can<br />
inform and transform our understanding<br />
of earlier narratives, serving as sequels that undermine or subvert each<br />
other, Klitsner draws parallels utilizing her command of both ancient<br />
and modern exegesis and the subtle nuances of Biblical language. The<br />
result is a series of original understandings of familiar popular narratives<br />
that may forever transform the way in which the reader examines<br />
biblical texts. While much of the book is dedicated to a rereading of<br />
various women’s narratives in the Bible—from Eve and Sarah, and<br />
Rebecca and Rachel of Genesis to Deborah and Hannah—she also<br />
explores other themes as well. A senior faculty member<br />
at the Pardes Institute for <strong>Jewish</strong> Studies in<br />
Jerusalem who has taught courses in Bible and Biblical<br />
exegesis for nearly two decades, Klitsner has given<br />
the world of <strong>Jewish</strong> scholarship a small gem that will<br />
be treasured by both novice and experienced readers<br />
of the Bible.<br />
Finalists:<br />
MAIMONIDES, SPINOZA AND US:<br />
TOWARD AN INTELLECTUALLY<br />
VIBRANT JUDAISM<br />
Rabbi Marc D. Angel<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Lights Publishing<br />
e live in an age when it is “Wincreasingly difficult to walk in<br />
the path of Torah in a focused and balanced<br />
way. The intensity of fire on the<br />
right has created a religiosity characterized<br />
by extremism, obscurantism, authoritarianism.”<br />
On the left, “widespread secularism<br />
and agnosticism create a deep void.” This is the description Rabbi<br />
Marc Angel, PhD., gives to the current religious climate. In this scholarly<br />
yet accessible volume, the author seeks to develop a balanced,<br />
intellectually sound view of Judaism rooted in the trans-generational<br />
debate between Maimonides and Spinoza regarding the relationship<br />
between Judaism and Reason.<br />
Through a comparative exploration of a wide range of topics in<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> thought, Rabbi Angel guides the reader on a path toward a textually<br />
based philosophical understanding of Judaism that integrates<br />
well with the contemporary mindset. His approach will invigorate<br />
anyone seeking an intellectually sophisticated approach to <strong>Jewish</strong> texts<br />
and <strong>Jewish</strong> life. The book explores topics such as the role of reason in<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
religious faith, Divine Providence, the authoritativeness<br />
of Torah, and the role of Jews and Judaism in the<br />
world. At the conclusion of each topic, the discussion<br />
is brought back to the contemporary reader’s<br />
spiritual quest.<br />
THE INVENTION OF HEBREW<br />
Seth L. Sanders<br />
University of Illinois Press<br />
In The Invention of Hebrew, Seth L.<br />
Sanders presents a unique approach to<br />
the Bible. He views the text from the vantage<br />
point of linguistic anthropology and<br />
shows that Hebrew was more than just a<br />
language to transmit the Bible; it was<br />
specifically chosen to foster a political and<br />
cultural agenda. Sanders demonstrates that<br />
writing the Bible in the local language of<br />
Hebrew was elemental to producing a text that could and would speak<br />
directly to the local population. It was this choice of language that<br />
helped to form their political identity so that the<br />
choice of Hebrew as the language of transmission<br />
became a driving force in the creation the community<br />
or nation of Israel. This interesting and provocative<br />
text is a must read for anyone who is interested<br />
in the history of Biblical Israel and the ancient roots<br />
of the <strong>Jewish</strong> people.<br />
SEPHARDIC CULTURE<br />
Mimi S. Frank Award in Memory of Becky Levy<br />
Winner:<br />
WE LOOK LIKE THE ENEMY:<br />
THE HIDDEN STORY OF ISRAEL’S<br />
JEWS FROM ARAB LANDS<br />
Rachel Shabi<br />
Walker & Company<br />
We Look Like the Enemy, which sheds<br />
light on the troubled history of<br />
Sephardic immigrants to Israel and the<br />
humiliations many of them endured, is a<br />
haunting read that stirs the emotions.<br />
Rachel Shabi brings a journalist’s flair and<br />
a personal sense of outrage to her challenging<br />
expose on the situation of Mizrahi Jews in Israel, offering fascinating<br />
reporting into, for example, how newly-arrived Jews from North<br />
African countries were sent to live in distant towns<br />
that were lonely and forlorn, and only underscored<br />
their sense of alienation from mainstream Israeli society.<br />
We Look Like the Enemy can be painful to read—<br />
but it is a story that must be read every bit as careful-<br />
ly as the more traditional odes to the founding of the<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> State and the history of Zionism.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 17<br />
Dafna Kaplan
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
VISUAL ARTS<br />
Winner:<br />
ACTION/ABSTRACTION: POLLOCK,<br />
DE KOONING, AND AMERICAN ART,<br />
1940-1976<br />
Norman L. Kleeblatt, ed.<br />
Yale University Press<br />
Published in association with The <strong>Jewish</strong> Museum<br />
Action/Abstraction: Pollock, de Kooning,<br />
and American Art, 1940–1976 is<br />
much more than a handsomely-designed,<br />
weighty catalogue that accompanied the<br />
glorious exhibition of Abstract Expressionist work held at The <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Museum in New York. It is an important contribution to the alreadyvast<br />
literature of the period that reframes the way we conceive of this<br />
historic and defining era of American art<br />
Using an inspired approach, the curator, Norman L. Kleeblatt,<br />
chose to focus on the two outsized and fiercely competitive critics,<br />
Clement Greenberg and Harold Rosenberg, and the artists they championed.<br />
The scholarly essays within the catalogue uncover the reality<br />
of both critics’ significant connections with <strong>Jewish</strong> publications and<br />
debates about <strong>Jewish</strong> culture. This information has, until recently,<br />
been suppressed under the dominance of formalist theory in the case<br />
of Greenberg, and an emphasis on self-determination through the<br />
action of painting in the case of Rosenberg.<br />
The nine essays in the catalogue cover the topic from a variety of<br />
vantage points including solid biographical information about each of<br />
the critics, personal remembrances of the era by the distinguished art<br />
historian Irving Sandler, and specific historical documentation of both<br />
Greenberg’s and Rosenberg’s writings relating to contemporary <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
debates. In addition, a detailed cultural timeline integrates the creation<br />
of the art with contemporaneous events in American life and the<br />
literary world.<br />
Action/Abstraction is remarkable for adding a fresh<br />
dimension to this increasingly historic era. We can<br />
now consider the impact of post-war <strong>Jewish</strong> identity<br />
on the lives and work of several important artists,<br />
and on the two men who acted as their primary<br />
translators, articulating the meanings of the work for<br />
generations of observers.<br />
Finalists:<br />
CHAGALL AND THE ARTISTS OF THE<br />
RUSSIAN JEWISH THEATER<br />
Susan Tumarkin Goodman, with essays<br />
by Zvi Gitelman, Vladislav Ivanov,<br />
Jeffrey Veidlinger, and Benjamin Harshav<br />
Yale University Press<br />
Published in association with The <strong>Jewish</strong> Museum<br />
Chagall and the Artists of the Russian <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Theater is the skillfully-researched<br />
companion volume to an historic exhibition<br />
at The <strong>Jewish</strong> Museum in New York<br />
City. This captivating work documents the development of two theater<br />
companies, Habima and GOSET, and brings to light an astonishingly<br />
rich body of visual work they produced in the two decades following the<br />
18 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Bolshevik revolution. As Goodman and her essayists vividly describe,<br />
the folkloric-themed Hebrew-language Habima and the contemporarythemed<br />
Yiddish-language GOSET were distinctive forces during this<br />
brief, once-flourishing cultural moment. Yet their designers—Marc<br />
Chagall, most famously, along with Natan Altman, Robert Falk, and<br />
others—shared a common devotion to vigorous experimentation as<br />
they promoted the vanguard Expressionist, Cubo-Futurist, and Constructivist<br />
idioms in their work for the stage and revolutionized the visual<br />
vocabulary of the theater. Tragically, the prolific years of the Russian<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> theater came to an end under the crushing repression of the later<br />
Stalinist regime. Chagall and the Artists of the Russian <strong>Jewish</strong> Theater merits<br />
special recognition for bringing the achievement and daring of these<br />
gifted artists to wider notice. The volume includes<br />
many fine examples, beautifully reproduced, of the<br />
visual record of this productive movement—Chagall’s<br />
renowned murals, along with rarely-exhibited costume<br />
and set designs by lesser-known lights, photographs,<br />
posters, and other theatrical ephemera of this<br />
fascinating time and place.<br />
PHOTOGRAPHING THE JEWISH<br />
NATION: PICTURES FROM S. AN-SKY’S<br />
ETHNOGRAPHIC EXPEDITIONS<br />
Eugene M. Avrutin, Valerii Dymshits,<br />
Alexander Lvov, Harriet Murav,<br />
Alla Sokolova, eds.<br />
Brandeis University Press<br />
This succinct volume, Photographing<br />
the <strong>Jewish</strong> Nation, is a collaboration<br />
between scholars at the University of Illinois<br />
and the European University at St. Petersburg in Russia. It showcases<br />
the photography of Solomon Iudovin, who brilliantly documented<br />
rural <strong>Jewish</strong> life in the Russian Pale from 1912–1914 during<br />
the ethnographic expeditions organized by S. An-Sky. An-Sky was an<br />
ethnologist who wanted to document, analyze, and preserve the long<br />
arc of Russian <strong>Jewish</strong> life at a critical moment of change in Russia at<br />
the beginning of the 20th century. These recently rediscovered, visually<br />
rich photographs capture a vanished world of <strong>Jewish</strong> life and are the<br />
most tangible legacy of their ambitious venture. The authors’ insightful<br />
essays analyze the compelling photographic images technically, aesthetically,<br />
and within the political context of that day. However, the<br />
well-researched book goes further than just gathering a memorable<br />
group of photographs. The text conjures up the gulf between the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
intellectuals, who on one hand embraced ideals of enlightenment<br />
and left behind the rigid framework of <strong>Jewish</strong> tradition; and on the<br />
other hand, intensely tried to capture the unifying “nation-defining”<br />
essence of <strong>Jewish</strong> folklore, <strong>Jewish</strong> images, <strong>Jewish</strong> architecture and <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
artifacts to pass along to the future. This book is a testament to An-<br />
Sky’s timely expedition to preserve the <strong>Jewish</strong> past through the modern<br />
medium of photography and the modern idea of the museum as a<br />
sanctuary for culture. Photographing the <strong>Jewish</strong> Nation highlights An-<br />
Sky’s struggle to come to terms with the duality of bringing ancient<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> traditions forward, while living a modern life—issues that<br />
assimilated Jews continue to wrestle with today.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
WOMEN’S STUDIES<br />
Barbara Dobkin Award<br />
Winner:<br />
MITZVAH GIRLS: BRINGING UP THE<br />
NEXT GENERATION OF HASIDIC<br />
JEWS IN BROOKLYN<br />
Ayala Fader<br />
Princeton University Press<br />
After decades of focus on demographic<br />
and sociological studies of Hasidic<br />
men, it is a pleasure to read this rich<br />
account of the world of Hasidic <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
girls in Brooklyn. Having acquired the<br />
requisite Yiddish and Hebrew language<br />
and ethnographic skills, anthropologist<br />
Ayala Fader was able to enter, observe, and analyze the hidden world<br />
of Bobover Hasidic girls. Her fascinating, well-written, and wellresearched<br />
study illuminates the transmission of a traditional <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
system of values, behaviors, language, and dress within a highly specific<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> community in a time when many in the <strong>Jewish</strong> world feel<br />
unsure about the most effective way to ensure <strong>Jewish</strong> continuity.<br />
Beginning with a linguistic analysis of the different forms of Yiddish,<br />
Yishivish and Yinglish taught differentially to boys and girls, Fader<br />
draws us into the world of their homes and their<br />
schools. We see how parents relate to each other and<br />
their children, how teachers relate to students and<br />
parents, and most of all, how Bobover girls are socialized<br />
by peers, teachers and parents to carry on their<br />
ultra-orthodox way of life while living in the midst of<br />
21st century New York.<br />
Finalists:<br />
LEVIRATE MARRIAGE AND THE<br />
FAMILY IN ANCIENT JUDAISM<br />
Dvora E. Weisberg<br />
Brandeis University Press<br />
According to Deuteronomy 25:5–10,<br />
a childless widow must marry her<br />
deceased husband’s brother or, in a deprecated<br />
outcome, be dismissed by him,<br />
which permits her to marry someone else.<br />
In her accessible and illuminating study of<br />
levirate message in rabbinic Judaism,<br />
Dvora E. Weisberg demonstrates how the<br />
rabbis of the Mishnah and Babylonian Talmud reconfigured this biblical<br />
mandate, shifting their legal preference from levirate marriage to<br />
release of the sister-in-law through halitza. Unlike the extended patriarchal<br />
kinship group of biblical times, the ideal rabbinic family consisted<br />
of a male householder, his wife (or wives), and children. Recognizing<br />
the profound difficulties the levirate mandate<br />
could create within individual lives in compact family<br />
units, the rabbis affirmed the needs of the living<br />
over those of the deceased, while still maintaining the<br />
option of a brother-in-law/sister-in-law marriage.<br />
Weisberg shows us that through their reassessment of<br />
the biblical levirate, the rabbis insisted that families<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
are composed of individual members who are not interchangeable and<br />
who must be granted a degree of autonomy in the intimate relationships<br />
of their lives.<br />
STILL JEWISH: A HISTORY OF<br />
WOMEN AND INTERMARRIAGE<br />
IN AMERICA<br />
Keren R. McGinity<br />
New York University Press<br />
Historical studies of marriage between<br />
Jews and non-Jews in the United<br />
States are rare. Rarer still are those that<br />
focus on <strong>Jewish</strong> women who married non-<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> men. Based on letters, memoirs,<br />
biographies, and interviews, Keren<br />
McGinity’s groundbreaking book begins<br />
with the immigrant generation of the early<br />
twentieth century and carries the story up to the present. She discusses<br />
“exceptional” women such as Mary Antin Grabau and Rose Pastor<br />
Stokes, but also considers how “ordinary” <strong>Jewish</strong> women’s opportunities<br />
and choices have been shaped and expanded by a range of 20th century<br />
social transformations. What McGinity discovers—and she is<br />
backed up by other contemporary research—is that by the beginning<br />
of the 21st century intermarried <strong>Jewish</strong> women are far<br />
more likely to raise their children as Jews than intermarried<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> men. Her timely volume reminds us<br />
that <strong>Jewish</strong> identity and family life is still shaped by<br />
gender and that this must be taken into account as<br />
the American <strong>Jewish</strong> community strategizes its survival<br />
in the decades to come.<br />
MENEKET RIVKAH: A MANUAL<br />
OF WISDOM AND PIETY<br />
Original text by Rivkah bat Meir;<br />
Translated from the original Yiddish<br />
to German, with introduction and<br />
commentary by Frauke Von Rohden<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society<br />
The first-known Yiddish book to be<br />
written by a woman, Meneket Rivkah<br />
(Rivkah’s Nurse) reveals a great deal about<br />
16th century <strong>Jewish</strong> women’s lives and religious<br />
practices. It includes Rivkah bat Meir’s<br />
sermons, her interpretations of the Bible, and other religious instructions<br />
on various topics to guide women in their familial relationships.<br />
First published posthumously in Prague, in 1609, Meneket Rivkah<br />
pre-dates the work of Glueckel of Hamelin and makes a new contribution<br />
to the fields of Yiddish literature and <strong>Jewish</strong> women’s literature. Von<br />
Rohden’s critical introduction and commentary serve to place the work<br />
within biblical and rabbinical literature, and within<br />
other Yiddish ethical works of Rivkah bat Meir’s time.<br />
This is the first book to include the original Yiddish<br />
text in English translation, as well as the original Yiddish<br />
manuscript of Rivkah bat Meir’s unpublished<br />
Simhes Toyre Lid. The book also includes the original<br />
Yiddish text of Meneket Rivkah.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 19
59 TH NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARDS<br />
WRITING BASED ON ARCHIVAL MATERIAL<br />
The JDC-Herbert Katzki Award<br />
Winner:<br />
THE HOLOCAUST IN<br />
THE SOVIET UNION<br />
Yitzhak Arad; Ora Cummings, trans.<br />
University of Nebraska Press<br />
In this comprehensive new study, Yitzhak<br />
Arad has managed to take advantage of a<br />
rare window of opportunity: the opening<br />
of various Soviet archives during the early<br />
1900’s. Arad traveled to the Soviet Union<br />
(or, later Russia, Ukraine and Belarus) and<br />
explored extensive documentation never<br />
seen before by historians. Among the numerous Soviet archives cited in<br />
the book are the Communist Party archives, Soviet Military archives,<br />
the Soviet Partisans’ Movement archives, and the KGB archives.<br />
Those new documents supplemented previously-known data from<br />
Archives of the Third Reich, the Allies, and <strong>Jewish</strong> entities, thus enabling<br />
Dr. Arad to identify unique aspects of the Holocaust in the Soviet territories<br />
and to complete the tragic narrative in a full manner, striving to<br />
eliminate as many unknown “white stains” or blanks as possible.<br />
This massive historical work is organized in a chronological as well<br />
as geographical matrix. The book makes a significant contribution to<br />
the continuous effort of scholars to fathom the phenomenon know as<br />
“The Holocaust.”<br />
20 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
JEWISH BOOK<br />
COUNCIL<br />
CONGRATULATES<br />
THE 2009 NJBA<br />
WINNERS!<br />
For information on the 2010 National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong><br />
Awards, please contact jbc@jewishbooks.org.<br />
To review past winners, please visit<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
JUDGING PANELISTS<br />
We wish to publicly acknowledge and thank<br />
the people who served on the Panels of Judges for<br />
the 2009 National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Awards program<br />
Robert Abrams<br />
Harlene Winnick Appelman<br />
Judith R. Baskin<br />
Liliane K. Baxter<br />
Toni Bickart<br />
Analia Bortz<br />
Seth Cohen<br />
Helene Kalson Cohen<br />
Margery Cohen<br />
Ruth Cole<br />
Bobbi Coller<br />
Rela Mintz Geffen<br />
Sarah Gold<br />
Billie Gold<br />
Moshe Halbertal<br />
Tully Harcsztark<br />
Adah Hirschfeld<br />
Sharon Keller<br />
Temma Kingsley<br />
Rebecca Kobrin<br />
Lucette Lagnado<br />
Josh Lambert<br />
Joan Larkin<br />
Fred Lazin<br />
Amy Rosenblatt Lui<br />
Adam Mendelsohn<br />
Naomi Miller<br />
Adam Mintz<br />
Jean Mishkin<br />
Karen Moss<br />
Carol Neuberger<br />
Alana Newhouse<br />
Rachel Norton<br />
Robert Pollack<br />
Barbara Reisner<br />
Robert Rifkind<br />
Jonathan D. Sarna<br />
Shuly Schwartz<br />
Amir Shaviv<br />
Rona Sheramy<br />
Bill Shulman<br />
Jessica Siegel<br />
Lisa Silverman<br />
Neal Sokol<br />
Gerry Sorin<br />
Gerald Stern<br />
Marc Straus<br />
Margie Vigneri<br />
Arnee R. Winshall<br />
Lois Zachary<br />
Rakefet Zalashik
Hear,<br />
22 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010 www.jewishbookcouncil.org
O Israel...<br />
In a perfect—perhaps beshert—collaboration, the<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society and the <strong>Jewish</strong> Braille<br />
Institute have published a complete audio<br />
Tanakh of the authoritative JPS 1985 translation.<br />
The year-long project not only brings this<br />
edition of the Tanakh to the blind and visually<br />
impaired but also makes it available on line, as an<br />
MP3 download, and on other audio devices, giving<br />
it total portability.<br />
Although primarily a publisher of books, JPS, like<br />
other publishers, has been expanding its formats to<br />
reach people through the internet and other electronic<br />
systems. But the Tanakh proved a problem.<br />
Because of its 2,000-page length and the sixty hours<br />
required to record it, the project was too costly to<br />
produce commercially. Then someone recalled discussions<br />
with JBI a few years ago, and the collaboration<br />
was born. JBI had state-of-the-art equipment<br />
and the necessary experience as well as a crew of professional<br />
volunteer readers. JPS listened to recordings<br />
of about twenty readers and then selected thirteen,<br />
among them a few guest readers like Tovah Feldshuh,<br />
Bruce Feiler, Theodore Bikel, and Rabbi Harold<br />
Kushner. Rabbi Kushner reads from Psalms, and in<br />
alternating voices Theodore Bikel and his friend Marciarose<br />
Sheftack, the former Philadelphia radio and<br />
television broadcaster, read the Song of Songs.<br />
For those used to hearing the weekly portion<br />
chanted in Hebrew or to reading it silently, a sampling<br />
of the audio Tanakh offered the opportunity<br />
to hear the text in a straightforward, almost conversational<br />
tone without the trappings of worship or<br />
study. The Tanakh once again speaks for itself. Having<br />
several readers prevents monotony and lends<br />
variety and an individual tone to the portions.<br />
An interesting aside is the readers’ experience.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
By Maron L. Waxman<br />
Both Jews and non-Jews participated in the reading,<br />
and they reported that it was a personally meaningful<br />
experience. An Orthodox Jew was surprised to<br />
learn the actual written text of the Tanakh and realized<br />
how much of what he knew was midrash, or<br />
interpretation. He also had to master contemporary<br />
Hebrew pronunciation, which is not always used in<br />
communities of East European background. Pronunciation<br />
was the biggest challenge for most of the<br />
readers, and JBI produced both an audio and written<br />
guide to Hebrew pronunciation to help them.<br />
For the readers the reward was becoming familiar<br />
with the Tanakh or, for the non-Jews, the Old Testament,<br />
many of whom were unfamiliar with it.<br />
In this audio version the Tanakh will be accessible<br />
to a broad audience in as many ways as possible. JPS<br />
is offering free podcasts of the weekly portion on its<br />
website, and soon the audio Tanakh will be available<br />
for purchase not only through the website but at<br />
Audible and the iTunes Store as well as an MP3<br />
download. And an additional feature at the JPS website<br />
will soon allow people to place an icon on their<br />
home pages so that one click there will automatically<br />
broadcast the weekly portion. Purchasers may buy<br />
the entire Tanakh, the Torah, the Five Megilloth, or<br />
the individual books of the Tanakh. JBI will distribute<br />
the audio Tanakh to any eligible client who asks<br />
for it.<br />
The project was funded by Aaron Feingold, Dr.<br />
Seymour and Jane Kessler, and Norman and Edith<br />
Weisfeld.<br />
Maron L. Waxman, retired editorial director, special projects,<br />
at the American Museum of Natural History, was also an<br />
editorial director at HarperCollins and <strong>Book</strong>-of-the-Month<br />
Club. She also leads editorial workshops.<br />
Featuring the<br />
voice talents of...<br />
Bruce<br />
Feiler<br />
Harold<br />
Kushner<br />
Marcia<br />
Rose<br />
Theodore<br />
Bikel<br />
Tovah<br />
Feldshuh
BOOK GROUP FORUM<br />
Editor’s Note: Please let us know which <strong>Jewish</strong>-interest books have worked out particularly well for your reading group.<br />
<strong>Book</strong> Club Recommendations<br />
Fiction<br />
GRATITUDE: A NOVEL<br />
Joseph Kertes<br />
Thomas Dunne <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009<br />
Winner, 2009 National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Award in Fiction<br />
1. What do you think is represented by the stampede of wild horses<br />
that Lili witnesses? Do horses recur in the novel? Do other animals<br />
play a significant role in the novel? For example, how does Smetana<br />
the cat help Istvan to survive?<br />
2. What is the role of music in this novel? How did the passages about<br />
music add to your reading experience? What is being implied by the<br />
music?<br />
3. Commandant Karoly Fekete mercifully saves Lili from Sergeant Erdo.<br />
In the concentration camp, a cruel guard spares Marta’s life and helps<br />
her escape. Why do you think people capable of such cruelty are<br />
also depicted as capable of compassion?<br />
4. Was it reasonable for Robert to ask Paul and his sister to go on work<br />
detail? Did he intend for Paul to depart? Why do you think Paul<br />
decided to leave at the end of the novel without telling his family<br />
where he was going? Where do you think he goes?<br />
5. Why is the novel called Gratitude?<br />
Q & A from Penguin Canada<br />
Non-Fiction<br />
SAVING ISRAEL: HOW THE<br />
JEWISH PEOPLE CAN WIN<br />
A WAR THAT MAY NEVER END<br />
Daniel Gordis<br />
John Wiley & Sons, 2009<br />
Winner, 2009 National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Award Winner in<br />
Contemporary <strong>Jewish</strong> Life and Practice<br />
1. Gordis titles his third chapter “The First War, All Over Again.” What<br />
do you think he means by that? Do you agree with his assessment of<br />
the continuing conflict?<br />
2. Gordis discusses Professor Sammy Smooha’s idea<br />
of an ethnic democracy, a system that “combines<br />
the extension of civil and political rights to permanent<br />
residents who wish to be citizens with<br />
the bestowal of a favored status on the majority<br />
group.” Do you think Israel is an ethnic democracy?<br />
Is Israel’s status as a <strong>Jewish</strong> state in opposition<br />
to its democracy? Can a religious state ever be<br />
truly democratic? (pg. 131)<br />
3. What do you see as Israel’s purpose? How does<br />
this purpose affect policy in Israel, both foreign<br />
and domestic? How can Israel better fulfill this<br />
purpose? (pg. 148)<br />
4. Gordis discusses his youthful <strong>Jewish</strong> education as<br />
such: “We were taught <strong>Jewish</strong> history and philosophy<br />
in a way that made passivity and Judaism<br />
sound like the most natural combination. ...In a<br />
strange way, it now seems to me, we were actually<br />
comfortable with the role of victim.” What do<br />
you think about this? How do you think <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
culture intersects with a sense of victimhood? Is<br />
this a good thing, a bad thing, or neither? (pg. 183)<br />
5. How does Gordis suggest Israel should be saved?<br />
Do you agree? What changes do you think would<br />
have to be made in Israeli and <strong>Jewish</strong> culture and<br />
politics to enable Gordis’ plan?<br />
24 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010 www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Zion Ozeri
A Conversation with David Sax<br />
By Laurie Gwen Shapiro<br />
Over the phone David Sax tells me it is almost a relief that I suggest a Lower East Side<br />
coffee bar to kibbitz. (Apparently most of his previous profilers think a deli meet is<br />
a novel idea.) David is already there when I arrive, a suspiciously belly-less young<br />
Canadian in his early 30’s.<br />
What authority<br />
could he have to write<br />
about the territory of<br />
aging hefty uncles?<br />
Nonetheless this<br />
svelte hipster boychik<br />
from Toronto has traveled<br />
the globe in order<br />
to understand the<br />
warp and the weft of<br />
this endangered food<br />
niche. Los Angeles, Cleveland, Chicago. He<br />
made it to other <strong>Jewish</strong> pockets of America<br />
where, when ordering white bread on your<br />
pastrami, no one clobbers you with a baseball<br />
bat. He even hopped across the pond to see<br />
The Beefeaters we rarely hear about in London,<br />
the Salt Beef eating kind, not the warders<br />
of her Majesty’s royal palace. And into Galiciana<br />
Poland to see what <strong>Jewish</strong> cooking was<br />
like in the new millennium. (Not so good.)<br />
I tried to introduce myself at his book<br />
launch in Ben’s Kosher Deli in the Diamond<br />
District, but tell him that I have never witnessed<br />
such joyous pandemonium at a book<br />
event. Needless to say, the Save the Deli launch<br />
was loud and fun and fully embraced its <strong>Jewish</strong>ness.<br />
Frankly, it felt more like a bar mitzvah<br />
than a book launch; it was impossible to talk<br />
to anyone over the gabble of hundreds of<br />
happy partygoers, which included Catskill<br />
legend Freddie Roman, and The <strong>Jewish</strong> Elvis,<br />
Jelvis. David modestly shrugs off the lines out<br />
the door, “Complimentary pastrami and<br />
cream soda will do it.”<br />
“Reviews have been phenomenal,” I remind<br />
him, and he grins.<br />
David’s humor runs dark in person and<br />
on the page, as evident in his book’s details,<br />
like his deep revulsion at watching his pastrami<br />
sandwich microwaved by a deli claiming<br />
to be authentic, and a customer choking on a<br />
big chunk of phenomenal gefilte fish who<br />
gets the Heimlich and then eats the projectile<br />
again because it was so good. He can be<br />
poignant too; I delighted in his often heartbreaking<br />
portraits of diehard deli men and<br />
their fantasias of making it big in Las Vegas.<br />
And then he shows the loathsomeness of the<br />
corporate “New York style” delis that have<br />
Christopher Farber<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
actually opened in the Casinos, even branches<br />
of famous American delis that muck up the<br />
failproof recipes. Mel Brooks also makes a<br />
Hollywood cameo in the book.<br />
What’s not to love here?<br />
Is he going to follow up with more foodie<br />
non-fiction, currently a hot slice of the book<br />
market? Or stick to <strong>Jewish</strong> topics? Or do a<br />
Carnegie combo of foodie and <strong>Jewish</strong>?<br />
“I know I don’t want to get typecast in deli.<br />
I’ve recently been posting radio stories on<br />
NPR.” Like what? He smiles, “Last one is called<br />
Man Enough to Love Eat Pray Love.” I laugh<br />
hard, mostly because my husband despised that<br />
book, which I got a big girlie kick out of. “I<br />
majored in economics and history and wrote<br />
serious journalism for several magazines, did<br />
journalism stints in South<br />
America, Argentina, and<br />
Brazil. A million subjects<br />
fascinate me. Actually, I’ve<br />
had this idea for a long<br />
time; while working on a<br />
term paper an idea fixed in<br />
my head to write this<br />
book.” Probably the only<br />
thing that doesn’t interest<br />
him is writing fiction. As<br />
our second coffee comes, I<br />
wish him a creative nonfiction<br />
career Rich Cohen<br />
or Mark Kurlansky would<br />
be proud of.<br />
David was born in<br />
1976 in Toronto, to parents<br />
who had left the<br />
Montreal <strong>Jewish</strong> community<br />
during the first threats of Québecois secession.<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> on both sides, his mother’s family<br />
emigrated to Canada in the early 1800’s, and<br />
his father, like many in the Montreal community,<br />
was the child of Romanian immigrants. I<br />
ask more about old school Canadian deli, and<br />
the Toronto food scene. Montreal is famous for<br />
its smoked meat, sort of a pastrami-meetscorned<br />
beef. “An artisanal deli restaurant called<br />
Mile End has opened up in Brooklyn’s<br />
Boerum Hill, where New Yorkers will get a<br />
taste of what <strong>Jewish</strong> Canadians crave, and even<br />
non-<strong>Jewish</strong> Canadians. And Caplansky’s in<br />
EMERGING VOICES<br />
Toronto is worth a visit. A new artisanal deli<br />
getting it right too.”<br />
But are artisanal delis in it for the long<br />
haul, or still in love with the newness? He<br />
shared my concern.<br />
He spoke forebodingly of the future for<br />
some of the old timers hanging on that he<br />
profiled, the dedicated ones for whom<br />
money, apparently, is incidental, but not to<br />
their heirs. But he concedes this artisanal deli<br />
movement, which includes Michael Anthony<br />
making his own pastrami at Gramercy Tavern,<br />
is a bright spot in the industry. “Can you<br />
imagine the dedication that goes into curing<br />
your own meat from scratch?”<br />
One of David’s most startling discoveries,<br />
after he carefully likens New York to the<br />
Jerusalem of Deli, is that the best city for deli<br />
is Los Angeles. Saying in print that Los Angeles<br />
has the best pastrami sandwich? Isn’t that<br />
an invitation to a war? “But it’s the truth,” he<br />
says, “they have many great delis there, supported<br />
by the Hollywood culture. And you<br />
have to taste the pastrami at Langer’s. A different<br />
stratosphere.”<br />
I press him as our hour ends, is there really<br />
a doomsday clock for my<br />
father’s favorite food?<br />
Can he vouchsafe pastrami’s<br />
existence for my<br />
young daughter’s generation<br />
when health and bottom-line<br />
concerns trump<br />
narrowminded pursuit of<br />
deli perfection?<br />
“As long as there are<br />
true fanatics I have hope.”<br />
Sounding more like my<br />
grandmother by the<br />
minute, I wish him<br />
nachas on his upcoming<br />
wedding, and think,<br />
maybe, just maybe I<br />
should swing by Katz’s<br />
for some takeout, to hell<br />
with the diet.<br />
To read more about David Sax, please visit<br />
www. Savethedeli.com<br />
Laurie Gwen Shapiro is the author of ALA Notable<br />
<strong>Book</strong> The Unexpected Salami and The Matzo Ball<br />
Heiress and other books for adults. She has also written<br />
two books for young adults, most recently for<br />
Random House. She is also a winner of an Independent<br />
Spirit Award for co-directing the IFC documentary<br />
“Keep the River on Your Right.” She is currently working<br />
on YA novel The O’Leary Bat Mitzvah, and producing<br />
a documentary about Iggy Pop. LaurieGwen-<br />
Shapiro.com<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 25
REVIEWS<br />
AMERICAN JEWISH STUDIES<br />
AN AMERICAN EXPERIENCE: ADELINE MOSES LOEB<br />
AND HER EARLY AMERICAN JEWISH ANCESTORS<br />
John L. Loeb, Jr., Kathy L. Plotkin, Margaret Loeb Kempner, Judith E. Endelman; Eli N. Evans, intro.<br />
Sons of the Revolution in the State of New York, 2009. 350 pp. $49.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-9822032-0-0<br />
If ever a physical book resembled its topics, this remarkable biography does. Elegantly presented,<br />
its coverage of its subject’s life and genealogical provenance are a revelation. Physical<br />
presentation almost overtakes the text’s uniqueness—portraits, maps, and many—6th cousins—genealogical charts. Oversize, it captures a world of atypical Americana—Jews.<br />
Adeline Moses Loeb fit two descriptions: “fine woman,” family-centered, respectable, modest<br />
beginnings, strong personality; and “fine lady,” beautifully gowned, charitable, proud of her<br />
heritage, with some rags (sort of)-to-riches tales. She was affectionately and realistically recalled<br />
by her daughter, Margaret Loeb Kempner, in “Mother’s Life with Father,” unpublished and<br />
written some years ago. Grandson John L. Loeb, Jr., the force behind the book, gives due credit<br />
to his grandmother’s outstanding, permanent philanthropy, as well as the paternal Loeb lineup<br />
of financial successes.<br />
While Adeline Loeb has only 33 discrete pages devoted to her, her name and background<br />
appear throughout, ranging from <strong>Jewish</strong> sea-farers, arriving here in the 17th century, to post-<br />
Civil War sagas of the South, iconic merchants, successful financiers, and highest-level friends.<br />
With a smooth, unchallenging style, it details membership in and publication by the Sons of<br />
the Revolution in the State of New York, to a not-in-your-face presentation of upper<br />
South/lower South dissensions, notably, discussion of <strong>Jewish</strong> ownership of “property-in-man.”<br />
Intermarriage—heavy, if surnames are an indicator—is not mentioned. A most unusual book,<br />
full of scholarly threads worth following.<br />
Appendices, bibliography, family charts and maps, general index, guide to family trees,<br />
name index. ABS<br />
Howard Megdal<br />
Collins, 2009. 320 pp. $22.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-06-155843-6<br />
THE BASEBALL<br />
TALMUD: A DEFINI-<br />
TIVE POSITION-BY-<br />
POSITION RANKING<br />
OF BASEBALL’S<br />
CHOSEN PLAYERS<br />
The Baseball Talmud is a book for <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
baseball statistic geeks. That said, it<br />
should be added that the book, like the Talmud,<br />
is sprinkled with lively anecdotes and<br />
wry observations worthy of a stand-up comic.<br />
Howard Megdal, baseball writer for the<br />
New York Observer and several baseball publications,<br />
uses sophisticated sabermetrics and other<br />
research to identify and rank all 160 <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
major leaguers, less than 1 percent of 16,696<br />
players who have made it to the bigs. Megdal’s<br />
definition of <strong>Jewish</strong> is, to use his word, expansive,<br />
but his standards are exacting and based<br />
on such measures as Baseball Prospectus’<br />
WARP3 (wins above replacement player) and<br />
formulas that adjust for differences between<br />
baseball parks and eras.<br />
After selecting the greatest <strong>Jewish</strong> baseball<br />
player—Hank Greenberg or Sandy Koufax?—<br />
Megdal ranks the remaining top ten and fearlessly<br />
predicts the top ten years out. He then<br />
ranks all the <strong>Jewish</strong> players by position, noting<br />
a lack of good second basemen. And for the<br />
finale Megdal names the all-time <strong>Jewish</strong> team<br />
and classes it, adjusted for parks and eras,<br />
unbeatable.<br />
All in all The Baseball Talmud will make for<br />
endless arguments on off-season Shabbos afternoons.<br />
Although Megdal is serious about his<br />
stats, he has a light touch with language, and<br />
his asides and anecdotes provide a neat balance<br />
to his pursuit of statistical affirmation. Glossary,<br />
illustrations, index. MLW<br />
WE REMEMBER<br />
WITH REVERENCE<br />
AND LOVE: AMERICAN<br />
JEWS AND THE MYTH<br />
OF SILENCE AFTER<br />
THE HOLOCAUST,<br />
1945–1962<br />
Hasia R. Diner<br />
New York University Press, 2009. 527 pp. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8147-1993-0<br />
In this well-researched and passionately<br />
argued book, Hasia Diner challenges the<br />
conventional view that postwar American<br />
Jewry showed little interest in the Holocaust<br />
until the 1960’s and, in fact, wanted to forget<br />
it rather than memorialize it. She maintains<br />
that nearly every historian, literary scholar, and<br />
cultural critic who has commented on American<br />
Jews in this period and their relationship<br />
to the Shoah, asserted with utter certainty that<br />
American Jews made little of the Holocaust,<br />
repressed it and did not make it an important<br />
part of their communal lives. Whether motivated<br />
by guilt, shame, fear, indifference, or the<br />
desire to assimilate, American Jews simply did<br />
not memorialize or focus on the Holocaust<br />
until the Eichmann trial in 1960–61 and<br />
Israel’s stunning victory in the Six Day War of<br />
1967 made it socially and culturally acceptable<br />
to do so. Coming out of World War II, American<br />
Jews were too busy with the emergence of<br />
the State of Israel, the threats of the Cold War,<br />
moving to the suburbs, financing a synagoguebuilding<br />
boom and carving out their place in<br />
society to have room in their public culture for<br />
the tragedy of European Jewry.<br />
Diner rejects this conventional view and<br />
claims that it is categorically false and based<br />
on thin evidence and gleaned from few<br />
sources. Uncovering a rich and varied trove of<br />
documentation—in literature, song, liturgy,<br />
public display, and many other forms, We<br />
Remember with Reverence and Love shows that<br />
American Jews were deeply engaged in<br />
memorializing the Holocaust in a multiplicity<br />
of ways and that it was a powerful element<br />
of <strong>Jewish</strong> life in postwar America. Whether in<br />
liturgy or pedagogy, in staged ceremonies or<br />
in the deliberations of <strong>Jewish</strong> organizations<br />
and in the activities of their youth groups, the<br />
tragedy of European Jewry was central to Jew-<br />
26 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010 www.jewishbookcouncil.org
New from <strong>Jewish</strong> Lights Publishing<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-423-8<br />
Quality PB Original, 6 x 9,<br />
208 pp $16.99<br />
Rabbi Joseph B. Meszler<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-412-2<br />
Quality PB Original, 6 x 9,<br />
224 pp $18.99<br />
Rabbi Elie Kaunfer<br />
Foreword by Prof. Jonathan Sarna<br />
ISBN 978-1-59473-275-1<br />
ISBN 978-1-59473-272-0<br />
Quality PB Original, 51 ⁄2 x 81 ⁄2,<br />
240 pp $16.99<br />
Trans. and Ann. by Rabbi Rami Shapiro<br />
Foreword by<br />
Rabbi Zalman M. Schachter-Shalomi<br />
(A SkyLight Paths <strong>Book</strong>)<br />
NEW IN PB<br />
Quality PB, 6 x 9, 160 pp<br />
$16.99<br />
Rabbi Daniel F. Polish, PhD<br />
(A SkyLight Paths <strong>Book</strong>)<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-424-5<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-422-1<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-426-9<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-425-2<br />
Steve Sheinkin<br />
Quality PB Original<br />
w/ full-color illus., 6 x 9,<br />
144 pp $16.99<br />
Please call or e-mail sales@jewishlights.com for a complete catalog.<br />
JEWISH LIGHTS PUBLISHING<br />
Sunset Farm Offices, Route 4 • P.O. Box 237 • Woodstock, VT 05091<br />
Tel: 802-457-4000 • Fax: 802-457-4004 • Orders: 800-962-4544<br />
www.jewishlights.com<br />
HC, 6 x 9, 304 pp (est) $24.99<br />
Ed. by Rabbi Lawrence A. Hoffman, PhD<br />
HC, 6 x 9, 256 pp $24.99<br />
Dr. Louis E. Newman<br />
Foreword by Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis<br />
Preface by Rabbi Karyn D. Kedar<br />
Quality PB, 6 x 9, 288 pp<br />
$16.99<br />
Rabbi Jill Jacobs<br />
Foreword by Rabbi Elliot N. Dorff, PhD<br />
Preface by Simon Greer<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-413-9<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-428-3<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-419-1<br />
HC, 6 x 9, 350 pp (est) $24.99<br />
Ed. by Rabbi Elliot J. Cosgrove, PhD<br />
HC, 6 x 9, 240 pp (est) $24.99<br />
Ed. by Rabbi William Cutter, PhD<br />
ISBN 978-1-58023-402-3<br />
HC, 6 x 9, 144 pp $19.99<br />
Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski, MD<br />
NEW IN PB NEW IN PB<br />
Quality PB, 6 x 9, 160 pp<br />
$16.99<br />
Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis
JBW 28.1_JBW 28.1 2/18/10 9:57 PM Page 28<br />
REVIEWS<br />
ish identity and activity. In this important<br />
book of scholarship and conviction, Diner<br />
attempts to revise our understanding of postwar<br />
American Jewry. She correctly challenges<br />
the conventional views on this topic, although<br />
her alternative narrative is also overdrawn to a<br />
degree, especially her assertions concerning<br />
what American Jews did and said concerning<br />
the “survivors,” the “refugees,” die geblibene<br />
(those left) in Yiddish, or the Displaced Persons,<br />
as they were variously referred to. Her<br />
claims here, challenged by solid research, raise<br />
doubts about the reliability of the overall thesis.<br />
I suspect the reality is somewhere between<br />
the denial and repression accepted by most<br />
and the active and productive engagement<br />
and advocacy suggested by Diner. A lively and<br />
controversial book, it is sure to spark debate<br />
and conversation for years to come. 2009<br />
National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Award Winner in<br />
American <strong>Jewish</strong> Studies. MND<br />
AUTOBIOGRAPHY<br />
AND MEMOIR<br />
Joel Chasnoff<br />
Free Press, 2010. 288 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-4932-1<br />
28 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Autobiography and Memoir<br />
THE 188 TH CRYBABY<br />
BRIGADE: A SKINNY<br />
JEWISH KID FROM<br />
CHICAGO FIGHTS<br />
HEZBOLLAH<br />
Part Stripes, part Camp Ramah, comedian<br />
Joel Chasnoff presents a new kind of coming-of-age<br />
story in his memoir and first book,<br />
The 188th Crybaby Brigade. Chasnoff had a typical<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> American adolescence; he grew up<br />
in Chicago, got an Ivy League education, and<br />
lived in Brooklyn in his early twenties. After a<br />
failed attempt at a career in stand-up comedy,<br />
he moves to Israel to fulfill his lifelong yearning<br />
to serve in the Israel Defense Forces. Underneath<br />
his skinny frame, weak stomach, and lack<br />
of athleticism burns a long-running love of<br />
Eretz Yisrael. Chasnoff is assigned to the<br />
Armored Corps and trains as a tank gunner.<br />
But stop right there; this is not an all-out slapstick,<br />
silly-American-goes-to-Israel, missile<br />
hijinks tale. The author illuminates the relatively<br />
unknown side of the IDF and shows us from<br />
the inside how an army made up of teenagers<br />
and run by twenty-something officers actually<br />
functions. Along with Chasnoff, we bond with<br />
his platoon mates, who all call each other achi,<br />
“my brother.” Chasnoff’s comedic timing and<br />
honest heart shine throughout the narrative as<br />
we follow his journey from supposed zero to<br />
Israeli hero. Glossary of Israeli military slang,<br />
south Lebanon security recipes. JBH<br />
AARON’S JOURNEY:<br />
FROM SLAVE TO<br />
MASTER<br />
Howard Herskowitz<br />
Crown Publications, 2010. 230 pp. $19.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-9819821-2-0<br />
This is not an easy book to read. It is the<br />
memoir of the ordeal of Aaron Herskowitz,<br />
a young Czechoslovakian who was<br />
caught up in the deadly cauldron of Nazi<br />
occupied Europe, who somehow survived<br />
and with the help of his son, the author of<br />
this work, shares his harrowing experiences<br />
with the reader. As Aaron discloses in the<br />
beginning of the book: “I am...beloved son,<br />
father, brother, husband; a...patriotic son of<br />
Czechoslovakia, soldier, lover of God; slave<br />
The memoir is often raw and<br />
disturbing, true to the times and<br />
the personalities it depicts.<br />
laborer, hater of God, Russian partisan, persecutor,<br />
killer, survivor.” He shares his story<br />
honestly, without apology and with no effort<br />
to smooth over the jagged edges of the experience.<br />
The memoir is often raw and disturbing,<br />
true to the times and the personalities it<br />
depicts. Perhaps the most stunning aspect of<br />
the book is the “blood rage” it depicts, the<br />
retribution that Aaron and his colleagues<br />
took against Nazis and their collaborators.<br />
These scenes are brutal and disturbing and<br />
raise questions about standards of appropriate<br />
behavior under extreme circumstances. Aaron<br />
urges the reader to “...hear my testimony<br />
before rendering judgment, and ask yourself:<br />
what would you have done in my place?”<br />
The book is well-written and often gripping<br />
and provides a perspective rarely found<br />
in Holocaust memoirs. It is recommended for<br />
mature readers who have the perspective and<br />
background to engage the material and the<br />
ethical issues it raises. MND<br />
Steve Luxenberg<br />
Hyperion, 2009. 401 pp. $24.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4013-2247-2<br />
ANNIE’S GHOSTS:<br />
A JOURNEY INTO<br />
A FAMILY SECRET<br />
Career journalists who attempt to write about<br />
their own family histories sometimes find<br />
they can’t separate their professional selves from<br />
their personal journeys. But Steve Luxenberg, an<br />
editor at the Washington Post, does not have this<br />
problem. Instead, he demonstrates his abundant<br />
writing skills and reporting talents by unearthing<br />
a story that is gripping, haunting, and real while<br />
telling it with just the right amount of professional<br />
distance and personal depth. The tale bounces<br />
through time and around the globe, illuminating<br />
life in a mental hospital in Depression-era<br />
Detroit, touching down in the Holocaust, traversing<br />
the sacred space between fathers and children,<br />
moving seamlessly from sadness to joy.<br />
Luxenberg tells this family saga as if it were a<br />
detective story, revealing one layer at a time of the<br />
hidden world of an institutionalized aunt he was<br />
never told existed and the consequences of family<br />
secrets that, when revealed, imply lost worlds and<br />
private motives that have consequences down<br />
through the generations. Yet in his hands, the<br />
story comes to life, and this memoir displays the<br />
texture of social history as it sheds light on the<br />
power of love in <strong>Jewish</strong> families to overcome the<br />
secrets that drive us apart. Author’s note, family<br />
tree, index, notes. The paperback edition of this<br />
book will be published in May, 2010. LFB<br />
THE ARISTOCRAT:<br />
THE LIFE AND<br />
LEGACY OF HILLEL<br />
MENASHE SUTTON<br />
Abraham Sutton<br />
Abraham Sutton, 2008. 256 pp. $25.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-615-20572-4<br />
With this memoir, a tribute to the<br />
memory of his father, Abraham (Al)<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
Save the Dates<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Authors Conference:<br />
Writing for the Adult Reader<br />
�����������������������<br />
— and —<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Children’s <strong>Book</strong> Writers<br />
and Illustrators Conference<br />
�������������������������<br />
�<br />
Whether you are a new or a published author or illustrator,<br />
this is your opportunity to network with other authors and<br />
experts from the publishing world who can help you get<br />
your work into print.<br />
Sponsored by<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> <strong>Council</strong><br />
New location*:<br />
Center for <strong>Jewish</strong> History<br />
15 West 16th Street, New York, NY 10011<br />
*Formerly held at 92nd Street Y<br />
For more information, please email:<br />
writers@jewishbooks.org<br />
— Space is limited —
BOOK PROFILE<br />
CHILDREN IN FLIGHT<br />
By Marcia Weiss Posner<br />
The universe of memoirs grows larger daily as survivors face up to the shortened<br />
time they have left to tell their stories. The first two memoirs take place in<br />
France, the third, in Germany. All of the writers were children trying to escape the<br />
Nazis—two by hiding, and the third, in constant flight with his family.<br />
Leo Michel Abrami<br />
Outskirts Press, 2009. 216 pp. $18.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-1432734299 (pbk.)<br />
Fred Gross<br />
Mercer University Press, 2009. 220 pp. $ 29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0881461435<br />
Helen Studley<br />
iUniverse, 2009. 120 pp. $12.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4401-4019-8<br />
EVADING THE NAZIS: THE STORY<br />
OF A HIDDEN CHILD IN NORMANDY<br />
ONE STEP AHEAD OF HITLER: A JEWISH<br />
CHILD’S JOURNEY THROUGH FRANCE<br />
THE WINTER’S JOURNEY<br />
OF MY YOUTH: A MEMOIR<br />
Evading the Nazis, written by a retired rabbi who was a hidden child, is more than<br />
a story of a <strong>Jewish</strong> child hidden by righteous French farmers; it is the story of a<br />
dynamic, brave woman whose charisma, moxie, and business sense enabled her to<br />
travel on public conveyances throughout Nazi occupied France, to ask a Nazi soldier<br />
for help in carrying her suitcase, and other audacities. She always had a joke to make<br />
a policeman laugh. Their family of three—the father had abandoned them before the<br />
second child was born—spent the war years with false papers in Paris, until Abrami’s<br />
mother realized that with more SS on the streets, her boys were more and more at<br />
risk. By this time she had built up a “practice” in the French countryside, supplying<br />
farmers with goods, while they supplied her with food for her family. Having some<br />
medical knowledge, she began to act as an unofficial nurse for some of the farmers’<br />
ailing family members. They were loyal to her, and were the best of guardians for her<br />
two boys, whom they treated like family. And if you can imagine, during the whole<br />
time, their daring mother lived in Paris among the Nazis and the corrupt French<br />
police. In her experience, most of the French gentiles were empathetic to the plight<br />
of their <strong>Jewish</strong> neighbors, but not the police , who were avid tormentors and collectors<br />
of innocent Jews. The latter part of the book is about the son’s experience in<br />
learning about Judaism, becoming a Hebrew teacher and a rabbi, and his changing<br />
views about the denomination of Judaism in which he felt most comfortable.<br />
Oddly enough, the most exciting and moving of the three, One Step Ahead of<br />
Hitler, is a flight not remembered by the author, who was only three when he experienced<br />
it. Because of his talent in interviewing members of his family, researching, and<br />
writing, it is an adventure you will not soon forget. Although Gross knew much about<br />
the Holocaust because of his family history, he didn’t know precisely what his immediate<br />
family, including himself, had experienced. Two decades ago, he tried to query<br />
his mother, asking her to tell him the story of the family’s flight from Belgium as the<br />
Nazis invaded. He learned a bit, but his stiff-necked mother was uncommunicative,<br />
and not until he began to query his older brothers did he learn about what had happened.<br />
Then, he too, began to remember some incidents. He remembered his cold,<br />
non-demonstrative mother pressing her body over his to protect him, as they tried<br />
to escape the strafing by German planes of the refugees streaming toward the coast.<br />
Most of the family’s flight took place in occupied France, where the French police<br />
helped the Nazis round up more than 75,000 Jews for deportation to the death<br />
camps. How was this canny family, interred in the Gurs camp, the way station to<br />
Auschwitz, able to free itself? It was through the cleverness and courage of father<br />
and son. Read how they ran from place to place, believing that they had found safety<br />
in the south of France, only to have the Nazis come there, as well. The brothers and<br />
father used their ingenuity, fortitude, courage, and the help of Righteous Christians<br />
along the way who risked their own lives on behalf of these desperate refugees as<br />
they made their way through France. What makes the book come alive are the many<br />
conversations, colorful descriptions, and narrative talent. It could be a novel, but is<br />
true. This is a tale worth telling, and here it is told particularly well.<br />
The Winter’s Journey is a lively memoir of a horrible experience. The abrupt transition<br />
from accomplished swimmer popular among her peers to an outlawed Jew forbidden<br />
to swim at the town pool, is quickly transitioned by a humorous alternative—a<br />
description of a swimming hole used by nudists, who cordially invite her to join them,<br />
even in a suit. To offset most of the offending actions, there are usually counterpoints<br />
of humor, and also the kindness of some people, especially the author’s boss in the<br />
slave labor camp where both she and her father worked. Through sheer moxie, Helen, a<br />
non-bookkeeper, served in that role to the civilian, German but non-Nazi Mr. Runge,<br />
who befriended her, taught her what to do, and warned her before round ups. The<br />
family of three, the father and his two daughters, were brave and resourceful and greatly<br />
aided by various people. Unlike most tales of a crowded hiding place, there are hilarious<br />
accounts of the various boarders. In fact, if Studley had married a Japanese boarder,<br />
he would have taken her to Switzerland, but she refused to leave her father and they<br />
could not get another visa. Studley was managing to pass as a gentile on the street<br />
until a gentile woman from the same camp, jealous of Runge’s attention to Studley,<br />
exposed her to the SS and she was jailed. What happened next, and how Studley saved<br />
herself among the jailed prostitutes is the best part of the book. Even in Auschwitz,<br />
although tattooed, at that late date, she did not have to cut her hair; and at liberation,<br />
the nurse who tended her during her bout with typhoid, could not believe she was a<br />
prostitute and soon made other arrangements for her. Can you imagine a Holocaust<br />
story that because of its lively portraits of the people with whom they shared various<br />
living places, is entertaining, as well as tragic? That is what Studley has accomplished.<br />
Sequences are not always clear, but it’s worth the effort to unravel them.<br />
Marcia Weiss Posner, Ph.D., is a librarian and program director at the Holocaust<br />
Memorial and Tolerance Center of Nassau County.
Sutton presents a brief synopsis of the history<br />
of the <strong>Jewish</strong> community of Aleppo, Syria, up<br />
to and through its diasporas to Tel Aviv,<br />
Jerusalem, New York, New Orleans, and<br />
Deal, New Jersey. All this in a thin volume<br />
generously laced with photographs.<br />
Al Sutton lost his father when he was only<br />
eleven years old. He thought he knew him;<br />
but one day he discovered that there had been<br />
...interesting, fast moving, and sparkles<br />
with little glimpses of everyday life in a<br />
land (Aleppo) that was continuously<br />
inhabited by <strong>Jewish</strong> people.<br />
a eulogy by a renowned kabbalist. He eventually<br />
found the text; what he discovered in the<br />
process provides the foundation of The Aristocrat.<br />
The book is interesting, fast moving,<br />
and sparkles with little glimpses of everyday<br />
life in a land (Aleppo) that was continuously<br />
inhabited by <strong>Jewish</strong> people from Biblical<br />
times until the late 20 th century. There are<br />
also scenes of Israel during the War of Independence,<br />
and Syrian <strong>Jewish</strong> life in the United<br />
States. Author’s notes, bibliography. SS<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Autobiography and Memoir<br />
CURRICULUM VITAE<br />
Yoel Hoffmann; Peter Cole, trans.<br />
New Directions, 2009. 128 pp. $14.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8112-1832-0 (pbk.)<br />
To Yoel Hoffmann, assembling a life story<br />
is like trying to gather up an infinite<br />
number of pearls from a broken string and<br />
collecting “at most a hundred.” This unconventional<br />
autobiography evokes a life lived in<br />
Israel and Japan in exactly one hundred<br />
dreamlike vignettes, each one related to but<br />
disconnected from the next.<br />
Hoffmann’s memories are as much sensory<br />
impressions, free associations, and flights of<br />
imagination as they are “facts.” For him a traditional<br />
narrative would be artificial and<br />
REVIEWS<br />
untrue to the experience of living; he sees<br />
cause and effect as an illusion. “We run into<br />
each other like balls on a billiard table, and the<br />
only thing left is the sound of the knocking,”<br />
he reflects.<br />
Sound, color, the willful peculiarities of<br />
memory, and the surreal qualities of the<br />
imagination constantly fascinate the writer,<br />
much like cartoons. He remembers one<br />
where “the cat’s heart flew out of its body (it<br />
was attached by a spring) because of the love<br />
that the body has trouble containing.” That<br />
wonderful phrase, in Peter Cole’s lapidary<br />
translation, has the compression and humanity<br />
that are characteristic of Hoffmann’s<br />
account of a life. Death is also on his mind, as<br />
in a heart-stopping sequence of haiku he<br />
imagines in the minds of people about to be<br />
murdered at a Nazi death camp.<br />
This laconic book is astonishing in its control,<br />
formal invention, wide-ranging interests,<br />
and its power to provoke and to touch. BG<br />
A Hero for a New Decade...<br />
Hero On Three Continents<br />
The debut novel by Stephen Maitland-Lewis<br />
“A moving, complex well-crafted fictional biography...”–Kirkus Discoveries<br />
In Hero On Three Continents, Stephen Maitland-Lewis has chronicled a century with the protagonist,<br />
Henry Brown, born to a wealthy Anglo-<strong>Jewish</strong> family, participating in events both cataclysmic<br />
and personal, and interfacing with characters both famous and imaginary from the sexy jazz<br />
age of the 1920’s to the tense war torn atmosphere of the 1940’s to the international crisis<br />
of oil and terrorism in the 1960’s and 1970’s.<br />
Eventually, Brown is posted as a military attache in Berlin during the war, which is a difficult assignment for a <strong>Jewish</strong> man, who is<br />
confronted by racial intolerance and bigotry and a series of events which change his life forever. Hero On Three Continents is an<br />
epic tale, which will enthrall readers until the climatic ending.<br />
www.maitland-lewis.com<br />
Available at Amazon.com, Barnesandnoble.com, Xlibris.com or by phone (888) 795-4274 ext. 7876<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4134-1428-8 (hc) ISBN: 978-1-4134-1429-5 (pbk)<br />
...evokes a life lived in Israel and Japan in<br />
exactly one hundred dreamlike vignettes,<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 31
REVIEWS<br />
Adolf Burger<br />
Frontline <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 288 pp. $39.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1848325234<br />
32 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Autobiography and Memoir<br />
THE DEVIL’S WORK-<br />
SHOP: A MEMOIR<br />
OF THE NAZI<br />
COUNTERFEITING<br />
OPERATION<br />
Although The Devil’s Workshop is described<br />
as a memoir of the Nazi counterfeiting<br />
operation based in the Sachsenhausen concentration<br />
camp between 1942–1945, Adolf Burger’s<br />
book is much more than that. Burger was<br />
arrested by the Nazis in Slovakia and subsequently<br />
sent to Auschwitz. He describes what<br />
life was like for Jews under the government of<br />
Monsignor Joseph Tiso, a Catholic priest, and<br />
his ersatz SS group, the Hlinka guards. He gives<br />
a vivid description of life in Auschwitz, where<br />
his 22 year old wife was sent to the gas chamber.<br />
He tells how <strong>Jewish</strong> “kommandos” were<br />
assigned to rob the dead of their dignity in<br />
Birkenau—shearing their hair, extracting gold<br />
fillings from their teeth, and so on. Berger also<br />
provides a harrowing picture of the Nazi treatment<br />
of the Gypsy camp at Birkenau—all in all<br />
a searingly graphic description of Auschwitz.<br />
He tells how <strong>Jewish</strong> “kommandos” were<br />
assigned to rob the dead of their dignity in<br />
Birkenau—shearing their hair, extracting<br />
gold fillings from their teeth, and so on.<br />
The second part of the memoir deals with<br />
the Nazis’ attempt to forge millions of British<br />
pounds sterling in order to weaken the British<br />
currency. Toward that end, the Reich Security<br />
Service organized a forgery workshop in the<br />
Sachsenhausen concentration camp. The Nazi<br />
creation of this economic weapon entailed the<br />
recruitment of <strong>Jewish</strong> prisoners from selected<br />
camps such as Auschwitz, Buchenwald, Ravenbruck,<br />
Mauthausen, and Theresienstadt, who<br />
were transferred to Sachsenhausen. The criteria<br />
for those selected was that they had some experience<br />
with the printing trade, and this was<br />
how Adolf Burger was saved from eventual<br />
death in Auschwitz (the memoir never explains<br />
why <strong>Jewish</strong> prisoners alone were chosen). All<br />
told, the project included 142 <strong>Jewish</strong> inmates<br />
who were forced to forge not only British<br />
paper money but also American bank note,<br />
worth billions, as well as bonds, stamps, and<br />
other documents. Accompanying his experiences<br />
in “Project Bernhard,” named after the<br />
SS supervisor of this criminal enterprise, Burger<br />
and the publisher have provided a large<br />
assortment of primary documents, rare photos<br />
of the main participants in the operation, and<br />
of prisoners incarcerated in the various concentration<br />
camps.<br />
If “Project Bernhard” sounds familiar, it is<br />
because the book served as the basis for the<br />
award-winning film 2007 film “The Counterfeiters.”<br />
This riveting book is essential for<br />
our understanding of a relatively unknown<br />
chapter of the Holocaust. JF<br />
DEVOTION:<br />
A MEMOIR<br />
Dani Shapiro<br />
HarperCollins Publishers, 2010. 256 pp. $24.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-162834-4<br />
Dani Shapiro lives with endless questions.<br />
Raised in an Orthodox <strong>Jewish</strong> family,<br />
she believes she has escaped that “stifling”<br />
world. Yet she finds that every time she<br />
touches something that reminds her of that<br />
world, she has the urge to cry and then experiences<br />
a disarming sense of peace. Instead of<br />
seeking further in that direction, she runs<br />
from those feelings, perceiving them to be<br />
nothing more than the comforting memories<br />
of childhood. Thus, her search continues.<br />
Neither AA meetings nor yoga and meditation<br />
yield much tranquility. Finally, a series of<br />
...her depiction of her walk<br />
through shame, guilt, pain, darkness,<br />
and light is beautifully told.<br />
losses and near losses lead Shapiro to realize<br />
that the journey is rewarding only if “...there<br />
is value in simply standing there—this too—<br />
whether the sun is shining, or the wind whipping<br />
all around.” Later she concludes that<br />
each of us is “full of longing, reaching out<br />
with our whole selves for something impossible<br />
to touch. Still, we are reaching, reaching.”<br />
While one may have wished for Shapiro to<br />
reveal a return to her roots, her depiction of<br />
her walk through shame, guilt, pain, darkness,<br />
and light is beautifully told. DS<br />
EATING ANIMALS<br />
Jonathan Safran Foer<br />
Little Brown, 2009. 352 pp. $25.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-316-06990-8<br />
Everything about factory farming is illuminated<br />
in Foer’s first major work of nonfiction,<br />
which attempts to help us make more<br />
informed choices about what we eat. Motivated<br />
by the question of what to teach his first<br />
son about food, Foer set out on a three year<br />
journey to learn where the meat on our plate<br />
comes from. His findings are startling.<br />
The author feeds us the gory details of the<br />
lives of factory-farmed animals. His first hand<br />
descriptions are vivid and striking in their<br />
gruesomeness. But this book is about much<br />
more than the gore that surrounds our meals.<br />
Foer explores the environmental impact of factory<br />
farming (“animal agriculture...is the number<br />
one cause of climate change”), he describes<br />
the way in which large-scale health threats are<br />
linked to factory farming (H1N1 aka swine<br />
flu), he probes into the waste, the humanitarian<br />
violations, and the ethical dilemmas surrounding<br />
the process by which many of us fill<br />
our dinner plates. He also debunks the myth of<br />
“free-range” and tells us exactly what is in our<br />
chicken...and it’s not just chicken.<br />
Foer is a fiction writer and portions of the<br />
book come to life the way his novels do. Beautiful<br />
passages describe the social and even ritualistic<br />
aspects of sharing meals (Passover seders).<br />
He begins the book with a powerful story of his<br />
grandmother turning down a piece of pork<br />
even while she was starving during the war. “If<br />
nothing matters, there’s nothing to save,” she<br />
told him. He ends the book with these very<br />
words, and the chapters in between tell us<br />
what, exactly, we are choosing when we choose<br />
to eat certain meats, and why it matters.<br />
Foer uses some of his trademark literary<br />
devices in this book—long lists (chapter 3,<br />
Words/Meaning), changes in narrative voice (he<br />
uses transcripts from his interviews with farmers<br />
without indicating who is speaking). These gimmicky<br />
devices make for a disjointed and sometimes<br />
tiresome reading experience, but they are<br />
well-worth the effort. Whatever is said of this<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
ook’s style, there is no question that it is a terribly<br />
important work—well-researched, heartfelt,<br />
and above all filled with facts that anyone<br />
who eats should know. Index, notes. AB<br />
GERTRUDA’S OATH<br />
Ram Oren; Barbara Harshav, trans.<br />
Doubleday, 2009. 320 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-385-52718-7<br />
ncredible’ doesn’t even begin to describe<br />
‘Ithis nonfiction tale, which deals with the<br />
Holocaust and the founding of the State of<br />
Israel. In the opening chapter, we’re introduced<br />
to Michael Stolowitzky and his adoptive<br />
mother, Gertruda Babilinska, living in Israel in<br />
the 1950’s. The narrative then shifts back to<br />
$15.95<br />
paperback<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Autobiography and Memoir<br />
the 1930’s, where Gertruda, a Polish Catholic<br />
teacher, is hired as a nanny for Michael, a tiny<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> child of an extraordinarily rich family.<br />
As Germany invades Poland, unleashing events<br />
that remove him from the care of his parents<br />
and the safety of his home, Gertruda comes to<br />
be Michael’s lone protecter. It’s a role she will<br />
continue to play at great risk through Poland,<br />
Lithuania, and other nations.<br />
The book reads like a novel—it’s fastpaced,<br />
heavy on violent confrontations, and<br />
colored with an array of supporting characters,<br />
including a sympathetic SS officer, Karl<br />
Rink, who is the husband of a <strong>Jewish</strong> woman.<br />
One could complain about certain elements—the<br />
author’s knowledge of World<br />
War II history is a little weak (the Soviet<br />
Union, for instance, also invaded Poland in<br />
1939) and some of the sentences spoken by<br />
the very young sound contrived. Still, there’s<br />
no getting around what an astounding story<br />
this is. In the spirit of Gone With the Wind,<br />
this is a true tale of people caught up in the<br />
pulverizing sweep of history, as well as of survival<br />
under the most trying circumstances<br />
imaginable. DC<br />
REVIEWS<br />
THE GIRLS OF<br />
ROOM 28: FRIEND-<br />
SHIP, HOPE, AND<br />
SURVIVAL IN<br />
THERESIENSTADT<br />
Hanalore Brenner; John E. Woods and Shelley<br />
Frisch, trans.<br />
Schocken, 2009. 336 pp. $26.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8052-4244-7<br />
As librarian of the Holocaust Memorial<br />
and Tolerance Center in Glen Cove,<br />
NY, I have read every book about Theresiendstat<br />
in my library, but never have I been as<br />
moved, emotionally or intellectually, as by<br />
Hannelore Brenner’s book.<br />
We have in the U.S. our own second and<br />
third generation children of Survivors; Germany,<br />
too, has its counterpart, and Brenner is a<br />
great representative of it. Brenner, a print and<br />
broadcast journalist, was moved to produce a<br />
“Rabbi<br />
Aaron<br />
brin<br />
g gs<br />
us<br />
to<br />
the<br />
realizatio<br />
n<br />
et ndles<br />
aht s joy<br />
is aactually<br />
ava vailable<br />
to<br />
and<br />
attainable<br />
b y each of u us.<br />
”<br />
— dr dr.<br />
gerald<br />
schroede<br />
oeder<br />
r ,<br />
autho<br />
r of God od A Accco<br />
ord<br />
din ing g tto<br />
to<br />
God G<br />
od<br />
“If<br />
you long<br />
for<br />
happi<br />
pppiness,<br />
wholeness,<br />
n insda<br />
piration,<br />
, I h<br />
ighly<br />
recommend<br />
you read<br />
this<br />
book.<br />
”.<br />
— debbie ford<br />
d ,<br />
author<br />
of �e<br />
21- -Da DDay<br />
y C<br />
Co oncss<br />
iousness<br />
ss CCl<br />
Cle<br />
eanse anse<br />
You ou a are<br />
nothing<br />
other<br />
tha<br />
a n an<br />
individual<br />
expression<br />
of God—so<br />
the<br />
Kabbalah<br />
h sa<br />
ays ys.<br />
Rabbi<br />
Aaron<br />
takes<br />
that<br />
ancient<br />
teaching<br />
from<br />
m t<br />
heory<br />
into<br />
practice,<br />
showing<br />
you how<br />
to<br />
conne<br />
ne ct with<br />
the<br />
Divine<br />
reality<br />
within<br />
to<br />
discover<br />
profou<br />
ofou nd meaning<br />
in<br />
your<br />
life.<br />
Trr<br />
umpeter B ooks | www .shambhala.com<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 33
REVIEWS<br />
radio documentary on the history of the opera<br />
“Brundibar” when she was invited to join the<br />
survivors of Room 28’s annual reunion in<br />
Prague. She then embarked on a ten year journey,<br />
meeting, interviewing, befriending, and<br />
being accepted by the survivors. She spent years<br />
in research, weaving the stories of those adolescents<br />
around her central character, Helga Pollak,<br />
thus memorializing all the girls who did not survive.<br />
The girls formed a close group, influenced<br />
by the brilliant and caring counselors who guided<br />
them and introduced the concept of ma’agal<br />
(circle), a court system that encouraged the girls<br />
to be caring and considerate. Brenner observes<br />
that thanks to all the intellectuals and talented<br />
people gathered in one ghetto, and because they<br />
decided that these children would be educated<br />
and prepared for their “futures” by whoever had<br />
not been deported, the children became better<br />
educated than Christian children, whose education<br />
was perverted by Nazi dogma. With Brenner’s<br />
book, the reader becomes one with those<br />
girls, sharing their uncertainties but also, from<br />
time to time, their pleasures. MWP<br />
HERE, THERE<br />
ARE NO SARAH’S:<br />
A WOMAN’S<br />
COURAGEOUS<br />
FIGHT AGAINST<br />
THE NAZIS AND<br />
HER BITTERSWEET<br />
FULFILLMENT OF THE<br />
AMERICAN DREAM<br />
Sonia Shainwald Orbuch And Fred Rosenbaum<br />
RDR <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 240 pp. $16.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-1571431301 (pbk.)<br />
The success of the film “Defiance,” the story<br />
of the Bielskis, who saved the lives of 1,200<br />
Jews in the forests of Belorussia, has ignited an<br />
interest about Jews who fought back. Critics have<br />
lamented the fact that the ranks of Jews who<br />
fought as partisans were few; they fear that the<br />
popularity of the film mitigates the real tragedy,<br />
that most Jews did not escape the murderous<br />
intentions of the Nazis to rid the world of Jews.<br />
Nevertheless, Jews did fight as partisans and<br />
the Bielskis were not the exception. This book is<br />
the story of Sonia Shainwald Orbuch, who<br />
escaped the roundup of Jews in Luboml, Poland,<br />
in the province of Volhynia, now part of<br />
Ukraine, between the two world wars. Alongside<br />
Luboml’s <strong>Jewish</strong> population were poor, uneducated<br />
Ukrainian peasants as well as a Polish<br />
minority. The town in the 1930’s had roughly<br />
7,000 people, about 4,000 of them Jews who<br />
worked mostly as artisans and merchants, and<br />
34 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Autobiography and Memoir<br />
the center of <strong>Jewish</strong> life was Luboml’s Great Synagogue.<br />
All of that is gone today as the Nazis,<br />
with help from some in the local population,<br />
devastated the <strong>Jewish</strong> community.<br />
Sonia and her father survived because they<br />
were able to escape in time, thanks to the heroic<br />
efforts of a Ukrainian neighbor who guided<br />
them to the nearby forest region where they were<br />
able to join a Soviet partisan band. Not all partisan<br />
Otriads who fought the Nazis welcomed<br />
Jews who tried to join them. The Polish and<br />
Ukrainian partisan groups, for example, were,<br />
for the most part, anti-Semitic and hated Jews as<br />
mush as they did the Nazis. Once part of the<br />
Soviet band, Sonia, whose given name was<br />
Sarah, was told that “Here, there are no Sarah’s,<br />
you will be called Sonia.” The author recalls that<br />
“I couldn’t object and wasn’t even sure I wanted<br />
to. I already felt like a changed person, and the<br />
new Russian name fit my new life.”<br />
Of particular interest is Sonia’s description<br />
of what life was like for women in her partisan<br />
unit. There was much sexual harassment and<br />
even rape and, as she explains, “for that reason<br />
single females did tend to pick a defender, often<br />
a brawny laborer, the sort of person with whom<br />
they would likely not have had contact before<br />
the war. Not infrequently a refined middle class<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> girl would end up with an uneducated,<br />
hard drinking Slav.” She goes on to write that<br />
sex was commonplace, often followed by<br />
unwanted pregnancies and venereal disease.<br />
During the war, Sonia eventually lost three<br />
brothers, her mother , and two men she loved,<br />
but survived the war along with her father. She<br />
married a <strong>Jewish</strong> survivor, whom she frankly<br />
admits was not someone to whom she was readily<br />
attracted. Nevertheless, the marriage endured,<br />
and they found themselves in a displacement<br />
camp following the war, where they made<br />
money in the black market, and eventually emigrated<br />
to the U.S. This is a riveting book and a<br />
welcome addition to our understanding of how<br />
Jews who joined partisans band—at least those<br />
that welcomed Jews—survived the war. JF<br />
HOUND DOG: THE<br />
LEIBER AND STOLLER<br />
AUTOBIOGRAPHY<br />
Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, with David Ritz<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2009. 322 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-5938-2<br />
Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller were not only<br />
two of the most creative songwriters of the<br />
20th century, but also vital figures—along<br />
with fellow American Jews such as Benny<br />
Goodman, Jerry Wexler, and the Chess<br />
brothers—in the integration of American<br />
music and popular culture. Today, they are<br />
figures of nostalgia, perhaps known best as<br />
the songwriters whose music makes up the<br />
musical “Smokey Joe’s Cafe.” Back in the<br />
1950’s and early 1960’s, however, their writing<br />
not only catapulted Elvis Presley to<br />
worldwide fame, but also helped performers<br />
such as Joe Turner, Big Mama Thornton, The<br />
Coasters, and The Drifters make their mark<br />
with colorful and entertaining songs that<br />
crossed color lines, sometimes in rather daring<br />
fashion. “Kansas City,” “Stand by Me,”<br />
“Hound Dog,” and “Jailhouse Rock” are<br />
some of the most recognizable American<br />
songs ever.<br />
This dual autobiography essentially has<br />
Leiber and Stoller trading verses, alternating<br />
as they share the stories of their lives. This is<br />
an effective technique when they are telling<br />
the same story—as in their anecdotes about<br />
Presley and his over-the-top manager Colonel<br />
Parker—but a bit confusing when they are<br />
discussing different topics. Moreover, once<br />
they get past their heyday, the narrative goes<br />
a bit flat, becoming more on the order of<br />
standard celebrity fare. The book’s certainly<br />
not a bad one, but it will not have the place<br />
in my life that their best songs do. Appendices,<br />
index. DC<br />
I CHOOSE LIFE:<br />
TWO LINKED<br />
STORIES OF<br />
HOLOCAUST<br />
SURVIVAL AND<br />
REBIRTH<br />
Jerry L. Jennings and Sol and Goldie Finkelstein,<br />
with Joseph S. Finkelstein<br />
Xlibris, 2009. 142 pp. $29.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4415-0306-0<br />
With this book the reader gets three stories<br />
in one—two “befores” and one<br />
“after.” First, a Sol story, and then a Goldie<br />
story, but once married, their story is a single<br />
narrative. Both maintained unusual courage<br />
and conviction that they would survive.<br />
Goldie was very pretty and remarkably selfassured.<br />
When an SS guard gave her parents a<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
choice of which of their two daughters would<br />
be put on the train to a labor camp, Goldie<br />
made a “Sophie’s Choice” and volunteered to<br />
go while her sister remained behind with<br />
their parents. Ironically, Goldie, who was<br />
chosen to work in the camp office, survived;<br />
the rest of the family did not. Meanwhile, Sol<br />
and his brother and father were sent to Mauthausen.<br />
A daring young man, Sol maneuvered<br />
himself into a better position and<br />
became more able to withstand the fiendish<br />
practices of the Nazi guards. He later lost his<br />
father in a march. After the war ended, the<br />
couple met in Stuttgart and later emigrated to<br />
America—a new country, a new land, and a<br />
new place to test their strength, ingenuity,<br />
and marvelous attitude. Of course, HIAS<br />
helped, but placed them in a location and<br />
jobs in which they could not envision living<br />
in the future. Then, fortuitously, these<br />
sophisticated former Europeans found themselves<br />
in Vineland, New Jersey, where they<br />
became chicken farmers and the nucleus of a<br />
small <strong>Jewish</strong> community. This is a well-written<br />
account that makes use of wartime<br />
records that became available in 2007,<br />
enabling son Joseph Finkelstein to travel to<br />
Poland and, eventually, to learn the details of<br />
his grandfather’s, death in a hospital after liberation.<br />
He was also able to show his father an<br />
enlarged photo of a memorial in a cemetery<br />
with his grandfather’s name engraved on it.<br />
This is a lively, well written account with lots<br />
of photos that families want to accompany<br />
these memoirs, but it makes good reading for<br />
us, too. Primarily an adult book, its liveliness<br />
suits teen readers as well. MWP<br />
MY FATHER’S<br />
BONUS MARCH<br />
Adam Langer<br />
Spiegel & Grau, 2009. 229 pp. $26.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-385-52372-1<br />
Adam Langer has written a small, elegant<br />
book about his search for the interior<br />
life of his father. For most of the author’s life,<br />
his father had spoken of writing a book<br />
about a little-known historical event, the<br />
Bonus March. World War I veterans had<br />
been promised payment for their service dur-<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Autobiography and Memoir<br />
ing the war, which they would not receive for<br />
several years. But during the Great Depression,<br />
they marched on Washington demanding<br />
the money, fearing they would never live<br />
long enough to receive it. Mr. Langer uses<br />
this event and his search for his grandfather’s<br />
part in the Bonus March to research his family<br />
history and explore his relationship with<br />
his father.<br />
During the research process Langer realizes<br />
that his father was not always honest<br />
about his family history. He would sometimes<br />
embellish events or add facts. Why<br />
would his father do this? He was a respected<br />
doctor, highly intelligent and accomplished.<br />
This raises an interesting question—to what<br />
extent do we all construct our identities, and<br />
what part is truth and what part is myth. And<br />
is it the myth that really defines who we are?<br />
Langer leaves us with another question to<br />
ponder: how many of us really know our parents,<br />
their life’s dreams and disappointments,<br />
and how they find contentment and happiness?<br />
BA<br />
Sally Srok Friedes<br />
O <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 212 pp. $19.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-1-84694-189-4 (pbk.)<br />
THE NEW JEW:<br />
AN UNEXPECTED<br />
CONVERSION<br />
When Sally, a Midwestern Catholic<br />
who hadn’t practiced her religion in<br />
years, met Michael, a <strong>Jewish</strong> New Yorker who<br />
hadn’t been inside a synagogue in decades,<br />
she didn’t expect that Judaism would become<br />
a part of her life in any significant way. Yet<br />
the first time she attended synagogue services<br />
with her new family, she found her heart<br />
filled with a deep spiritual longing.<br />
Ultimately, she found the connection and<br />
support she craved in converting to Judaism,<br />
something she never expected to do. This<br />
book is her warm, tender story, a tale told in<br />
the most personal terms. Unsentimental yet<br />
filled with small, endearing details such as<br />
how her <strong>Jewish</strong> mother-in-law helped her<br />
grow closer to her own mother, the story<br />
takes us on Sally’s ten-year journey from<br />
alienation to culture shock to inner searching<br />
and finally, happily, to Judaism.<br />
Memoir at its best reads like fiction, and<br />
this small book will find a comfortable home<br />
on the bookshelves of rabbis, converts and<br />
their families, those who are part of an interfaith<br />
marriage, and everyone who enjoys<br />
gaining that touch of wisdom only a good<br />
story can provide. LFB<br />
A SENSE OF PURPOSE:<br />
RECOLLECTIONS<br />
Suzy Eban<br />
Halban Publishers, 2008. 351 pp. $32.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1905-559114<br />
REVIEWS<br />
In this memoir Suzy Eban, wife of the great<br />
Israeli statesman Abba Eban, celebrates the<br />
exciting and challenging years just before and<br />
following the years of Israeli independence.<br />
She describes the difficult political realities of<br />
the time as the Middle East juggled the Suez<br />
Crisis and post-World War II <strong>Jewish</strong> immigrant<br />
conflicts. Groomed to play an important<br />
role in the struggle for Israeli independence,<br />
Abba and Suzy wend their diplomatic<br />
...beautifully written, intelligent, and<br />
comprehensive memoir...reward readers<br />
interested in a behind-the-scenes understanding<br />
of Israeli history and politics.<br />
way through their service to the United<br />
Nations and then as ambassadors for Israel to<br />
America.<br />
Eban discusses two pertinent items that<br />
get little attention elsewhere in current historical<br />
accounts. One is the role that wives of<br />
Israeli leaders played in helping their husbands<br />
in Israeli politics, such as Paula Ben<br />
Gurion and Vera Weizmann. Their diplomatic<br />
skills and astute sense of the necessities of<br />
the moment make for fascinating reading.<br />
The other item of specific note in this memoir<br />
is the author’s cogent understanding of<br />
how Israel has evolved from a nation sharing<br />
socialist and religious foundations into one<br />
that mixes those two elements with a rising<br />
modern, Western ideological way of understanding<br />
the nation and its relationship to the<br />
rest of the world.<br />
The Ebans, like all political families, made<br />
many sacrifices, including having to constant-<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 35
BOOK PROFILE<br />
FIGURES LIE, LIARS FIGURE<br />
By Noel N. Kriftcher<br />
These first books about the Bernard Madoff debacle begin to measure the<br />
magnitude and the human dimensions of Madoff's criminal enterprise.<br />
Andrew Kirtzman<br />
HarperCollins, 2009. 279 pp. $25.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-06-187076-7<br />
Sheryl Weinstein<br />
St. Martin’s Press, 2009. 224 pp. $23.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-312-61837-7<br />
Jerry Oppenheimer<br />
John Wiley & Sons, 2009. 256 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-470-50498-7<br />
BETRAYAL: THE LIFE AND LIES<br />
OF BERNIE MADOFF<br />
MADOFF’S OTHER SECRET:<br />
LOVE, MONEY, BERNIE, AND ME<br />
MADOFF WITH THE MONEY<br />
ly move and uproot their children. However,<br />
Suzy Eban does not regret the choices she and<br />
her husband made. She cites the comments of<br />
peers and even opponents who realized after<br />
“Abba’s” death what a brilliant, talented man<br />
her husband was. This beautifully written,<br />
intelligent, and comprehensive memoir will<br />
reward readers interested in a behind-thescenes<br />
understanding of Israeli history and<br />
politics. DS<br />
36 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
SURVIVING<br />
Akira Ohiso and Ellie Ohiso<br />
Zinc Plate Press, 2008. 71 pp. $36.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-6152-4147-0<br />
Erin Arvedlund<br />
Portfolio, 2009. 310 pp. $25.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59184-287-3<br />
TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE:<br />
THE RISE AND FALL OF BERNIE MADOFF<br />
If only the walls on floors seventeen, eighteen, and nineteen of New York’s Lipstick<br />
Building, where Bernard Madoff had his offices, could talk! Then we might learn<br />
who abetted him in his Ponzi scheme and when these crimes began. These are the<br />
central questions in these first books about, in Jerry Oppenheimer’s assertion, “the<br />
most reviled thief who ever lived.”<br />
The disproportionate impact which l’affaire Madoff had on <strong>Jewish</strong> philanthropy<br />
and image continues to reverberate. Organizations such as Yeshiva University and<br />
Hadassah, and icons such as Elie Weisel, were caught up in this scandal. Thousands of<br />
ordinary investors who felt comfortable investing with someone they felt they could<br />
trust because someone with whom they shared meals and social evenings also trusted<br />
him were devastated. The reigning emotions for this community continue to be<br />
anger and financial ruin, loss of trust and embarrassment, which explains why these<br />
books may be of interest to <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World readers.<br />
Andrew Kirtzman examines Madoff’s life, from his teenage years to his arrest and<br />
sentencing. He focuses on the unremarkable life Madoff led, reflecting his assumption<br />
of opulence and excess through the words of some of his classmates, investors,<br />
and associates. The most compelling character he introduces to the reader is Harry<br />
Markopoulous, whose suspicions led him early on to tip off the Securities and<br />
Exchange Commission (SEC) to the likelihood that Madoff was a fraud and a crook,<br />
only to be “debriefed, thanked, and shown the door.” Kirtzman describes Madoff’s<br />
self-serving explanation, that he “was a good man who got into trouble late in his<br />
career and couldn’t get out of it,” but this was as fraudulent as the statements he<br />
issued to his investors. Kirtzman concludes that “the facts point to his launching his<br />
criminal operation when he was in his twenties,” fully fifty years earlier.<br />
The author’s talent as a reporter is evident in this excellent introduction to the<br />
human dimensions of the Madoff disaster. He reveals his revulsion for Madoff, particularly<br />
when he notes that the elderly clothing manufacturer Carl Shapiro treated him<br />
like a member of his own family: “Bernie preyed on that loyalty to help salvage his<br />
criminal enterprise” by soliciting additional funds even at the end, when he knew<br />
that there was virtually no chance that Shapiro would ever see his money again.<br />
Erin Arvedlund reaches a similar conclusion regarding the longevity of Madoff’s<br />
criminal enterprise in her book. She asks, “...was there a time when [his investment<br />
advisory business] wasn’t an outright fraud? Probably not.” This volume is more technical<br />
and sophisticated in its analysis of how the scheme functioned, how hedge<br />
This small but powerful book tells a story<br />
in deeply emotional terms, yet manages<br />
to follow a straightforward path that points<br />
directly at Judaic love, and by doing so not<br />
only reflects our own, but at the same time<br />
broadens and strengthens it. Akira wrote the<br />
words and his wife, Ellie, designed the pages,<br />
culminating in a book that is a pleasure to<br />
hold, read, look at, and absorb. Complete<br />
with a timeline that traces the roots of Akira’s<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
funds and the stock markets in general operate, and also how Madoff was able to<br />
gain the trust of his clients in so extraordinary a way. Regarding why so few potential<br />
investors applied due diligence before surrendering their money, she cites Len Fisher,<br />
author of Rock, Paper, Scissors: Game Theory in Everyday Life: “Some of his<br />
investors suspected that Madoff was cheating, but they continued to invest because<br />
they were benefiting from his cheating.” In other words, greed was the engine that<br />
propelled both Madoff and his investors, with disastrous results, although there were<br />
some potential investors who chose not to trust their money to Madoff.<br />
Arvedlund, an investigative reporter who wrote a now oft-quoted 2001 article<br />
about Madoff for Barron’s, shows how the SEC missed “twenty-eight red flags” that<br />
pointed to Madoff’s guilt when Markopolous first disclosed his belief “that Madoff<br />
Investment Securities LLC is the world’s largest Ponzi scheme.” She concludes that<br />
the SEC’s problem was its failure to employ “people who had been trained in finance<br />
or banking—those who knew how Wall Street ripped people off,” relying instead on<br />
lawyers, both those who were conscientious and those who were marking time until<br />
they could find better paying positions “as Wall Street attorneys.” Arvedlund reveals<br />
names and skillfully details just how widespread Madoff’s reach extended. This is a<br />
readable and interesting book.<br />
Jerry Oppenheimer’s treatment of Bernie Madoff is more colloquial. He attributes<br />
Bernie’s thievery dishonesty to his having learned his way “around the system—<br />
even when he was a young punk growing up in Queens.” Oppenheimer’s language is<br />
colorful, as when he recounts Madoff’s having been excused from his two-year Army<br />
Judaism back to his <strong>Jewish</strong> great-grandfather<br />
and down to his baby son, it takes the reader<br />
on a journey from the Russian pogroms of<br />
1911 to the birth of Boaz Jules Ohiso in New<br />
York City in 2006. Akira himself was born in<br />
1970, the child of interracial parents, his<br />
mother an Irish-Russian Jew, his father a<br />
Japanese immigrant. He converted to<br />
Judaism in 2003, a year before his marriage to<br />
a <strong>Jewish</strong> woman, finding himself at a spiritual<br />
crossroads that offered to both enhance and<br />
reinforce his beliefs, offering him the kind of<br />
Judaic nourishment he now lovingly passes<br />
on to his son. This book is the story of that<br />
journey. LFB<br />
BIOGRAPHY<br />
Seth Rogovoy<br />
Scribner, 2009. 336 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-5915-3<br />
BOB DYLAN:<br />
PROPHET, MYSTIC,<br />
POET<br />
Even with all the books that have been<br />
written about Bob Dylan, it’s great to<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
have one that takes this approach. Seth<br />
Rogovoy’s gushing biographical work looks at<br />
the extraordinary singer-songwriter through a<br />
distinctly <strong>Jewish</strong> lens, placing him squarely in<br />
the prophetic tradition as he mines Dylan’s<br />
songs for references to <strong>Jewish</strong> texts. While<br />
acknowledging that Dylan’s songs also draw<br />
from concerns about politics, social issues,<br />
and identity, as well as his sometimes tortured<br />
love life, Rogovoy finds likely <strong>Jewish</strong> sources<br />
Even with all the books that have been<br />
written about Bob Dylan, it’s great to<br />
have one that takes this approach.<br />
for lyrics in many of his songs, even locating<br />
a possible source for the song title “Idiot<br />
Wind” in the Talmud. This is no easy task,<br />
particularly given that Dylan has, for decades,<br />
proved to be a most unreliable source of<br />
information about himself and his work.<br />
Rogovoy can’t help but deal with Dylan’s<br />
Christian period of the late 1970’s–early<br />
1980’s, but even here he manages to point<br />
out that Dylan always maintained a connection<br />
to the traditions of his birth. One can<br />
fault the author for some heavy-handed<br />
observations on politics, other musicians, and<br />
even on the definition of tikkun olam, but the<br />
depth of his research is marvelous and his<br />
expertise on Dylan’s music (both his landmark<br />
songs and many of his obscure ones) is<br />
superb. This is a worthwhile addition to the<br />
growing library on one of America’s most<br />
important cultural figures. Bibliography. DC<br />
BOOK PROFILE<br />
commitment because of “an ulcer—real, imagined or invented,” concluding with, “For<br />
Bernie, who would cheat thousands of investors out of billions and even cheat on his<br />
wife, it was no surprise that he would also successfully rob Uncle Sam out of two<br />
years of his life.” Oppenheimer covers familiar ground, and focuses attention on the<br />
people who knew and dealt with Madoff, but as entertaining as his language is,<br />
Oppenheimer offers no insights into Madoff’s motives or methods, beyond what is<br />
apparent from the nature of his crimes. This is strictly a quick-and-easy read.<br />
Sheryl Weinstein, former chief financial officer of Hadassah, has written a tell-all<br />
confessional that is neither salacious nor insightful. Had the two main characters been<br />
fictional creations, one would call them one-dimensional. We learn that Bernie was a<br />
middle-child who did not speak kindly of his older sister. He has facial tics and Weinstein<br />
believes that he suffers from Tourette’s syndrome or some other neurological malady.<br />
And he is not well-endowed, sexually. So what? For what reason, other than to earn back<br />
money which she had lost from her personal account, did she feel compelled to write<br />
this sophomoric book? Weinstein tells us she “had been married a long time and felt<br />
conflicted about being unfaithful.” And when she and Bernie ate in the restaurant at one<br />
of the hotels at which they had their trysts, “Bernie taught me about Dijonnaise sauce<br />
that night.” Really. I don’t think there will be a movie of this book anytime soon.<br />
Noel N. Kriftcher is a professor and administrator at Polytechnic Institute of New<br />
York University, having previously served as superintendent of New York City’s<br />
Brooklyn and Staten Island High Schools district.<br />
CONTEMPORARY JEWISH LIFE<br />
AND PRACTICE<br />
THE ART OF<br />
GIVING: WHERE<br />
THE SOUL MEETS<br />
A BUSINESS PLAN<br />
Charles Bronfman and Jeffrey Solomon;<br />
James Wolfensohn, fwd.<br />
Jossey-Bass, 2009. 276 pp. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0470501467<br />
This excellent guide can help donors<br />
strategically plan and implement their<br />
philanthropic support to organizations<br />
involved in issues important to them. They<br />
begin with the donor and move on to viewing<br />
the recipient organization as a "partner." Following<br />
their discussion of the organization,<br />
they examine the meaning of the "gift." They<br />
end their presentation with an extensive list<br />
of resources for additional information and<br />
guidance.<br />
The authors combine ideas and concepts<br />
with personal stories that offer the richness of<br />
their dual perspectives as philanthropist<br />
(Charles Bronfman) and professional (Jeffrey<br />
Solomon). Their presentation is valuable not<br />
only for those seeking advice on contributing<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 37
BOOK PROFILE<br />
THE PSYCHO-RESILIENT JEWISH SOUL<br />
By Audrey Freshman<br />
There is a fine but important literary line between a memoir and a narcissistic<br />
rant. We inhabit the world of the author and are asked to embrace his or her<br />
battle against internal and external demons. The distinction is between the reader<br />
joining with the subject in search of larger truth or falling into a voyeuristic journey<br />
to nowhere. Three new books engage us at different levels in the struggles of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
women coping with emotional abuse, obsessive compulsive disorder, and bipolar<br />
disorder.<br />
but also for not-for-profit professionals seeking<br />
contributions. SGD<br />
Harold S. Kushner<br />
Knopf, 2009. 173 pp. $23.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-307-26664-4<br />
HOUSE RULES: A MEMOIR<br />
Rachel Sontag<br />
Harper Perennial, 2008. 261 pp. $13.99 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-0-06-134123-6 (pbk.)<br />
In House Rules, Rachel Sontag is asked, “So, who’s the monster?” She replies, “My<br />
father,” I said. “He plays the leading monster.” In this fast-paced, well-written<br />
memoir, the nuance of Sontag’s emotional abuse as a child reared in an upper-middle-class<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> home by a physician father and social-worker mother is reenacted.<br />
Sontag astutely notes that the plight of the abused child derives from “occupying<br />
the center of someone’s universe,” in her case, her father’s. Her sister, in contrast, is<br />
the neglected child whose role it is to remain safely invisible. Both siblings are impris-<br />
CONQUERING<br />
FEAR: LIVING BOLDLY<br />
IN AN UNCERTAIN<br />
WORLD<br />
This book, by design, refers to a litany of<br />
fear-provoking events, from traffic fatalities<br />
to 9/11 to “a genetic time bomb hidden in<br />
our DNA,” to the end of humankind, and of<br />
course, growing old and our own death. Yes,<br />
there is plenty to fear in life, and in this thin<br />
volume, Kushner offers inspiration and practical<br />
advice gleaned from a variety of religious<br />
and secular sources.<br />
38 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Each chapter tackles one or more sources<br />
of fear. In the chapter on “Job Loss and Loss<br />
of Love,” Kushner points out that having a job<br />
and having a relationship both make you feel<br />
valued. When either is lost, feelings of rejection<br />
follow. Though it’s natural to fear losing<br />
these things, it’s critical not to let fear interfere<br />
with your ability to cherish what you have. If<br />
your significant other leaves you, don’t let fear<br />
of rejection prevent you from looking for a<br />
new love. If you lose your job but have loved<br />
ones to support you emotionally, if not financially,<br />
revel in that. But, if you lose both—not<br />
an unheard of phenomenon given our battered<br />
economy and high divorce rate—conquering<br />
fear is somewhat harder.<br />
Around the same length as Rabbi Kushner’s<br />
most famous book, Why Bad Things Happen<br />
to Good People, Conquering Fear pivots<br />
around the same theological pillar—God<br />
doesn’t cause the things that we fear but can<br />
be a source of hope. It’s a quick and inspirational<br />
read that certainly puts fear into the<br />
right perspective. But it doesn’t seem destined<br />
to have the same impact as Why Bad<br />
Things Happen. RKL<br />
oned by an ineffectual mother who fails to protect. Sontag struggles to set herself<br />
free, only to learn that she has internalized some of the evil through identification<br />
with the aggressor. She enables the audience to palpably sense the subtle divide<br />
between “normal” parental negativity and emotional punishment. We are rewarded<br />
for our efforts through Sontag’s resilience. Sontag leaves the reader recognizing<br />
traces of her tale within their own life and those around them.<br />
Abby Sher<br />
Scribner, 2009. 320 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-8945-7<br />
AMEN, AMEN, AMEN: MEMOIR<br />
OF A GIRL WHO COULDN’T STOP<br />
PRAYING (AMONG OTHER THINGS)<br />
Amen, Amen, Amen is a sad revelation written in a humorous style by improvisational<br />
comedienne Abby Sher. For Sher, the monsters that occupy her universe<br />
reside within and find destructive expression in obsession-compulsion, eating disorders,<br />
and substance abuse. Sher portrays the complex intersection between Judaism<br />
and obsessive ritualism. She realizes that “...making lists and repeating things were a<br />
large part of being <strong>Jewish</strong>, too.” However, this work does not lend psychological<br />
insight and instead the pages filled with Kaddish and other prayers become taxing<br />
recitations to be read alongside song lyrics, food lists, exercise protocols, and testaments<br />
to self-mutilation. We are left to ponder Sher’s predilection for shredding her<br />
dinner napkins along with her most primary personal and professional relationships.<br />
This book captures the intractability of chronic anxiety in the face of loss (both real<br />
DO ONE NICE THING:<br />
LITTLE THINGS<br />
YOU CAN DO TO<br />
MAKE THE WORLD<br />
A LOT NICER<br />
Debbie Tenzer<br />
Crown Publishers, 2009. 241 pp. $20.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-307-45380-8<br />
Stop worrying about corruption, war, ethnic<br />
hatred, crime, and climate change,<br />
counsels Debbie Tenzer. Her recommendation—do<br />
a nice thing, and do it once a week.<br />
That message has travelled so far and fast,<br />
she claims, that, thanks to her, people all over<br />
the world are performing acts of kindness on<br />
schedule.<br />
Tenzer has written a warm, proselytizing<br />
handbook that covers a whole range of things<br />
people can do who want to make a genuine<br />
but limited commitment of time and money.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
and imagined). This memoir could be a source of identification for those suffering from obsessive compulsive<br />
disorder and might also be suited for case study material in a psychology seminar.<br />
Her ideas are inexpensive and useful, like<br />
sending shaving equipment to homeless shelters;<br />
or sitting with a friend recovering from<br />
surgery so his wife can run an errand. A few<br />
short accounts of kind works given and<br />
received are enclosed. By the end, when the<br />
author calls “Join us!” readers may well be<br />
moved to follow.<br />
High school clubs, service groups, and<br />
religious organizations will find this a helpful<br />
tool for spreading good will. Addresses are<br />
added when necessary. JW<br />
DRIVEN TO<br />
DARKNESS: JEWISH<br />
ÉMIGRÉ DIRECTORS<br />
AND THE RISE<br />
OF FILM NOIR<br />
Vincent Brook<br />
Rutgers University Press, 2009. 285 pp. $26.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8135-4630-8 (pbk.)<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE: A MEMOIR<br />
BOOK PROFILE<br />
Nancy Bachrach<br />
Knopf, 2009. 234 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-307-27090-0<br />
The Center of the Universe immediately captivates with a narrative that is comprised of mystery, drama, comedy,<br />
and tragedy and that elicits the full gamut of human response. It is the tale of Nancy Bachrach, whose<br />
mother’s bipolar disorder dominates her life. Bachrach, an advertising executive, is suddenly called back to the U.S.<br />
from Paris, where she is trying to cultivate a cultural taste for antiperspirant amongst the French. She returns to<br />
deal with a parental catastrophe that could have been written by Oliver Sachs. We are introduced to her mother<br />
as “...Norma Desmond, descending the staircase in Sunset Boulevard, eyes wide and frozen, getting ready for her<br />
close-up. She is Salome, stripping the veil off the face of the cosmos. She is my mother, Lola Hornstein. And she is<br />
crazy.” Lola’s story can fill a page and fortunately, Bachrach “began taking notes for a story about my mother the<br />
minute I could write.” Bachrach masters the literary style of the memoir with inspiring prose. This book will transcend<br />
a popular audience seeking an absorbing tale of madness in a <strong>Jewish</strong> home in Providence, Rhode Island, to<br />
those who will be educationally entertained by the folly of the neuropsychiatric universe.<br />
Audrey Freshman, PhD , LCSW, CASAC, is a psychotherapist with a private practice located in Rockville Centre,<br />
NY. Dr. Freshman is the associate director of an outpatient substance abuse agency and the assistant editor<br />
of the Journal of Social Work Practice in the Addictions.<br />
Vincent Brook argues that the development<br />
of film noir was fundamentally<br />
determined by a relatively small group of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
émigré directors who brought to Hollywood<br />
not only an intimate working knowledge<br />
of German expressionism but also a<br />
distinctly <strong>Jewish</strong> outlook that shaped the<br />
basic traits of the genre.<br />
While Brook provides valuable insights<br />
into the careers of such fascinating directors<br />
as Fritz Lang, Billy Wilder (and his older<br />
brother, the largely neglected W. Lee Wilder),<br />
Robert Siodmak, and Otto Preminger, this<br />
academic study raises more questions than it<br />
answers and ultimately feels too strained to be<br />
supportable.<br />
In his eagerness to prove what he dubs<br />
“the <strong>Jewish</strong> émigré noir thesis,” Brook identifies<br />
a number of markers of “<strong>Jewish</strong>ness” that<br />
will strike many readers as preposterous,<br />
offensive, or both. That a fascination with the<br />
femme fatale is an inherently <strong>Jewish</strong> trait, for<br />
example, will come as news to readers familiar<br />
with Homer’s Circe, Shakespeare’s Cleopatra,<br />
and Margaret Mitchell’s Scarlett O’Hara.<br />
And maintaining that multiple flashback as a<br />
narrative technique derives from the<br />
hermeneutic method of the Talmud verges on<br />
the absurd. Virtually anything, of course, may<br />
be argued, but that does not guarantee that<br />
the argument will be convincing or even<br />
plausible. BB<br />
EVERYTHING IS<br />
GOD: THE RADICAL<br />
PATH OF NONDUAL<br />
JUDAISM<br />
Jay Michaelson<br />
Trumpeter <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 276 pp. $18.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59030-671-0<br />
REVIEWS<br />
It seems to be a core belief among many<br />
Jews—and people from other monothestic<br />
faiths, as well—that God is an entity entirely<br />
separate from ourselves. This type of dualistic<br />
thinking holds that we are souls down here<br />
watched over by a Supreme Being who resides<br />
somewhere up there.<br />
In this compelling book, one that jolts us<br />
from such an ego-centered illusion of separateness,<br />
Jay Michaelson takes us on a fascinating<br />
magical mystery tour to a different place of<br />
knowing, one where there are not seven<br />
degrees of separation between us and God.<br />
Instead, God is presented as a spiritual<br />
energy that is part and parcel of all of us—a<br />
holy light which surrounds, illuminates, and<br />
imbues everything, from the molecules of the<br />
page you are now reading to every synapse in<br />
our brains.<br />
Michaelson, an innovative writer and<br />
teacher of spirituality, Kabbalah, and meditation<br />
as well as a columnist for the Huffington<br />
Post, the Forward, Tikkun, and other publications,<br />
tackles the enormous task of convincing<br />
his readers of this truth. He does so convincingly,<br />
presenting lofty Kabbalistic ideas<br />
and complex theological texts to support his<br />
position in a down-to-earth manner.<br />
In the course of doing so, the author presents<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong>, Buddhist, postmodern, and even<br />
pop cultural sources to demonstrate that such<br />
a nondualistic view of God is not a new radical<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> view of the Creator but, rather, one<br />
which for centuries has been a closely-held<br />
secret among the <strong>Jewish</strong> mystics known as<br />
Kabbalists.<br />
Continued from Page 42<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 39
COOKBOOKS<br />
Tal Ronnen<br />
William Morrow, 2009. 240 pp. $29.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-06-1874338<br />
THE CONSCIOUS COOK:<br />
DELICIOUS MEATLESS<br />
RECIPES THAT WILL<br />
CHANGE THE WAY<br />
YOU EAT<br />
Stylish, innovative, and totally vegan, Tal Ronnen’s<br />
creative dishes have all the fresh flavor<br />
and satisfaction of contemporary cuisine. In<br />
developing his vegan recipes, Ronnen, a trained<br />
chef and restaurant consultant, demands the<br />
same variety and nutritional value that he<br />
enjoyed when he ate a meat-based diet.<br />
Ronnen, who designed Oprah Winfrey’s<br />
vegan regimen, can tempt any appetite with<br />
dishes like Artichoke and Oyster Mushroom Rockefeller,<br />
Peppercorn-encrusted Portobello Fillets with<br />
Yellow Tomato Béarnaise and Mashed Potatoes, and<br />
Mediterranean Chickpea Wrap. To supplement his<br />
own recipes, Ronnen has invited four guest chefs to<br />
prepare original dishes from their restaurants. For<br />
Ronnen and his fellow chefs, much of the pleasure<br />
of food is in the preparation, and Ronnen encourages<br />
readers to cook with friends, a good social and<br />
culinary suggestion as many of his recipes take some<br />
time and effort.<br />
Ronnen admits to being a bit of a crusader for animal-free food, and<br />
HEARTY LENTIL SOUP<br />
This rustic winter soup was a real favorite of my<br />
mother’s when she was a little girl. I’m not sure that<br />
she was aware that lentils are naturally low in fat, high<br />
in fiber, and rich in protein—she just loved the taste!<br />
I like to make this with red lentils, as they give the<br />
soup a wonderful color, but green lentils can be used<br />
instead, if desired.<br />
PAREVE: contains no meat or dairy products/can be<br />
made in advance/can be frozen up to 1 month<br />
PREPARATION TIME: 15 minutes<br />
COOKING TIME: 45 minutes<br />
SERVES: 6 to 8<br />
2 tablespoons vegetable oil<br />
2 medium yellow onions, peeled and chopped coarsely<br />
2 medium carrots, peeled and chopped coarsely<br />
2 celery stalks, chopped finely<br />
1 medium potato, peeled and chopped coarsely<br />
7 cups hot vegetable stock<br />
PINE NUT GARDEIN<br />
This dish uses Gardein “chicken,” a great tasting<br />
and high-protein product that is a great transitional<br />
option for people new to vegetarian cuisine. You can<br />
find it in the frozen and fresh sections of your local<br />
grocery store. Kale cuts the richness of the sauce and<br />
the “meat” just enough.<br />
For the chicken:<br />
1 cup pine nuts, toasted<br />
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour<br />
5 large basil leaves, cut into chiffonade<br />
4 Gardein breasts, thawed<br />
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper<br />
4 tablespoons canola oil<br />
For the lobster mushroom beurre blanc:<br />
Sea salt<br />
1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil<br />
2 shallots, minced<br />
1 1⁄2 cups dried red lentils, rinsed<br />
Two 14 ounce cans tomatoes chopped with juice<br />
Salt and freshly ground black pepper<br />
6 to 8 sprigs fresh Italian parsley, for garnish<br />
1. Heat the vegetable oil in a large saucepan over<br />
medium-low heat. Add the onions, carrots, celery, and<br />
potato, and sauté 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.<br />
2. Add the vegetable stock, lentils, and tomatoes.<br />
Salt and pepper to taste.<br />
3. Increase the heat to medium-high and bring to<br />
a boil. Reduce the heat to low and simmer 40 minutes.<br />
Adjust seasonings, if necessary.<br />
4. Transfer to large, individual soup bowls. Garnish<br />
the bowls with parsley sprigs and serve hot.<br />
From The <strong>Jewish</strong> Mama’s Kitchen by Denise Phillips.<br />
Copyright © 2009 Octopus Publishing Group Ltd.<br />
Reprinted by permission of Octopus <strong>Book</strong>s USA<br />
1 pound lobster mushrooms, cut into brunoise<br />
1/2 cup dry white wine<br />
1/2 cup regular Cashew Cream<br />
2 tablespoons nutritional yeast flakes<br />
8 tablespoons Earth Balance, cut into<br />
tablespoon-sized pieces<br />
Juice of 1 lemon<br />
1 tablespoon minced fresh chives<br />
Freshly ground black pepper<br />
ABOUT GARDEIN: Gardein, the protein in this<br />
recipe, looks and tastes like chicken but contains no<br />
animal or dairy ingredients. It has a savory taste and<br />
authentic texture and is made from a blend of vegetables<br />
and grains—soy, wheat, ancient grains, peas,<br />
beets, and carrots, among others.<br />
From The Conscious Cook: Delicious Meatless Recipes<br />
that will Change the Way You Eat, Tal Ronnen, published<br />
by William Morrow<br />
The Conscious Cook presents the ethical and health arguments<br />
for veganism. However, the array of beautifully<br />
presented and constructed dishes in this lavishly illustrated<br />
book is the best argument for trying Ronnen’s cusine.<br />
He also includes much helpful information on equipment<br />
and ingredients, from greens to vegan products.<br />
An added value for the kosher cook is the flexibility of<br />
totally animal-free recipes that can supplement any<br />
meal. Full color throughout, seasonal menus, index. MLW<br />
THE JEWISH<br />
MAMA’S KITCHEN<br />
Denise Phillips<br />
Octopus Publishing Group, 2009. 160 pp. $12.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-84601-341-6<br />
Iwould have liked to serve the beautiful photograph<br />
of Denise Phillips’s Mother-in-<br />
Law’s Boiled Gefilte fish as a tempting Erev<br />
Shabbat appetizer, but whereas photos won’t<br />
do, the actual preparation will, in a distinct<br />
way. The charming photographs are of a family<br />
in the kitchen busily preparing all the<br />
goodies. The recipes are excellent examples of<br />
home prepared victuals and I know the aroma<br />
and presentation will draw you to the table.<br />
There are “handwritten” hints scattered<br />
throughout to encourage you.
JEWISH SLOW<br />
COOKER RECIPES<br />
Laura Frankel<br />
John Wiley & Sons, 2009. 244 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-470-26089-0<br />
Laura Frankel, the executive chef of<br />
Wolfgang Puck’s restaurant in the (<strong>Jewish</strong>)<br />
Spertus Museum in Chicago, calls her<br />
slow cooker her “Shabbat miracle machine.”<br />
The busy person will make the cooker a<br />
close friend at any time of day or night,<br />
Shabbat or not.<br />
Unique and delectable dishes along with<br />
inspiring menus energize one to read the<br />
book and start “slow cooking.” The Sabbath<br />
Cholent with Kishke is a mouth-watering<br />
dish in the Eastern European tradition; equally<br />
tempting is the Moroccan equivalent, Dafina<br />
with Moroccan Rice Dumpling. The home<br />
chef is guided with a sure hand in preparing<br />
scrumptious desserts such as the unusual and<br />
world-spanning Chocolate-Ancho Chile Pudding<br />
Cake with Sparkling Sabayon, or sauces<br />
such as the tangy Latin-inspired Mole<br />
Poblano. Yes, the kosher cook should go ahead<br />
and buy a few long lasting slow cookers or<br />
inserts. It will be well worth the expense.<br />
Through the years, I have prepared dishes<br />
overnight in my oven, which I call “cooking<br />
while you sleep.” Now I want to try Laura<br />
Frankel’s Vegetarian Chili, Chicken with Rice,<br />
Senegalese Peanut Soup, Mashed Sweet Potatoes,<br />
Simple Grits, and Lamb Tagine among<br />
other fascinating offerings.<br />
GARLICKY POT ROAST<br />
Laura Frankel holds your hand in the more complicated recipes<br />
Makes 6 to 8 servings<br />
Something magical seems to happen when this<br />
dish cooks for a long time—the meat becomes fragrant<br />
and the garlic becomes caramelized and sweet.<br />
The “gravy” that results is so delicious that I often<br />
find one of my kids hanging around the kitchen with<br />
bread in hand to sop it up. The addition of the gingersnaps<br />
to the dish might seem odd, but they add a<br />
lot of flavor and help thicken the gravy.<br />
The roast can be stored, covered, in the refrigerator<br />
for 3 days, or frozen for 1 month. To reheat the<br />
pot roast, place the meat and gravy in a saucepan.<br />
Add enough chicken stock to moisten the meat, usually<br />
only about 1⁄4 cup. Cover and cook on low heat<br />
until heated through.<br />
Alongside the mouth-watering Potato Salad with Lemon Mayonnaise<br />
recipe, we read, “Mama says: To save curdled mayonnaise, gradually<br />
add one egg yolk while whisking the mayonnaise constantly.”<br />
The fare reflects the traditions of<br />
Eastern European, Sephardic, and the<br />
cuisine of Israel as well as modern <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
cooking everywhere.<br />
For Purim, “Fritlach” are also featured,<br />
which Ms. Phillips explains “is<br />
the generic Yiddish word for anything<br />
fried...Resembling half moons, these<br />
fragile golden bubbles are meant to represent<br />
Haman’s ears (Hamans Ohren).”<br />
The Hamantaschen with Apple are a<br />
delectable twist on the popular pastry.<br />
For the Marinade<br />
3 tablespoons chopped garlic (about 4 large cloves)<br />
1⁄4 cup light brown sugar<br />
1⁄4 cup olive oil, plus extra for browning the roast<br />
1⁄2 cup balsamic vinegar<br />
2 tablespoons tomato paste<br />
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper<br />
One 3- to 5-pound chuck roast, fat trimmed<br />
Olive oil<br />
For the Sauce<br />
2 large Spanish onions, chopped<br />
6 garlic cloves, chopped<br />
1 cup dark beer such as Guinness or Aventinus<br />
1 whole head of Roasted Garlic<br />
2 cups chicken stock<br />
1 cup crumbled gingersnaps (about 15 small cookies;<br />
store-bought are fine)<br />
1⁄4 cup tomato paste<br />
Suggested accompaniments<br />
grits, mashed potatoes<br />
COOKBOOKS<br />
1. Marinate the Roast: In a bowl large enough<br />
to hold the roast, stir together the chopped garlic,<br />
brown sugar, olive oil, vinegar, tomato paste, and<br />
1 tablespoon each salt and pepper. Add the roast<br />
and turn it to coat on all sides. Cover the bowl and<br />
marinate for at least 3 hours, or overnight in the<br />
refrigerator.<br />
2. Place a large sauté pan over medium heat. Lightly<br />
coat the bottom of the pan with olive oil. Remove<br />
the roast from the marinade and pat dry. Discard the<br />
marinade. Lightly season the roast with salt and pepper.<br />
Brown the meat on all sides, about 7 minutes per<br />
side. Set aside the roast but do not clean the pan.<br />
3. Preheat a 6 1⁄2-quart slow cooker to High.<br />
4. Make the Sauce: Add the onions to the sauté<br />
pan and cook until brown, 3 to 5 minutes. Add the<br />
chopped garlic and cook for 2 to 3 minutes more, until<br />
the garlic is very fragrant and has softened slightly; do<br />
not let the garlic brown. Add the beer. Scrape up the<br />
browned bits with a wooden spoon or spatula. Transfer<br />
the mixture to the slow cooker insert.<br />
5. Place the roast and any collected juices in the<br />
insert. Squeeze the roasted garlic out of the skin and<br />
into the insert. Add the stock, gingersnaps, and tomato<br />
paste. Stir together. Cover and cook the roast on High<br />
for 7 to 8 hours, until it can be pierced easily with a fork.<br />
6. Remove the roast from the cooker and keep<br />
warm. Strain the sauce before serving. Cut the roast<br />
into large chunks and serve hot with your choice of<br />
accompaniment. Pass the sauce.<br />
From <strong>Jewish</strong> Slow Cooker, Laura Frankel,<br />
published by Wiley.<br />
and guides you with her knowledge and experience. The <strong>Jewish</strong> Slow<br />
Cooker will bring out the dormant 5-star chef in you. DGL<br />
This reviewer was pleased to see the instructions for Goulash<br />
with caraway seeds as part of the plan. What could be better than<br />
these pieces of chuck steak, redolent of paprika, served on a plate of<br />
noodles, or rice, or potatoes, or just<br />
by itself?<br />
Ms. Phillips runs her own cooking<br />
school in London, has written regular<br />
columns for <strong>Jewish</strong> newspapers in<br />
New York and Toronto, and has hosted<br />
a radio show.<br />
Be ready to celebrate with Denise<br />
Phillips and thus in many ways with<br />
her Booba and family, whose voices<br />
are lovingly recreated in this book.<br />
Index, glossary. DGL<br />
Photography by © Joff Lee from The <strong>Jewish</strong> Mama’s Kitchen
COOKBOOKS<br />
Marcy Goldman<br />
Whitecap <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 403 pp. $26.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-77050-003-7<br />
A TREASURY OF JEWISH HOLIDAY BAKING:<br />
THE 10 TH ANNIVERSARY EDITION<br />
We all have friends whom we see often and others with whom<br />
we have not been in contact for weeks, months, or years—but<br />
the relationship is still vibrant and can be rekindled at any moment.<br />
That is precisely the feeling I have each time I pick up Marcy Gold-<br />
Continued from Page 39<br />
And while many traditional Jews, baby<br />
boomers or older, might balk at such a shakeup<br />
in their thinking, the author’s language of<br />
oneness is certain to resonate with a younger<br />
generation of spiritual seekers who are more<br />
open to a contemporary <strong>Jewish</strong> culture that<br />
includes writers like Michaelson, independent<br />
prayer communities, Buddhist Jews, and<br />
a growing number of non-denominational<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> performers such as Matisyahu and the<br />
Balkan Beat Box who are creating new forms<br />
of music.<br />
Everything Is God is a mystical Pandora’s<br />
box. Open the book and out pops a genie<br />
who may very well transform a reader’s cos-<br />
a call to open our eyes to a new<br />
way of thinking about God; it is also<br />
filled with practical information about<br />
how this non-dualistic way of approaching<br />
God can improve our everyday<br />
lives and even better the world.<br />
mic view. But the book is more than simply a<br />
call to open our eyes to a new way of thinking<br />
about God; it is also filled with practical<br />
information about how this non-dualistic<br />
way of approaching God can improve our<br />
everyday lives and even better the world.<br />
Religion, suggests the author, is not about<br />
belief, but love. Meditation is not about special<br />
states of mind, but learning to accept<br />
everything in life—including suffering, pain,<br />
and injustice—as God. It is also, Michaelson<br />
argues, about involving oneself in social<br />
action and social justice, which is impossible<br />
to ignore if we truly understand that Everything<br />
(and, thus, everybody) is God.<br />
42 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Everything Is God is both a scholarly work<br />
(Michaelson is completing his Ph.D. at<br />
Hebrew University)—and, at the same time,<br />
an easy-to-understand approach to the subject<br />
of non-dual Judaism. LS<br />
GETTING TO<br />
THE HEART OF<br />
INTERFAITH: THE<br />
EYE-OPENING,<br />
HOPE-FILLED<br />
FRIENDSHIP OF A<br />
PASTOR, A RABBI<br />
AND A SHEIKH<br />
Pastor Don Mackenzie, Rabbi Ted Falcon,<br />
and Sheikh Jamal Rahman<br />
Skylight Paths Publishing, 2009. 183 pp. $16.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59473-263-8<br />
These three authors reflect the hopes of so<br />
many people throughout the world.<br />
When will we learn to respect and even transcend<br />
our religious differences in a way that<br />
ends war and division? How can we mature in<br />
our faith through exposure to other religions<br />
without losing or demeaning our own? These<br />
authors courageously address those who are<br />
indifferent or even opposed to such intercommunication.<br />
Each spiritual leader shares his<br />
personal story of learning tolerance through<br />
meeting and understanding similarities, and<br />
discusses what he wants others to know about<br />
his faith that will yield a sharing spirit. No<br />
topic is off-limits, particularly the ones that<br />
normally add to dissension rather than unity.<br />
The book concludes with discussion questions<br />
that are designed to produce meaningful<br />
learning, sharing, appreciation of all<br />
man’s books. This friend is always true, sound, and almost a family<br />
member. She never fails me. Her breads, her cakes, her photos, her<br />
hints, her encouragement, her cookies, her tartlets, and her guiding<br />
spirit are all there. This time, in the 10 th Anniversary Edition, she has<br />
added a new bonus chapter to her baking wonders, reflecting her<br />
“savory cooking.”<br />
Each year, our family prepares her famous “My Trademark, Most<br />
Requested, Absolutely Magnificent Caramel Matzoh Crunch” which<br />
she and we call “sublime.” Another popular seder dessert is the “Mock<br />
Chestnut Torte” which, needless to say, contains no chestnuts.<br />
Go ahead, try the challahs, the varied hamantaschens, the coffee<br />
cakes, the cholent, and anything in the tome and you will hear only<br />
“oohs and ahs” from your admiring tasters.<br />
Goldman, who has been nominated for a Julia Child Cookbook<br />
Award, is a professional pastry chef and the creator of BetterBaking.com.<br />
Index; source guide for equipment, tools, and ingredients; metric conversion<br />
chart. DGL<br />
faiths, and deepening of one’s own faith as<br />
well. DS<br />
JEWS, GOD, AND<br />
VIDEOTAPE:<br />
RELIGION AND<br />
MEDIA IN AMERICA<br />
Jeffrey Shandler<br />
New York University Press, 2009. 352 pp. $23.00 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 9780814740682 (pbk.)<br />
A mid-20th century TV, complete with<br />
rabbit ear antennae, sits swathed in an<br />
ethereal green light. The only image filling<br />
its rounded screen is a closeup of a sheet of<br />
matzoh. This installation by artist Melissa<br />
Shiff adorns the cover of Jeffrey Shandler’s<br />
Jews, God, and Videotape, and suggests that<br />
the subject matter will be scholarly, deconstructive,<br />
and focused on the medium as<br />
much as the message. Thankfully, for the<br />
general reader, this is not the case. Instead,<br />
Shandler delivers a series of interesting<br />
essays on varied areas of American <strong>Jewish</strong> life<br />
sharing only some connection with modern<br />
media.<br />
Shandler sheds light on forgotten trends<br />
such as cantorial music in the early 20 th century,<br />
as well as <strong>Jewish</strong> themes on mainstream<br />
American radio in the 50’s, the phenomenon<br />
of bar mitzvah videos, and the use of media<br />
and the Internet by the Chabad movement.<br />
His writing is clear, well-researched, and<br />
thoughtful. Illustrations. JHB<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
JUDAISM: A WAY<br />
OF BEING<br />
David Gelernter<br />
Yale University Press, 2009. 248 pp. $26.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-300-15192-3<br />
Despite the fact that Judaism has survived<br />
three thousand years—“the senior<br />
nation of the Western world”—today American<br />
Jews are fast disappearing. David Gelernter<br />
believes the reason is that most Jews see a<br />
fractured Judaism—a set of rituals, a history, a<br />
culture—and fail to grasp the grand scheme<br />
and underlying ideas of Judaism. In this brief<br />
but intellectually packed book, Gelernter<br />
attempts to present Judaism as a total structure,<br />
to begin a Torat ha-lev, the Torah of the<br />
mind and heart that can lead to understanding<br />
the pressing questions of human existence.<br />
A professor of computer science at Yale,<br />
Gelernter is also an artist, novelist, and contributing<br />
editor to the Weekly Standard. He<br />
brings to this deeply felt book the full impact<br />
of his understanding of literature, science, art,<br />
philosophy, and Christianity as well as his<br />
broad knowledge of Judaism.<br />
To view Judaism from different angles,<br />
Gelernter identifies four theme-images to<br />
explain some of the issues that contemporary<br />
Jews may find distant or archaic. The theme<br />
of “separation” addresses the intricacies of<br />
halakha. “The veil” explains how to experience<br />
an indescribable and abstract God. “Perfect<br />
asymmetry” describes the relationship of<br />
men and women, family and sexuality, and<br />
“inward pilgrimage” wrestles with the problem<br />
of evil and a just and merciful God.<br />
Through these themes, which Gelernter<br />
paints in vivid and poetic language, he presents<br />
a multilayered picture of Judaism. Image<br />
is laid on image—the veil is the tallit that<br />
allows the wearer to feel God and is also the<br />
curtain behind which the transcendent dwells,<br />
as God dwelled in the Temple’s Holy of<br />
Holies; it is the wedding veil; it is the reverse<br />
side of the mezuzah scroll on which Shaddai is<br />
inscribed. And so with Gelernter’s three other<br />
images; they embrace, enfold, and unravel layers<br />
of biblical, literary, and midrashic reference,<br />
each layer offering another view and<br />
entry into Judaism. Inner pilgrimage, the final<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Contemporary <strong>Jewish</strong> Life and Practice<br />
image, is a moving and intellectually exalted<br />
vision of each individual’s struggle to the<br />
place, deep within your mind, where you will<br />
meet yourself and your God.<br />
Challenging, often exhilarating, richly<br />
learned, intensely personal, and tough-minded,<br />
Judaism offers a passionate picture of<br />
Judaism. This said, the Judaism that Gelernter<br />
describes is not one that all Jews will recognize.<br />
For him normative Judaism is Orthodox<br />
Judaism. This definition throws up<br />
stumbling blocks for many practicing non-<br />
Orthodox Jews in United States. With the<br />
statement “‘female rabbi’ and <strong>Jewish</strong> law are<br />
mutually exclusive,” he disenfranchises large<br />
numbers of Jews; references to the Lord and<br />
man, rather than human being, undercut his<br />
assertion of the asymmetric but equal role of<br />
women in Judaism. Concepts of community<br />
and social justice, vital to many Jews, have no<br />
mention in Gelernter’s Judaism.<br />
In Gelernter’s desire to address both Jews<br />
and non-Jews, Judaism requires no knowledge<br />
of Hebrew or Judaism. MLW<br />
THERE SHALL<br />
BE NO NEEDY:<br />
PURSUING SOCIAL<br />
JUSTICE THROUGH<br />
JEWISH LAW AND<br />
TRADITION<br />
Rabbi Jill Jacobs<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Lights Publishing, 2009. 257 pp. $ 21.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58023-394-1<br />
The author provides a wonderful perspective<br />
on the roots of social justice in<br />
Judaism and focuses on the implications for<br />
us in the way we live our lives in modern society.<br />
Beginning with a comprehensive<br />
overview of traditional <strong>Jewish</strong> text, she provides<br />
the foundation for understanding our<br />
obligation to make the world a better place.<br />
In subsequent chapters Rabbi Jacobs focuses<br />
on specific subject areas that impact all of us<br />
in our daily lives, including such issues as<br />
poverty, employer-employee relations, housing<br />
and the homeless, health care, environment,<br />
and rehabilitation. In the final chapter<br />
she brings everything together by suggesting<br />
how the <strong>Jewish</strong> community can play an<br />
important role by participating in public life<br />
in the United States.<br />
Rabbi Jacobs’ writing is clear and concise<br />
and she presents the text in a way that enables<br />
one not only to learn with her but to want to<br />
know more of what she is discussing. This is<br />
a particularly inspiring book that may lead<br />
readers to become active in their local communities<br />
and even become involved in broader<br />
movements to improve American society.<br />
Glossary, index, list of recommended books<br />
for further reading. SGD<br />
Norman Podhoretz<br />
Doubleday, 2009. 337 pp. $27.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-385-52919-8<br />
REVIEWS<br />
WHY ARE JEWS<br />
LIBERALS?<br />
Norman Podhoretz, the venerable neoconservative<br />
pundit who served as editor<br />
of Commentary magazine for 35 years,<br />
explores in his latest book the question of<br />
why Jews continue to be overwhelmingly<br />
associated with liberal ideas and organizations,<br />
despite the fact that, in his view, such<br />
associations are not in their best interests. The<br />
first half of the book is devoted to a historical<br />
review, beginning with the birth of Christianity,<br />
unambiguously illustrating how anti-<br />
Semitism had been historically linked with<br />
right-wing politics in the West, resulting in<br />
explores...question of why Jews continue<br />
to be...associated with liberal ideas and<br />
organizations, despite the fact that...such<br />
associations are not in their best interests.<br />
Jews continually gravitating to liberal groups<br />
and social movements. However, Podhoretz<br />
argues that in light of the radicalization of the<br />
left in the United States over the course of the<br />
last 40 years, accompanied by the right’s<br />
adopting positions that appear to be more in<br />
line with <strong>Jewish</strong> concerns, including Israel’s<br />
security and stable family values, it is difficult<br />
to understand why the majority of Jews have<br />
not more profoundly shifted their political<br />
allegiances. The question of the intrinsic<br />
nature of <strong>Jewish</strong> political perspectives appears<br />
to be more powerfully posed than the answers<br />
that the author tentatively offers, and to<br />
which only the last 30 pages of the book are<br />
devoted. This is a topic that deserves continued<br />
research and reflection. JB<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 43
REVIEWS<br />
44 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Education and <strong>Jewish</strong> Identity<br />
WHY THE DREYFUS<br />
AFFAIR MATTERS<br />
Louis Begley<br />
Yale University Press, 2009. 204 pp. $24.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-300-12532-0<br />
History remembers Captain Alfred Dreyfus<br />
as a victim of French anti-Semitism<br />
who was convicted of espionage he did not<br />
commit, and exonerated thanks to the passionate<br />
support of the novelist Emile Zola.<br />
Louis Begley insists that the lessons of the<br />
Dreyfus Affair, beyond the particulars of the<br />
historical episode, extend to abuses of power<br />
and anti-<strong>Jewish</strong> behavior at large today.<br />
In the spare language of his novels, Begley<br />
builds a devastating case against the conspirators<br />
who knowingly perverted the justice system<br />
as they made Dreyfus a scapegoat. Then<br />
he goes on to draw a straight line from the<br />
anti-Semitism of the Catholic Church and<br />
the French military in the 1890’s down to the<br />
present.<br />
The French Jews, he writes, nonetheless<br />
had a “tendency to minimize the importance<br />
of anti-Semitism, remain passive, and avoid<br />
speaking out against outrageous behavior.<br />
insists that the lessons of the Dreyfus<br />
Affair...extend to abuses of power and<br />
anti-<strong>Jewish</strong> behavior at large today.<br />
...Emancipated Jews had fallen in love with<br />
the good news that they could be like other<br />
people, [but] ‘other people’ did not want<br />
Jews to be like them. They wanted Jews out<br />
of the way.”<br />
Begley, writing in 2008, was struck by the<br />
parallels between the standard operating procedures<br />
for the Guantánamo prison camp and<br />
the instructions for the administration of<br />
Devil’s Island, where Dreyfus suffered solitary<br />
confinement under horrible conditions for<br />
some four years. He asks whether each succeeding<br />
generation will have its own Zolas,<br />
“ready to defend human rights...against abuse<br />
wrapped in claims of expediency and reasons<br />
of state.” Begley’s riveting details and unremitting<br />
passion make this book a worthy successor<br />
to J’accuse. Cast of characters, chronology,<br />
index, notes. BG<br />
EDUCATION AND JEWISH<br />
IDENTITY<br />
LEARNING AND<br />
COMMUNITY: JEWISH<br />
SUPPLEMENTARY<br />
SCHOOLS IN THE<br />
TWENTY-FIRST<br />
CENTURY<br />
Jack Wertheimer, ed.<br />
Brandeis University Press, 2009. 380 pp. $35.00 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58465-770-5 (pbk.)<br />
There aren’t enough good stories about<br />
after-school programs, and this new<br />
volume edited by Jack Wertheimer of the<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Theological Seminary establishes<br />
high achievement marks for everyone with<br />
an investment in an after-school program of<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> studies, from educators to parents<br />
and students. Wertheimer and his coauthors<br />
have identified ten communitybased<br />
and synagogue-based schools that<br />
demonstrate moral and academic excellence.<br />
These successful schools welcome many different<br />
kinds of learners and their educational<br />
leaders guide their teachers thoughtfully,<br />
ultimately motivating students to learn<br />
Hebrew, pray with authentic fervor, act as<br />
moral role models, and discover their history.<br />
The schools represent geographical and<br />
ideological diversity; some tend to emphasize<br />
academic learning and mastery while<br />
others tend to emphasize experiential learning,<br />
moral action, personal discovery, community<br />
service, and family celebrations.<br />
What is the recipe for success? Match the<br />
professional staff to the mission and vision<br />
of the school; build seven-day parent and<br />
community support beyond drop-off and<br />
pick-up in the carpool line; don’t be afraid<br />
to accept that the school cannot meet every-<br />
This book is a must-read<br />
for after-school program<br />
educators, parents, and<br />
board members.<br />
one’s needs; and sustain student interest by<br />
establishing measurable goals that students<br />
can achieve at every level; identify milestones<br />
of success and promote a sense of<br />
responsibility for students’ own learning.<br />
This book is a must-read for after-school<br />
program educators, parents, and board<br />
members. The wealth of ideas can transform<br />
any program. Index, notes. JKL<br />
SOWING THE SEEDS<br />
OF CHARACTER: THE<br />
MORAL EDUCATION<br />
OF ADOLESCENTS<br />
IN PUBLIC AND<br />
PRIVATE SCHOOLS<br />
Judd Kruger Levingston<br />
Praeger Press, 2009. 172 pp. $44.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-313-35191-4<br />
The crisis in character and citizenship is<br />
acute in contemporary America. There<br />
are veritable cottage industries (Character<br />
Counts, Mentschlichkeit Matters to name just<br />
two) of educational interventions to further<br />
character development. Rabbi Judd Kruger<br />
Levingston’s Sowing the Seeds of Character<br />
stands out as an exceptional contribution to<br />
this growing body of literature both in the<br />
depth and breadth of its concerns.<br />
Whether <strong>Jewish</strong>, Christian, Islamic, or<br />
Chinese, educational institutions for adolescents<br />
are capable of having a deep moral<br />
impact on the lives of students. They do so<br />
through the dialogues they engender, the questions<br />
they ask, and the role models they provide.<br />
Further, their moral character is seen as<br />
much in the school’s halls and playground as<br />
in its classrooms. Levingston chronicles the<br />
successes and challenges of these schools in<br />
thoughtful and empathetic ways. He wants us<br />
to understand the profound impact of school<br />
on the moral life of the child even apart from<br />
the obvious influences of family and the internal<br />
psychological forces of moral development.<br />
Listening to the young adults in these<br />
schools discuss moral dilemmas, the author<br />
detects three master orientations in the voices<br />
of the students. He labels these orientations<br />
authentic and assured, bridging and binding,<br />
and constructing and considering. It is unclear<br />
in the end whether Levingston believes that<br />
all three orientations can live in some measure<br />
within each individual.<br />
Clearly, Sowing the Seeds of Character is a<br />
particularly timely scholarly contribution in<br />
an era that is likely to measure school success<br />
by test scores. The only critique I might offer<br />
pertains to the title itself. It certainly can be<br />
argued that by adolescence one is actually<br />
“reaping the seeds of character” sown at a<br />
much earlier age. JS<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
TOOLBOX FOR<br />
TEACHERS AND<br />
MENTORS: MOVING<br />
MADRICHIM TO<br />
MENTOR TEACHERS<br />
AND BEYOND<br />
Richard D. Solomon and Elaine C. Solomon<br />
Wheatmark, 2009. 338 pp. $33.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1604942682<br />
Teaching is often seen as an easy job; just<br />
walk into any classroom and start teaching<br />
the children, who are eager to learn. If only<br />
it were so simple! Unfortunately, throughout<br />
North America and especially in the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
community, there are many who think these<br />
statements are true.<br />
This is why Toolbox for Teachers and Mentors<br />
is such an important book for educational<br />
leaders in the <strong>Jewish</strong> community. Beginning<br />
with the assumption that becoming a successful<br />
teacher is the result of years of training<br />
under the close supervision of mentors and<br />
guides, the Solomons outline a series of strategies<br />
for recruiting and developing teachers<br />
from novice high school madrichim to master<br />
teachers ready to mentor the next generation.<br />
By incorporating the best thinking from<br />
the fields of education and psychology, this<br />
book lays out an in-depth approach for<br />
preparing our brightest young people to be<br />
outstanding teachers in the future. PAF<br />
FICTION<br />
36 ARGUMENTS<br />
FOR THE EXISTENCE<br />
OF GOD: A WORK<br />
OF FICTION<br />
Rebecca Newberger Goldstein<br />
Pantheon <strong>Book</strong>s, 2010. 416 pp. $27.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0307378187<br />
When Rebecca Goldstein won a<br />
MacArthur “Genius” Award in 1996,<br />
the foundation wrote, “In her (Goldstein’s)<br />
fiction her characters confront problems of<br />
faith: religious faith and faith in an ability to<br />
comprehend the mysteries of the physical<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
world.” The MacArthur Foundation went on<br />
to say that “Goldstein’s writings emerge as<br />
brilliant arguments for the belief that fiction in<br />
our time may be the best vehicle for involving<br />
readers in questions of morality and existence.”<br />
While those geniuses at MacArthur couldn’t<br />
have anticipated that Google would<br />
replace fiction as readers’ preferred vehicle to<br />
address questions of morality and existence,<br />
their praise for Goldstein and her work was as<br />
clairvoyant as it was accurate. Her characters<br />
absolutely deal with religious faith, faith in<br />
self, faith in love, and faith in no less than<br />
humankind.<br />
In her latest novel, 36 Arguments for the<br />
Existence of God, psychology professor Cass<br />
Seltzer has just been launched from academic<br />
obscurity to fame with a new book, “The<br />
Varieties of Religious Illusion.” Seltzer, who<br />
teaches at a small liberal-arts college in<br />
Boston, is less jarred by fame—being a guest<br />
on Jon Stewart’s “The Daily Show” or speaking<br />
to a sold-out crowd at the 92nd St Y—than<br />
with understanding game theory, which is the<br />
academic specialty of his girlfriend and fellow<br />
pysch professor at Frankfurter University.<br />
Another asset...is the author’s strong<br />
knowledge of philosophy and religion...<br />
When we meet the protagonist, he is<br />
deliberating over a job offer from Harvard<br />
and thinking of how to tell his competitive<br />
yet sensitive girlfriend, Lucinda Mandelbaum,<br />
about the offer. She is away lecturing.<br />
Without warning, Seltzer’s past begins to<br />
catch up with him as eccentric characters<br />
enter the story to escort him down memory<br />
lane. Through encounters with a zesty<br />
anthropologist ex-girlfriend now on a quest<br />
for immortality and middle of the night<br />
email exchanges with an old colleague,<br />
Seltzer’s major influencers are revealed to the<br />
reader; the list involves Seltzer’s mom, a Hassidic<br />
rabbi, a zany philosopher, and a prodigious<br />
six-year-old.<br />
One of the strongest features of the book<br />
is the 50 page appendix in the back, which<br />
outlines each of the 36 arguments for the<br />
existence of G-d. These arguments are quite<br />
rational and very well thought out. Another<br />
asset of the novel is the author’s strong<br />
knowledge of philosophy and religion, both<br />
of which she breaks down for readers into<br />
understandable terms.<br />
The last novel that forced me to think<br />
about abstract concepts and forage through a<br />
dense appendix, all the while laughing with<br />
the characters, was David Foster Wallace’s<br />
Fiction<br />
Infinite Jest. While this book can be difficult<br />
to get through at times, with its hefty and<br />
complicated content, like Infinite Jest it is an<br />
immensely rewarding read. MT<br />
Paula Phelan<br />
ZAPmedia, 2009. 242 pp. $14.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-9778192-1-8<br />
1939: INTO THE DARK<br />
This book is a fascinating fictional<br />
account of the cultural and political<br />
events of the year 1939, told in 12 chapters,<br />
month by month. The rise of Hitler is followed<br />
closely in reports by a fictional war correspondent<br />
while entertainment news is<br />
tracked by another reporter. We learn about<br />
the public and behind-the-scenes details of<br />
the 1939 World’s Fair. The story progresses<br />
through the lives of a cast of characters in<br />
New York and Hollywood, including a director,<br />
actors, musicians, dancers, poets, an<br />
architect, and a patron of the arts who is also<br />
an arms merchant. Everyone is affected by the<br />
impending war, but some ignore it while others<br />
wish to take action. The family of one<br />
character is unable to get out of Europe and<br />
there is a pall of doom over the future. An<br />
innovative novel for teens and adults. MBA<br />
Anne Rice<br />
Knopf, 2009. 288 pp. $25.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4000-4353-8<br />
REVIEWS<br />
ANGEL TIME:<br />
A NOVEL<br />
Only a masterful storyteller could pull off<br />
this engaging metaphysical adventure<br />
novel, and Rice is certainly among the most<br />
prolific and skillful writers of our time.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 45
BOOK PROFILE<br />
JEWISH SOUTH AFRICA IN FICTION<br />
Two novels set 50 years apart explore discomforting nuances of class, power, and<br />
money for Jews in South Africa.<br />
IN A PALE BLUE LIGHT<br />
Lily Poritz Miller<br />
Sumach Press, 2009. 240 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-8945-4983-7<br />
Lily Poritz Miller is a South African born playwright who co-edited a book of letters<br />
that were written by family and friends in Lithuania and abroad in the first<br />
part of the 20th century. A Thousand Threads, published in 2005, gave her a keen<br />
insight into the turmoil experienced by Lithuanian emigrants, and likely led her to the<br />
subject matter of her first novel, In A Pale Blue Light.<br />
The book tells of a family of Lithuanian immigrants to Cape Town, South Africa in<br />
the early 1900’s, drawing on Miller’s own childhood memories of the city. The story is<br />
about the hardships encountered by Sara, a recent widow, and her five children as<br />
they try to settle in a new country where apartheid is rife and the white people<br />
around them are either anti-Semitic Boers or new <strong>Jewish</strong> immigrants like themselves.<br />
Unlike themselves, though, many of the Jews around them are happy with segregated<br />
South Africa. Moreover, they’re social climbers and prone to interfere in and gossip<br />
about the misfortunes of others.<br />
It’s potentially great fodder for a story, but unfortunately Miller’s characters are<br />
insufficiently developed and don’t spring to life. Part of the problem is the words<br />
that come out of their mouths. They don’t feel a natural fit with the characters and<br />
their respective ages—primarily the teenager Lieba, whose thoughts are reflected in<br />
a discourse that’s totally out of line with her age.<br />
This makes A Pale Blue Light a difficult read, though for anyone who lived in<br />
Author of nearly 30 novels (perhaps most<br />
famously Interview with the Vampire), Rice<br />
consistently serves up dazzling, elegant prose<br />
and thrilling plots. Dwelling on issues of<br />
faithfulness, altruism, and devotion, the novel<br />
is told predominantly from the first-person<br />
perspective of 28-year-old Toby O’Dare, a<br />
cruel and desperate hitman. Known to his<br />
mysterious boss as “Lucky the Fox,” Toby, a<br />
lapsed Catholic, soon finds himself traveling<br />
through time to 13 th century England.<br />
Malchiah, an angel who has always watched<br />
out for Toby, gives him a chance to turn his<br />
life of crime around. Malchiah reminds Toby<br />
that he had once enjoyed a budding career as<br />
a talented musician, until tragic events dashed<br />
Toby’s hopes for going to a college conservatory,<br />
or for anything resembling a normal life.<br />
Malchiah offers Toby a chance to atone for<br />
46 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
his crimes by moving to an alternate world,<br />
where Meir and Fluria, a <strong>Jewish</strong> couple, have<br />
been wrongfully accused of ritually killing<br />
their daughter. While the country approaches<br />
mass violence against the Jews, Rice expertly<br />
interweaves a portrait of <strong>Jewish</strong> life in medieval<br />
England with Toby’s attempts to help. The<br />
novel is particularly brilliant in the many chapters<br />
narrated by Fluria, who tells a timeless tale<br />
of romantic love against the backdrop of societal<br />
unrest. Both Fluria’s life story and Toby’s<br />
actions as he moves metaphysically through<br />
“angel time” have profound reverberations for<br />
Toby’s 21 st century life, which stands in limbo<br />
while his saga unfolds. Throughout, Rice is<br />
wholly unafraid to illustrate life’s suffering,<br />
while also illuminating those moments when<br />
the human spirit triumphs over oppression,<br />
hatred, and despair. PS<br />
South Africa, and particularly those readers of Lithuanian stock, it offers some interesting<br />
insights into the challenges experienced by their recent ancestors. LK<br />
THE SERVANT’S QUARTERS<br />
Lynn Freed<br />
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009. 216 pp. $24.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-15-101288-6<br />
The law of unintended consequences comes to mind when reading The Servant’s<br />
Quarters, for in this novel readers encounter a group of characters who are continually<br />
met with situations in which actions have unanticipated effects.<br />
In the main, the novel is the coming of age story of Cressida, an impetuous, but<br />
clever and inquisitive nine-year-old <strong>Jewish</strong> girl growing up in the 1950’s in South Africa.<br />
She is eager to learn and experience life, but is riddled with social insecurities caused,<br />
in part, by a self-absorbed, supercilious mother and a comatose father. Despite her<br />
dysfunctional family environment, Cressida’s actions indicate her desire to become a<br />
responsible, reliable, and productive member of society. Yet, she cannot negotiate this<br />
space because, by her own admission, she “forgets to consider the consequences of<br />
anything” and ultimately decides that “considering the consequences of something<br />
before you actually [do] it...doom[s] [one] to failure right from the start.”<br />
The invisible hand of unintended consequences is also evident when readers<br />
learn that both Cressida and her sister, Miranda, are haunted by nightmares about the<br />
Holocaust that “come alive for someone who hadn’t been born until it was over.” In<br />
Miranda’s case, these thoughts translate into debilitating nightmares; in Cressida’s<br />
case, the nightmares fuel her need to know her personal history.<br />
The Servants’ Quarters is a multilayered novel in which Freed not only tells a<br />
love story, but also addresses social class, economic necessities, perceptions of normalcy,<br />
and subservience. Still, the psychological and philosophical undertones are<br />
what make this novel intriguing. MDE<br />
THE BIG KAHN<br />
Neil Kleid and Nicolas Cinquegrani<br />
ComicsLit, 2009. 176 pp. $13.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-1-56163-561-0 (pbk.)<br />
Like ripples on a pond after a stone is<br />
thrown, the consequences of a lie continue<br />
to spread until everyone is affected. In the case<br />
of Rabbi David Kahn, his 40 year masquerade<br />
as a Jew has detrimental effects on his wife, three<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
children, and the congregation he led up until<br />
the time of his death. A stranger claiming to be<br />
Kahn’s brother shows up at his funeral, and he<br />
reveals that the rabbi was his brother, Donnie<br />
Dobbs. They were con men, and while swindling<br />
people at a bar mitzvah, Donnie met and<br />
fell in love with Rachel Friedberg. He changed<br />
his name, taught himself everything he could to<br />
live as a Jew, and never revealed his true identity<br />
to his wife and children. As each family member<br />
comes to terms with grief and anger, they are<br />
forced to examine their lives and the choices<br />
they have made and will continue to make in<br />
light of this devastating event. Kleid, author of<br />
Brownsville, tells an original and engaging story.<br />
Readers are given an inside look at an observant<br />
family’s life; a helpful glossary translates Hebrew<br />
and Yiddish terms that are used throughout the<br />
book. Cinquegrani’s art complements the text<br />
with action and nuanced emotion. WW<br />
THE BRISS<br />
Michael Tregebov<br />
New Star <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 233 pp. $19.00<br />
ISBN: 978-155420043-6<br />
The Briss opens with Teddy Ostrove, a<br />
twenty-something Jew from Winnipeg<br />
calling his parents from Ramallah to tell them<br />
that he’s volunteered as a human shield for the<br />
Palestinian cause, and that he has fallen in love<br />
with, impregnated, and proposed to a Palestinian<br />
woman he met on his Birthright-Israel-like<br />
trip. Such a fantastically volatile opening ought<br />
to have launched a book where outrageous<br />
humor only augments some degree of emotional<br />
and political substance, but The Briss is<br />
so ludicrously lopsided against Israel and takes<br />
such a uniformly scathing attitude toward its<br />
very vulgar one-dimensional <strong>Jewish</strong> characters,<br />
that it is hard to empathize with any of them<br />
despite their respective distress, or to derive<br />
any insight into the situation, whatever side of<br />
the political divide you’re on. It may well make<br />
you laugh uncomfortably though.<br />
Teddy’s parents are crass, inept social<br />
climbers whose greatest concern is what the<br />
superficial and super-cruel suburban Jews they<br />
aspire to hobnob with will think of them, and<br />
Teddy’s divorced sister has a reputation for sleep-<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
ing around with married men. The Ostroves’<br />
feeble and ignorant pro-Israel platitudes easily<br />
get bested by Teddy’s only comparatively articulate<br />
new-found pro-Palestinian radicalism.<br />
Teddy’s latent liberalism was triggered on the<br />
trip by his having met “ugly Israelis” (American<br />
settlers) and a charismatic alpha-male sabra soldier<br />
angry about “the occupation” who schooled<br />
him in the ostensible facts about the iniquities<br />
the Palestinians suffer, and of course, by falling<br />
for his Palestinian princess at first sight. Teddy’s<br />
parents had pushed him to go to Israel and<br />
change his life, because they were humiliated<br />
first by his dropping out of medical school to<br />
become a nurse, and then by his having an affair<br />
with a lesbian rabbi’s wife.<br />
Tregebov’s strong dialogue flows fast and<br />
funny, and the book reads more like a play<br />
than a novel, but the effect is glib and nasty<br />
from the start. The book, though strident and<br />
completely unbalanced, falls short of being<br />
propaganda, because skewering the ignorance<br />
of diaspora Jews almost seems more important<br />
to the author (who lives in Barcelona)<br />
than bashing Israel or boosting the Palestinian<br />
cause. Mrs. Ostrove tells Teddy repeatedly,<br />
“You’re taking my neshome (soul) out,” and<br />
that’s exactly how reading this book felt. EA<br />
CITY OF GOD: A<br />
NOVEL OF PASSION<br />
AND WONDER IN<br />
OLD NEW YORK<br />
Beverly Swerling<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2009. 522 pp. $15.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-4922-2<br />
This is a fascinating fictional account of life<br />
in New York City from 1834 to 1857, the<br />
years leading up to the Civil War. We learn<br />
about medicine, real estate, the shipping business,<br />
opium trade, and the Chinese immigrant<br />
community through the stories of two notable<br />
and intertwined New York families. The<br />
author wrote about previous generations of the<br />
Turner and the Devrey families in Shadowbrook,<br />
City of Dreams, and City of Glory, but<br />
you needn’t have read those books to enjoy<br />
this one. A <strong>Jewish</strong> family plays a significant<br />
role in this tale as well. There is an abundance<br />
of interesting detail about the notorious Bellevue<br />
Hospital, Protestant/Catholic relations,<br />
and the discovery of germs and anesthesia. The<br />
Fiction<br />
author weaves together history, romance, and<br />
culture into a book that is hard to put down.<br />
There is an extensive family tree for clarification.<br />
A map would have been helpful. MBA<br />
Barbara Cherne<br />
Fithian Press, 2009. 96 pp. $12.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-56474-848-5<br />
REVIEWS<br />
DEVORA IN EXILE:<br />
STORIES<br />
In composing this slim volume of four<br />
linked stories, Cherne was inspired by the<br />
memories of a friend who, as a child, had fled<br />
with her family from Russia during that country’s<br />
revolution in 1917. When the book<br />
opens, the stories’ protagonist, Devora Marcus,<br />
is an elderly widow living in southern<br />
California. The first story, “The Conversion,”<br />
in which Devora falls briefly under a guru’s<br />
spell before reclaiming her <strong>Jewish</strong> identity, is<br />
perhaps the book’s strongest, although some<br />
readers may find the intensity of Devora’s<br />
bond to the young man who comes to her<br />
home to teach her Hebrew as depicted in “A<br />
Holocaust in My Breakfast Room” to be the<br />
most emotionally powerful and poignant<br />
aspect of the work. Occasionally repetitive (as<br />
with the disturbing material concerning the<br />
rape of Devora’s elder sister back in Russia),<br />
Devora in Exile nonetheless draws us in and<br />
allows us to get to know a sympathetic character<br />
and, with the exception of the brief second<br />
piece, offers full and compelling stories. ED<br />
EXILES<br />
Elliot Krieger<br />
Soho Press, 2009. 344 pp. $24.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-56947-589-8<br />
The time is 1970 and America is<br />
embroiled in the Vietnam War. Students<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 47
REVIEWS<br />
Fiction<br />
are protesting, campuses are in revolt, and<br />
student Lenny Spiegel becomes involved with<br />
a draft resistance movement, ARMS. This<br />
novel traces Lenny’s journey from America to<br />
Sweden to join a group of draft resisters and<br />
pose as the leader of the group, Aaronson,<br />
while the real Aaronson makes a mysterious<br />
trip to Germany. Lenny’s physical resemblance<br />
to Aaronson, and his willingness to<br />
become involved in the resistance movement,<br />
...Lenny’s long awaited revelation<br />
of the truth is eye opening.<br />
is a political mystery with a touch of Kafka.<br />
His motivation is to do a good deed in the<br />
anti-war movement, but his grasp of political<br />
reality is näive. Lenny is spiritually and emotional<br />
adrift and the allure of being part of a<br />
larger movement appeals to him at a time of<br />
emotional vulnerability. The ending has a<br />
surprise twist and Lenny’s long awaited revelation<br />
of the truth is eye opening.<br />
The characters are well developed but the<br />
plot drags in spots. Overall an interesting<br />
story of the height of the student anti-war<br />
movement and the community life in Sweden<br />
where they fled to avoid the military draft. BA<br />
GONE TO THE DOGS:<br />
A NOVEL<br />
Mary Guterson<br />
St. Martin’s Griffin, 2009. 278 pp. $13.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-312-54179-8<br />
Breaking up with boyfriend Brian leads 30something<br />
Rena to examine her life. And<br />
did I mention, to steal his new girlfriend’s dog?<br />
In order to extricate herself from the past, and<br />
to return the dog to its owner, she relies on<br />
help from friends and family. These include<br />
divorced parents who dine together weekly,<br />
former drug-dealing sister turned religious,<br />
well-grounded friend Lisa, and platonic new<br />
flame, Chaim (Chuck). Through the characters,<br />
Guterson explores when relationships<br />
begin, how they end, and which ones endure.<br />
“Odd souls need each other, whether they<br />
want each other or not,” Rena muses.<br />
Examining relationships in this book<br />
extends to self-regard. Having given up on<br />
48 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
becoming a speechwriter, Rena admits, “I’m a<br />
waitress in a steakhouse with no future career<br />
prospects. I have a pushy mother. I have one<br />
failed relationship under my belt. I have no<br />
confidence in myself. I’m a criminal. You do<br />
the math.” Yet throughout Gone to the Dogs, she<br />
becomes the heroine of her narrative. Bridget<br />
Jones Crossing Delancey best describes Rena.<br />
Family interactions also humorously expose the<br />
mores of modern <strong>Jewish</strong> life. Readers who have<br />
been there, if you know what I mean, will smile<br />
while recognizing themselves in the novel. NL<br />
GOOD FOR THE JEWS<br />
Debra Spark<br />
University of Michigan Press, 2009. 264 pp. $24.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-472-1171-6<br />
This is the story of a small group of characters<br />
in Madison, Wisconsin whose lives are<br />
intertwined through work, family, and romantic<br />
associations. The main characters are loosely<br />
based on biblical figures from the Story of<br />
Esther. “Ellen” is “Esther,” an orphan who lost<br />
her parents and is fostered by her cousin<br />
“Mose”/“Mordechai”. “Alex” is the superintendent<br />
for schools and is the stand-in for King<br />
“Ahasuerus.” He was formerly married to<br />
“Valerie” (“Vashti”), director of Madison’s Center<br />
for Artistic Exchange, but becomes involved<br />
with Ellen, who works in daycare. “Hyman,”<br />
the new school principal is “Haman” and an<br />
anti-Semite who plots the removal of Mose,<br />
American History teacher at the progressive<br />
school for at-risk children.<br />
This fast paced, contemporary tale demonstrates<br />
how each character’s early history<br />
informs who they are, how they view the<br />
world, and how they respond and interact<br />
with others. And though Spark vividly reveals<br />
the deleterious and devastating effects that<br />
interpersonal relations can create, in delineating<br />
each person’s past she almost seems apologetic<br />
for individual shortcomings. As she concludes:<br />
“So, what of it?... Ellen didn’t know,<br />
though at moments she imagined herself and<br />
the others as hapless actors, unwittingly cast in<br />
some biblical story, where being right meant<br />
being rewarded and being rewarded meant<br />
demolishing your enemy.” KJH<br />
Rafael Yglesias<br />
Scribner, 2009. 369 pp. $26.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4391-0230-5<br />
A HAPPY MARRIAGE<br />
This heartbreaking, joyous autobiographical<br />
novel oscillates between love and loss. It<br />
begins on the night the narrator meets his wife<br />
of 30 years; in the next chapter we see her in her<br />
final illness. As successive chapters go back and<br />
forth in time, we come to know them and their<br />
marriage intimately. And not just them. His<br />
alter ego’s <strong>Jewish</strong> mother and Latin father, and<br />
his <strong>Jewish</strong> in-laws from Long Island, are memorable<br />
personalities too. Yglesias limns detailed<br />
portraits of even minor characters, like a doorman,<br />
hospice physician or couples therapist.<br />
Yglesias, like the late John Updike, has the<br />
uncanny ability to describe the moment-tomoment<br />
feelings of his characters in precise<br />
and graceful language, often with astute similes.<br />
The in-laws “reacted to feelings as if they<br />
were brand-new purchases that didn’t fit the<br />
room for which they were bought.” After<br />
charming his future wife’s college friends, the<br />
protagonist “felt as if he had been welcomed<br />
into a friendly foreign land.”<br />
A reader becomes the confidante of a talented,<br />
passionate, touchingly insecure man<br />
who is delighted by and profoundly devoted<br />
to a singular woman. The story of their life<br />
together leaves an indelible impression of<br />
them and their love. BG<br />
Hesh Kestin<br />
Dzanc <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 370 pp. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0976717782<br />
THE IRON WILL OF<br />
SHOESHINE CATS<br />
Twenty-two year old orphaned student<br />
Russell Newhouse is introduced to<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
Shushan “Shoeshine” Cats, a self educated<br />
gangster in New York City. Shoeshine quickly<br />
takes Russell under his wing and throws him<br />
into the comical underbelly of the New York<br />
crime scene. Set against the backdrop of the<br />
Kennedy assassination and the Civil Rights<br />
movement, Kestin’s poignant and witty epic<br />
novel is superbly written. Kestin has the right<br />
ear for dialogue. When the FBI shows up to<br />
ask Shushan why he went on a recent trip to<br />
Dallas and his known association with a local<br />
gangster named Jack Ruby, “The man was crying<br />
on the phone. I went down, held his hand.<br />
I think he was having what they call a breakdown.<br />
He was a wreck, His business wasn’t<br />
doing too well. There was trouble with one of<br />
the strippers he was dating. She walked out on<br />
him. Men get to a certain age, things don’t<br />
work out, they can get... desperate.”<br />
Packed with numerous literary references<br />
that will test your reading IQ, Kestin has created<br />
a terrific out of this world novel where<br />
nothing and nobody is as they seem. GK<br />
IS IT GOOD FOR<br />
THE JEWS?: MORE<br />
STORIES FROM<br />
THE OLD COUNTRY<br />
AND THE NEW<br />
Adam Biro; Catherine Tihanyi, trans.<br />
University of Chicago Press, 2009. 152 pp. $20.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-226-05217-5<br />
Adam Biro first attracted attention in the<br />
United States with his ninth book, One<br />
Must Also Be Hungarian, which evoked the<br />
lost world of pre-war Hungarian Jews<br />
through stories about members of his own<br />
family. In contrast, his latest book is a collection<br />
of jokes whose humor depends on<br />
stereotypes of European Jews, much like his<br />
Two Jews on a Train of 2001.<br />
Many of these tales are well-traveled: the<br />
Jew who reads an anti-Semitic newspaper,<br />
Jews who compete with one another to be the<br />
most humble, the ticketless synagogue visitor<br />
on Yom Kippur who is warned not to be<br />
caught praying. Others deal with enduring<br />
themes like Jews who are shrewd in business,<br />
parents manipulating their children through<br />
guilt, fund-raisers for the United <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Appeal, and complaining <strong>Jewish</strong> women.<br />
Typically, the telling of a joke is stretched over<br />
five pages, embellished with many imagined<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
details and authorial asides.<br />
The translation’s many stilted or mistaken<br />
word choices (often substituting French usage<br />
for English: “Carpates” for “Carpathians,”<br />
“the Saint” for “the Holy One”) are distracting.<br />
In the end, though, how much you enjoy<br />
these stories will probably depend on how<br />
much you like the author’s prolix, self-referential<br />
way of recounting them. BG<br />
LOVE IS LIKE<br />
PARK AVENUE<br />
Alvin Levin; James Reidel, ed.<br />
New Directions, 2009. 196 pp. $13.95(pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-08112-1799-6 (pbk.)<br />
With a cover photo that evokes<br />
O’Hara/Fitzgerald, Park Avenue in<br />
the title, and an abandoned car, a puzzled<br />
book buyer might think that Alvin Levin,<br />
Jew, was doing his own take on the rich.<br />
Wrong. This book deals with the angst-ridden,<br />
Bronx-trapped, Yiddish-inflected,<br />
always-poor of the 1920–30’s. It is not one<br />
story, but several—from fragments to novella.<br />
Prefaced by John Ashbery, and edited by<br />
biographer James Reidel, who wrote the<br />
introduction and drew Levin’s work together,<br />
Reidel dealt with published material as well as<br />
boxed manuscripts found after Levin’s death.<br />
Levin, 1914–1981, was also an attorney and<br />
publisher of utilitarian pamphlets. Burdened<br />
by lifelong lameness (polio) which brought<br />
together his frustration and talent, it<br />
swamped the possibility of lifelong creativity.<br />
Characters exist with<br />
choking intensity, longing<br />
for comforts and choices<br />
Characters exist with choking intensity,<br />
longing for comforts and choices—“Park<br />
Avenue”—lacking in lives of the unemployed<br />
and underemployed in the Bronx. Most<br />
remarkable is his depiction of the anguish<br />
among young women, jobless, poor, dependent<br />
on family, or bereft. Levin’s gritty language<br />
and tone make Reidel invoke Saroyan,<br />
Miller, and Dos Passos.<br />
At age 30 or so, Levin stopped writing,<br />
Fiction<br />
REVIEWS<br />
although his slender works had appeared in<br />
New Directions anthologies and The New<br />
Yorker. He corresponded with their editors,<br />
James Laughlin IV and William Maxwell.<br />
Each praised, but urged that he write short<br />
stories, not “prose.” That did not happen.<br />
The triggers ending his productivity are<br />
unknown; certainly an injurious traffic accident<br />
must be factored in. Our loss, as well as<br />
Levin’s. In 2010, Levin’s writing is worth<br />
revisiting. Illustration, notes. ABS<br />
LUCINELLA<br />
Lore Segal<br />
Melville House, 2009. 154 pp. $13.00 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-1-933633-79-4 (pbk.)<br />
If the estate and grounds adjoining those of<br />
Jane Austen’s family home had become a<br />
Yaddo community—with selected artists<br />
given two weeks to two months to create—<br />
Austen, who sporadically struggled with<br />
deciding titles for her books, might have<br />
opted to immortalize the new neighbors with<br />
a work titled Pride and Prejudice, and additionally,<br />
Sensibility—but Sense? Hardly. Not<br />
as Lore Segal saw Yaddo. While mining the<br />
same intellectual/personal territory, she did,<br />
however, fancifully title her novella Lucinella,<br />
a name that could have bobbed up in the 18th century. In this analogy, New York parallels<br />
London, as do Segal’s surnames, names like<br />
Winterneet and Betterwheatlings, another<br />
delicious conceit of earlier (British) times,<br />
Segal produced this work in 1976, polishing<br />
and segmenting her pastoral, bourgeois tale,<br />
including incarnations of Zeus and Hera.<br />
Lucinella, a Yaddo resident, alternately targets<br />
and embraces her cohorts: “this girl, who says<br />
what she actually means, tends to mumble<br />
her words inside her mouth, so as to keep the<br />
option of eating them.” Yaddo-ites come with<br />
emotional and creative baggage, and some<br />
flaunt pedigree—having been publicly recognized<br />
financially, preferably recently. No burdensome<br />
pre-Victorian families here; at<br />
Yaddo most enjoy openly legal or, lacking<br />
that, spontaneous cohabitation.<br />
For those who remember the 60’s–70’s<br />
with grinning affection, the new Melville<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 49
REVIEWS<br />
Fiction<br />
House’s edition of Lucinella is a boon, especially<br />
in its close-to-Kindle size, albeit with<br />
grayish, rather than black, print. For those<br />
with wry memories, it changes nothing, but<br />
adds fresh admiration for Segal’s facile ability<br />
with malicious language. ABS<br />
THE MURDERER’S<br />
DAUGHTERS:<br />
A NOVEL<br />
Randy Susan Meyers<br />
St. Martin’s Press, 2010. 320 pp. $24.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-312-57698-1<br />
Think of two little girls witnessing the<br />
murder of their mother by their father.<br />
Think of one small child subsequently<br />
stabbed by the same father and sent all alone<br />
to the hospital. It is painful to envision, and<br />
yet, we are not naïve, and know such violence<br />
exists. Now imagine how the crime, the loss,<br />
and the knowledge of their imprisoned father<br />
waiting for them to visit affects the girls in<br />
every step of their development and every<br />
moment of their adult lives.<br />
...the sisters are bound to each other by<br />
a promise that is wearing to the core.<br />
With excellent craft Randy Susan Meyers<br />
gets us inside the heads of sisters Lulu and<br />
Merry. We are with them at the horrific event,<br />
as they are rejected by family members and<br />
sent to a Dickensian orphanage, then into a<br />
safe but difficult foster home, and on into<br />
adulthood, one as a doctor and one a parole<br />
officer. Choosing to hide their past from just<br />
about everyone, the sisters are bound to each<br />
other by a promise that is wearing to the core.<br />
Not a day passes without wrestling the tug of<br />
family loyalty vs. the wish for oblivion. We<br />
share the ironies of their saving and giving life,<br />
finding and holding onto love, and above all<br />
else the question of forgiveness.<br />
Perhaps readers will find the story unusual<br />
or more disturbing as the family was <strong>Jewish</strong>.<br />
However, the sad reality of this compelling<br />
tale is the sisters coping alone, without any<br />
community/religious support we might have<br />
anticipated. The author acknowledges the<br />
extraordinary benefit of such support as she<br />
reflects on her own life. PGM<br />
50 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
David Del Bourgo<br />
Mystere Press, 2009. 284 pp. $14.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-442-11987-1<br />
PRAGUE SPRING:<br />
A SIMON WOLFE<br />
MYSTERY<br />
This fast-paced detective story is distinctive<br />
in that it weaves two events in 1968—<br />
Berkeley’s student protests and the Czech<br />
uprising against the Soviet Union, for which<br />
the book is named, and mixes in flashbacks by<br />
the central character to his time as a prisoner in<br />
Theresienstadt and Auschwitz. Inspector<br />
Simon Wolfe works for the San Francisco<br />
Police Department, and is a Holocaust survivor<br />
who was a member of the Mossad’s<br />
“Nokim,” a group that killed Nazis. When a<br />
congressman’s son is murdered, Wolfe’s<br />
attempts to solve the crime are inhibited by the<br />
police and the congressman as he is blackmailed<br />
about his past. He is further compromised<br />
by his feelings for the murder victim’s<br />
psychiatrist, who is a child of Holocaust survivors<br />
herself. Wolfe is a sympathetic character,<br />
though he is a loner with unshakable opinions.<br />
Wolfe’s insistence on following through with<br />
this case leads the reader to explore the ideas of<br />
political corruption, revenge, justice, and survival.<br />
MBA<br />
Anna Winger<br />
Riverhead, 2008. 320 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1594489976<br />
THIS MUST BE<br />
THE PLACE: A NOVEL<br />
To begin to understand contemporary<br />
Germany as it relates to Jews, one must<br />
read This Must Be the Place.<br />
In June the city of Frankfurt invited my<br />
father and several other “Former Frankfurters”<br />
to return for two weeks to the city of<br />
their birth. All of them had survived the<br />
Holocaust one way or another and we<br />
assumed the town wanted to show them how<br />
Frankfurt has changed since the 1930’s. The<br />
city has done this annually since 1980; my<br />
grandmother was among those invited that<br />
first year.<br />
My brother and I joined my father on this<br />
trip and one evening we were invited to dinner<br />
with the other members of the “second<br />
generation” who had accompanied their parents<br />
to Frankfurt. I thought it was meant as<br />
an ice-breaker; after all, we would be spending<br />
a lot of time together on a tour bus. But<br />
over dinner it became clear that we’d all experienced<br />
similar feelings of otherness during<br />
our childhood, feelings many of us had never<br />
given voice to, and passionate conversation<br />
went on into the night.<br />
To begin to understand contemporary<br />
Germany as it relates to Jews, one<br />
must read This Must Be the Place.<br />
I realized that the city of Frankfurt organizes<br />
these elaborate trips (the best hotel, opera,<br />
theater, dinner, museum tours) as much for<br />
their own children and the descendents of survivors<br />
as for the Former Frankfurters themselves.<br />
They want young Germans to meet<br />
survivors face to face to hear their stories<br />
because their own parents or grandparents are<br />
not talking. We heard them worry that the<br />
psychology of this has affected the culture.<br />
Another day my father was invited to<br />
speak at a local high school about his experience<br />
as a Jew growing up in Nazi Germany.<br />
When the organizers learned that my brother<br />
and I would be there as well they changed the<br />
date of the lecture to accommodate us. I was<br />
surprised to learn it was because they felt sure<br />
the students would have questions for us as<br />
well. Sure enough, the students were equally<br />
curious about our feelings as “second generation”<br />
survivors, a term I’d never applied to<br />
myself. What was it like growing up knowing<br />
what our father had gone through? Did we<br />
hate Germans? How did it feel being in Germany<br />
now? My brother answered them with<br />
the words our father had told us as children,<br />
“To hate Germany and Germans would be to<br />
hate him, because he was German, to deny<br />
this would be to grant victory to Hitler.”<br />
It was serendipitous then to read This<br />
Must Be the Place upon my return home,<br />
which embeds themes of identity and guilt<br />
for post-war born Germans and Americans,<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> and not, into a subtly rendered story.<br />
Walter Baum is a lonely has-been actor, a<br />
German Johnny Drama without the<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
entourage. He pursues Hope, an aptly named<br />
American woman living in his building, but<br />
first he must deal with his past. In daring and<br />
unflinching portrayals, Winger puts us face to<br />
face with the innocents who inherited the<br />
legacy of the Holocaust. SLS<br />
YOM KIPPUR<br />
IN AMSTERDAM:<br />
STORIES<br />
Maxim D. Shrayer<br />
Syracuse University Press, 2009. 141 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0815609186<br />
In Yom Kippur in Amsterdam, Maxim Shrayer<br />
explores the complex and often difficult<br />
adjustments of Russian-<strong>Jewish</strong> immigrants to<br />
American life. Shrayer himself was born in<br />
Moscow in 1967 and spent nine years as a<br />
refusenik before emigrating to the United<br />
States in 1987.<br />
In the title story, Russian-born Jake Glaz<br />
flees his home in Baltimore after a painful<br />
break-up with a Catholic girlfriend who is<br />
unable to convert to Judaism. After a restorative<br />
week on the Riviera, he finds himself in<br />
the seedy, red-light alleyways of Amsterdam<br />
just hours before the eve of Yom Kippur.<br />
In “Sonatchka,” two old friends reunite in<br />
suburban Connecticut and reminisce about<br />
their early lives in Moscow. As the day wanes,<br />
painful truths emerge about their current circumstance.<br />
“The Afterlove,” set entirely in Russia, is a<br />
bittersweet coming-of-age tale. Set first at a<br />
glittering dinner party of the Moscow intelligentsia<br />
in the early 1980’s, it travels back in<br />
he finds himself in the seedy, red-light<br />
alleyways of Amsterdam just hours<br />
before the eve of Yom Kippur.<br />
time to 1945. Young Pavel Lidin and Fyodor<br />
Shtock are selected to spend a summer at an<br />
experimental government-run post-World<br />
War II summer camp. Throughout, the writing<br />
is soulful, evocative, and deeply detailed.<br />
Maxim Shrayer, chairman of the department<br />
of Slavic and Eastern Languages at<br />
Boston College, has published a memoir,<br />
Waiting for America, and several books on<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong>-Russian literature. JuF<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
HISTORY<br />
DANCING IN THE<br />
DARK: A CULTURAL<br />
HISTORY OF THE<br />
GREAT DEPRESSION<br />
Morris Dickstein<br />
W.W. Norton & Company, 2009. 576 pp. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-393-07225-9<br />
In this magisterial study of American culture<br />
in the 1930’s, Morris Dickstein examines<br />
a vast range of material, from serious fiction<br />
and poetry to potboilers, popular songs,<br />
gangster films, and Busby Berkeley musicals.<br />
He selects his case studies with assured care<br />
and analyzes them deftly and astutely. What<br />
emerges is a convincing mosaic of an era<br />
devoted to the cult of liveliness, a metaphor<br />
for life itself.<br />
As his title suggests, Dickstein sees the<br />
popular culture of the era not so much as a<br />
form of escapism or wish-fulfilment, but as<br />
an assertion of the importance of motion in<br />
an age when so much was shutting down. In<br />
the cross-country trek of the Joads in The<br />
Grapes of Wrath, the upward social mobility of<br />
Rico in Little Caesar and his partners in celluloid<br />
crime, the fascinating rhythms of George<br />
Gershwin, the furious pace of screwball comedy,<br />
and the nimble tread of the feet of Fred<br />
Astaire, we see a nation raging, in its uniquely<br />
graceful way, against the dying of the light. BB<br />
SCREENING<br />
A LYNCHING:<br />
THE LEO FRANK<br />
CASE ON FILM<br />
AND TELEVISION<br />
Matthew H. Bernstein<br />
University of Georgia Press, 2009. 348 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8203-3239-0<br />
Bernstein examines how the Leo Frank<br />
case was treated in four different screen<br />
productions: the 1936 film Murder in Harlem<br />
by the African-American auteur Oscar<br />
Micheaux; the 1937 Warner Brothers feature<br />
They Won’t Forget; a 1964 episode of the TV<br />
History<br />
REVIEWS<br />
series Profiles in Courage; and the 1988 NBC<br />
miniseries The Murder of Mary Phagan.<br />
While Bernstein’s discussions of the four<br />
productions are valuable and interesting, as a<br />
whole the study falls short, mostly because of<br />
the limited and disparate nature of the material<br />
Bernstein treats. Micheaux’s work took<br />
the basic facts of the Frank case as a framework<br />
on which to hang a wholly fictional<br />
story that examined social issues largely unrelated<br />
to those in the actual Frank case. They<br />
Won’t Forget was a powerful but similarly fictionalized<br />
Hollywood treatment of the case<br />
that also soft-pedaled significant issues (for<br />
example, in neither of these films was the<br />
Frank character depicted as <strong>Jewish</strong>). The Profiles<br />
in Courage episode focused almost exclusively<br />
on the Georgia governor whose commutation<br />
of Frank’s death sentence<br />
precipitated his lynching. Only The Murder of<br />
Mary Phagan aimed at a comprehensive treatment<br />
of the case.<br />
A study of how the Frank case has been<br />
treated by journalists, historians, and purveyors<br />
of popular culture would be a fascinating<br />
piece of social and cultural history, but choosing<br />
to examine any phenomenon through a<br />
window as narrow as this necessarily limits<br />
how much light may be shed on it. BB<br />
THE TEN LOST TRIBES:<br />
A WORLD HISTORY<br />
Zvi Ben-Dor Benite<br />
Oxford University Press, 2009. 226 pp. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-19-530733-7<br />
Ever since Assyria conquered the northern<br />
kingdom of Israel some 2700 years ago,<br />
the destiny of the exiled Ten Tribes has captivated<br />
the imagination of Jews and non-Jews.<br />
Think of the excitement when researcher<br />
Tudor Parfitt recently found a genetic link<br />
between the <strong>Jewish</strong> priestly class of Kohanim<br />
and the Lemba tribe of southern Africa, or<br />
the controversy when the Chief Rabbinate of<br />
Israel in 2005 recognized an ethnic group living<br />
in East Asia as “descendants of Jews” from<br />
the Biblical half-tribe of Menasseh.<br />
The archeological record confirms the<br />
Biblical account in 2 Kings that the Israelites<br />
were deported to distant lands in the Assyrian<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 51
BOOK PROFILE<br />
IN THE GRASP OF THE SHOAH: TALES OF TRAVAIL<br />
AND ITS AFTERMATH<br />
By Marcia Weiss Posner<br />
Titles are listed in alphabetical order, but reviewed according to their place<br />
in history<br />
ICON OF LOSS: THE HAUNTING CHILD<br />
OF SAMUEL BAK<br />
Danna Nolan Fewell and Gary A. Phillips<br />
Pucker Art Publications, 2009. 83 pp. $50.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-879985-21-6<br />
NITZOTZ: THE SPARKOF RESISTANCE<br />
IN KOVNO GHETTO AND DACHAU-<br />
KAUFERING CONCENTRATION CAMP<br />
Laura Weinrib, ed. and intro; Estee Weinrib, trans.<br />
Syracuse University Press, 2009. 232 pp. $34.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8156-3233-7<br />
Efraim Zuroff<br />
Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. 238 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-230-61730-8<br />
OPERATION LAST CHANCE:<br />
ONE MAN’S QUEST TO BRING<br />
NAZI CRIMINALS TO JUSTICE<br />
REMEMBER US: MY JOURNEY FROM THE<br />
SHTETL THROUGH THE HOLOCAUST<br />
Martin Small and Vic Shayne<br />
Skyhorse Publishing, 2009. 328 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-60239-723-1<br />
REMEMBERING SURVIVAL:<br />
INSIDE A NAZI SLAVE LABOR CAMP<br />
Christopher R. Browning<br />
W.W. Norton & Company, 2009. 320 pp. $27.95<br />
ISBN: 978-393-07019-4<br />
Nitzotz—Just two months after the liquidation of the Kovno ghetto, a Dachau-<br />
Kaufering issue of Nitzotz appeared. Its editors were Abraham Melamed and<br />
Shlomo Frenkel Shafir. The first two issues were written by Frenkel from the BBC<br />
nightly, German broadcasts while he was in Kaufering 1 and II. These secret publications<br />
were a result of the underground meetings of the IBZ (Irgun Brith Zion) begun<br />
secretly in the Kovno Ghetto and continued in the Kaufering camps, where they were<br />
an inspiration to other Zionists in the camps. They are Hebrew language publications,<br />
a language forbidden by their occupiers, but continued in secret. The five issues of<br />
Nitzotz circulated in Dachau-Kefering that appear in this volume are a small sample<br />
of the 42 that were produced during that period. Begun in opposition to the Soviet<br />
occupation, it continued under the Nazis. Unfortunately, the bulk of IBZ archives<br />
have been lost to history. Extensive bibliography, notes, photography.<br />
Remember Us—Vic Shayne has told Martin Small’s story with clarity, sincerity,<br />
and balance—beginning with the closeness of his loving family, the traditions of the<br />
shtetl, and wisdom of one’s elders—and ending abruptly and brutally with the mad<br />
incursion of the Nazis and the shocking transformation of local anti-Semites and<br />
even neighbors, some of whom buried Small’s family alive. How could it happen? It<br />
was as if they had become bewitched and transformed into pure evil. From work<br />
camps to the partisans of the Nowogrodek forests; from Mauthausen to life as a displaced<br />
person in Italy; from fighting in Israel to ultimately coming to America, this is a<br />
must read account, with its twists and surprises, but primarily because of the ethics<br />
and mantra of a remarkable man. An outstanding memoir, with a startling ending.<br />
Afterword, epilogue, family photos, notes.<br />
Remembering Survival—Upon reading survivors’ accounts of life in ghettos,<br />
slave-labor camps, and even killing camps, one wonders how any survived. Depending<br />
on the religiosity of the testifier, they attribute either it to a miracle, to God’s intervention,<br />
to luck, to a particular person who helped them to survive, or other survival<br />
strategies. Drawing on the testimony of survivors of the Stratachowice slave labor<br />
camps in Poland, Browning describes many of these strategies. In the end, Browning<br />
agrees that those who survived often had the ties of family and neighbors to sustain<br />
and help them; those who did not usually perished. Browning also discusses the fact<br />
that despite the incriminating eyewitness testimony of survivors, many of the perpetrators<br />
are acquitted. As if to reiterate that fact, the lawyer for Nazi war criminal John<br />
Demjanjuk asserted that his Ukrainian client (an accessory to the murder of 29,700<br />
Jews at the Sobibor death camp in Poland in 1943) should not be held accountable for<br />
following the orders of higher-ups in Germany, many of whom escaped punishment.<br />
Illustrations, notes, photos.<br />
Icon of Loss—To many, the paintings of Samuel Bak represent the Holocaust. Not<br />
only are they beautifully painted in an Old Master style, but their images of Holocaust<br />
devastation and tragedy are moving and unforgettable. Many of us are familiar<br />
with the photograph of a young boy in the Warsaw Ghetto, arms raised in surrender—his<br />
innocence violated by a German SS pointing a gun at him. Although this particular<br />
child happened to survive, Bak uses his image in a series of paintings to represent<br />
all the children of the Shoah, most of whom perished. Cynthia Ozick’s<br />
comments on Bak’s paintings of the boy in variations of the theme and settings, but
always with his hands up, are so apt that I usurp them here in a partial quotation:<br />
“...Never, never, never was pity so twinned with outrage, or visionary image-making<br />
so united with unforgiving historical fact...In Bak’s work there is absolute knowledge; I<br />
think he must understand that his eye and his hand are anointed.” List of Bak<br />
exhibits, galleries, museums and films.<br />
Operation Last Chance—Simon Wiesenthal is gone, but Efraim Zuroff carries on<br />
his work, described here truthfully but with a novelist’s ability to employ drama,<br />
characterizations, and description so that this account communicates the frustration<br />
and occasional triumphs of tracking down Nazi murderers, many of whom now live in<br />
empire, but the facts end there. NYU professor<br />
Zvi Ben-Dor Benite traces the unfolding<br />
of the rest of the story in legend. Post-Biblical<br />
Apocrypha, especially 2 Esdras, envisioned<br />
the Ten Tribes hidden behind mountains and<br />
a miraculous river and living proud, strong,<br />
free, and independent lives. That enviable<br />
state contrasted with the all too visible dispersion<br />
and desperation of the Jews of the Southern<br />
Kingdom after the destruction of the two<br />
Temples, and gave them hope and comfort.<br />
Where exactly were these pure, distant,<br />
hidden Jews? They were always imagined to be<br />
at the edge of the known world. As conquerors<br />
and explorers extended the boundaries<br />
of what was known, the lost tribes receded<br />
to those far horizons. Travelers in the<br />
Middle Ages, some credulous (like Benjamin<br />
of Tudela) and some deceiving (like David<br />
Reuveni), brought back stories of the tribes<br />
that suggested they were scattered from India<br />
to Ethiopia. After the European encounter<br />
with the New World, there were legends about<br />
hidden Jews in the jungles of South America,<br />
as well as speculation that native North Americans<br />
were descendants of the lost tribes.<br />
...weaves the religious, legendary,<br />
and scientific history of this idea<br />
into a colorful and enchanting story.<br />
Sometimes a purported connection to the<br />
Tribes supported claims of privilege, as with<br />
British theories of Ten Tribes ancestry. More<br />
often, though, the belief in the persistence of<br />
the Ten Tribes resembles the Shiite faith in<br />
the occluded Twelfth Imam or the Czech<br />
national story of the Hussite warriors hidden<br />
in Mt. Blánik. Just as the Hussites are said to<br />
stand ready to aid the Czech people in their<br />
time of need, and the Twelfth Imam is to<br />
emerge to bring salvation as Mahdi, the Ten<br />
Tribes were imagined to have a large army<br />
ready to defend the Jews. They offered the<br />
consolations of strength in the face of loss,<br />
eventual triumph following defeat, succor<br />
amid distress. Zvi Ben-Dor Benite weaves the<br />
religious, legendary, and scientific history of<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
this idea into a colorful and enchanting story,<br />
told in scholarly detail with a deft personal<br />
touch. Bibliography, index, notes. BG<br />
URANIUM WARS:<br />
THE SCIENTIFIC<br />
RIVALRY THAT<br />
CREATED THE<br />
NUCLEAR AGE<br />
Amir D. Aczel<br />
Palgrave Macmillan, 2009. 256 pp. $27.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-230-61374-4<br />
Despite the intimidating title, Uranium<br />
Wars is, above all, a story about people.<br />
The author introduces us to the key players in<br />
the discovery of uranium and the history of<br />
nuclear arms, bringing us into the lives and<br />
struggles of the scientists, with brief interludes<br />
to explain some of the science (in<br />
remarkably easy and accessible language). He<br />
shows us Marie Curie (among many others)<br />
as a student searching for a Ph.D. thesis and<br />
graduating with what was the start of Nobelwinning<br />
research. He details the rivalry<br />
between Curie’s daughter, Nobel Laureate<br />
Irene Joliot-Curie, and Lise Meitner, two<br />
women racing to explain how a nucleus splits<br />
at a time when very few women dominated<br />
any scientific discipline.<br />
The relationships among the scientists<br />
bring history to life and the sections about<br />
the role of the Nazis in the arms race are gripping.<br />
Aczel ends with a look at the U.S.’s own<br />
questionable decision to drop the bomb—the<br />
final product of the scientists’ research—onto<br />
Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Some of the most<br />
memorable chapters show Aczel, and the rest<br />
of the world, struggling to understand what<br />
the scientists knew and didn’t know about<br />
the intended use of their efforts, and what<br />
their feelings were when it happened.<br />
Endnotes, illustrations, insert, references. AB<br />
BOOK PROFILE<br />
comfort and luxury. It reads like fiction, but unlike fiction, it is sadly truthful and<br />
describes frustrating failures, mostly due to lack of cooperation by the governments<br />
in question, as well as successes. Just by targeting them, flushing them out from their<br />
covers, Zuroff achieves a certain level of victory, even if they are not ultimately<br />
imprisoned. Zuroff may not carry a spear or a shield, but he is a true warrior searching<br />
for justice and retribution.<br />
Marcia Weiss Posner, Ph.D., is a librarian and program director at the Holocaust<br />
Memorial and Tolerance Center of Nassau County<br />
HOLOCAUST STUDIES<br />
ARNOLD DAGHANI’S<br />
MEMORIES OF<br />
MIKHAILOWKA: THE<br />
ILLUSTRATED DIARY<br />
OF A SLAVE LABOUR<br />
CAMP SURVIVOR<br />
Deborah Schultz and Edward Timms, eds.<br />
Vallentine Mitchell, 2009. 243 pp. $32.50 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-0853036395 (pbk.)<br />
The history of the publication of Daghani’s<br />
diary is almost as depressing as the diary<br />
itself which, after a brief introduction, is the first<br />
part of this fascinating study. Entitled “The<br />
Grave is in the Cherry Orchard” the history<br />
describes in terse yet poetic detail life in the slave<br />
labor camp of Mikhailowka during 1942 and<br />
1943, where the Romanian artist and his wife,<br />
Anisoara, whom he calls Nanino, are sent from<br />
their home in Czernowitz to build a strategic<br />
road for the Germans. During that year, besides<br />
the unbearable hardships they endured, Daghani,<br />
who had brought his paints and brushes with<br />
him (at the suggestion of the arresting officer),<br />
records both in English shorthand and, visually,<br />
in genre-like paintings, cruelty, occasional kindnesses,<br />
as well as portraits and interior scenes<br />
commissioned by his captors. Making their<br />
escape in 1943, the Daghanis carried the works<br />
above their heads as they waded across the Bug<br />
river and managed to get to a ghetto in Transnistria<br />
where they survived until the end of the war.<br />
The saga of the publication of this dual testament<br />
then begins. Though written in English, it was<br />
first published in Romanian in 1947. The<br />
Daghanis were then living in Bucharest. It was<br />
not until 1961 that the journal Adam: International<br />
Review published it in England in its original<br />
English. (The year before, it had been turned<br />
down by a literary agent whose comment was<br />
“good, but too few atrocities!”) Daghani’s paintings<br />
and writings would be concerned through-<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 53
BOOK PROFILE<br />
“CURB” COUPLE MEMOIRS<br />
By Jaclyn Trop<br />
Show your enthusiasm for the real Jeff and Susie's soul-baring memoirs on living<br />
the comedic life.<br />
Susie Essman<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2009. 256 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1439150177<br />
Jeff Garlin<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2010. 256 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1439150108<br />
WHAT WOULD SUSIE SAY?: BULLSH*T<br />
WISDOM ABOUT LOVE, LIFE AND COMEDY<br />
MY FOOTPRINT: CARRYING THE WEIGHT<br />
OF THE WORLD<br />
out his life with the fate of his fellow prisoners,<br />
most of whom were brutally murdered in<br />
Mikhailowka, and with the aftermath of the war.<br />
He testified and his works were inserted as evidence<br />
in trials that took place in the decades following.<br />
Rather bizarrely, he established contact<br />
with several of his captors, excerpts of whose letters<br />
to Daghani and depositions for a war crime<br />
investigation prompted by the publication in<br />
1960 of a German translation of his diary are<br />
included. Essays dealing with the Daghanis’ lives<br />
after the war, “mapping” his testimony with others<br />
of the same time and place, plus the color<br />
illustrations of his work make this much more<br />
than a diary/memoir of the Holocaust. “Roll-<br />
Call: Memorial List of those who Perished in<br />
Mikhailowka” is particularly chilling. The editors,<br />
Schultz and Timms, write in non-academic<br />
style so the text is readable and absorbing. The<br />
ultimate home of Daghani’s works is the University<br />
of Sussex, which is committed to the collection<br />
as an important historical and artistic record,<br />
and to promoting its continued availability for<br />
scholarly research. Some of Daghani’s paintings<br />
54 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
are in Yad Vashem and at YIVO in New York<br />
City. Sadly, although offered, neither Yad Vashem<br />
nor the Israel Museum would accept his complete<br />
works. Bibliography, illustrations, index. EN<br />
THE DEATH<br />
OF THE SHTETL<br />
Yehuda Bauer<br />
Yale University Press, 2010. 207 pp. $35.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-300-15209-8<br />
For many Jews and non-Jews alike, Israeli historian<br />
Yehuda Bauer, Professor Emeritus of<br />
Holocaust Studies at the Hebrew University of<br />
Jerusalem, is considered the world’s foremost<br />
expert on the Shoah. In his latest book, The<br />
One of HBO’s most colorful couples bare their souls—and the love, fear, and<br />
drama underlying a life in comedy—in a pair of first-person accounts. Jeff Garlin<br />
and Susie Essman of HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm,” starring the semi-real exploits<br />
of Seinfeld co-creator Larry David, may seem one-sided and self-obsessed, but their<br />
real-life musings are deep.<br />
Jeff Garlin, the irascible roly-poly who plays Larry David’s manager and cohort<br />
Jeff Greene, embarks upon his own journey to lose weight while going green. Neither<br />
serious nor lighthearted (no pun intended), this daily journal outlines his struggles in<br />
earnest as he searches for the strength to overcome overeating.<br />
Whether helping himself to food reserved for a strangers’ wedding, visiting Krispy<br />
Kreme, or decrying the Jamba Juice-toting woman who attended an Overeaters<br />
Anonymous meeting, Garlin maintains a sense of humor about his food addiction.<br />
Meanwhile, he takes the bus, greens his house, and argues with his wife over replacing<br />
their windows.<br />
The real treat is the behind-the-scenes gander Garlin, who also serves as co-producer,<br />
shares of the Curb set, including a bit involving Jerry Seinfeld and a chocolate<br />
milkshake.<br />
Susie Essman has penned an autobiographical glimpse into the life of a stand up<br />
comedienne—replete with hopelessness and despair before catching her big break<br />
as the acerbic wife of Jeff Greene on “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Life lessons accrued<br />
along the way touch upon relationships, gay men as the new soccer moms, and the<br />
travails of menopause.<br />
Especially useful is the stirring eight-page letter Essman writes to her four<br />
stepchildren: “Frequently when our hearts are broken, obsession takes over, but<br />
obsession is never about what we think it’s about.” Essman’s words and hard-won<br />
success inspire as only someone once plagued by severe self-doubt can.<br />
Though it is easy—and a delight—to imagine the story delivered in the shrill<br />
staccato Essman uses to call Jeff a fat **** or order Larry to get the **** out of<br />
her house, her message is heartfelt. There are few punch lines, but wisdom<br />
abounds.<br />
Jaclyn Trop is a business reporter for The Detroit News and a graduate of Columbia<br />
University’s Graduate School of Journalism.<br />
Death of the Shtetl, Bauer provides a penetrating<br />
analysis of the destruction, between September<br />
1939 and March 1943, of thousands of small<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> towns and villages that composed the<br />
eastern part of the prewar Polish Republic. These<br />
shtetlach, which comprised the “center of traditional<br />
prewar Jwish existence” were home to over<br />
1.3 million Jews. Drawing heavily on survivor<br />
testimonies collected after the war at Yad<br />
Vashem, important survivor memoirs, and the<br />
latest Israeli, German, British, and American<br />
scholarship Bauer concludes that the two percent<br />
of Jews (26,000) from the Kresy (northeastern<br />
Poland, Volhynia, and East Galicia) who survived<br />
the war owed much to simply pure<br />
“chance and luck.”<br />
The Death of the Shtetl tells the story of nine<br />
representative shtetlach and surveys dozens of<br />
other similar communities. At the same time,<br />
Bauer focuses on major questions that have preoccupied<br />
historians for the past 65 years: the role<br />
played by the Judenrate in the destruction of 1.3<br />
million Jews, the efforts of a few hundred young<br />
Zionists (left and right) to organize resistance<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
groups, the attitudes and actions of Soviet partisans<br />
who eventually liberated the survivors, and<br />
finally the role played by the non-<strong>Jewish</strong> neighbors<br />
(i.e., the Poles, Ukrainians, and Belorussians)<br />
in the murder of one-fifth of all the victims<br />
of the Holocaust. CJR<br />
Reinhard R. Dorries<br />
Enigma <strong>Book</strong>, 2009. 330 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-929631-77-3<br />
HITLER’S INTELLI-<br />
GENCE CHIEF: WALTER<br />
SHELLENBERG: THE<br />
MAN WHO KEPT<br />
GERMANY’S SECRETS<br />
This is a thoroughly researched, scholarly<br />
text. Its audience is the serious student<br />
or researcher; the casual student of Holocaust<br />
history would find this book overwhelming,<br />
albeit informative. But, one can always learn.<br />
Hitler’s Intelligence Chief gives the reader an<br />
opportunity to examine the workings of the Nazi<br />
government machine and the political “games”<br />
played in the name of “getting ahead in the Nazi<br />
party.” If little else, it reinforces the atmosphere of<br />
distrust in all ranks of the Nazi party, and explores<br />
some of the unexpected alliances and activities of<br />
those in power, e.g., Shellenbergs’ collaboration<br />
with Count Bernadotte to save Jews in the waning<br />
months of the war.<br />
This is a good book, but not what we<br />
would call a good read. It benefits from careful<br />
reading and rereading, as well as a discussion<br />
partner. Abbreviations, appendices, bibliography,<br />
editors comment, glossary, index,<br />
introduction, preface. NDK<br />
HUMOR<br />
I DRINKFOR<br />
A REASON<br />
David Cross<br />
Grand Central Publishing, 2009. 236 pp. $23.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-446-57948-3<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Fans of David Cross’ stand-up comedy<br />
won’t be disappointed by his new book, I<br />
Drink for a Reason. Much of the book is written<br />
in the persona that Cross assumes onstage: personal,<br />
ranting, profane, political, often antagonistic<br />
and hyperbolic, and enlivened with an<br />
engaging and imaginative silliness. The book<br />
comprises dozens of short chapters, most<br />
roughly five pages long. Some of them read like<br />
stand-up routines set on the page; others are<br />
elaborations on material that has earned Cross<br />
his reputation as a fearless polemicist. Many are<br />
essentially concerned with language, marking<br />
Cross as a potential heir to George Carlin, the<br />
language-obsessed and consistently hilarious<br />
lapsed Catholic comedian.<br />
Cross explains that he was raised <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
and now considers himself an atheist. He fits<br />
into that category of atheist Jews whose <strong>Jewish</strong>ness<br />
informs their outlook without touching<br />
their ethics or spirituality. The basic<br />
polemic posture Cross strikes—the sardonic<br />
critic attacking established assumptions and<br />
popular misconceptions with sarcastic and<br />
impassioned commentary—sounds recognizably<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong>. Organized religion is among<br />
Cross’ favorite targets and, since he would<br />
identify himself as (at most) culturally <strong>Jewish</strong>,<br />
organized Judaism and its adherents come<br />
under the hammer frequently in I Drink for a<br />
Reason. Cross’ self-criticism, which he points<br />
out is not self-loathing, is representative of the<br />
opinionated secular modernity that Judaism’s<br />
tradition of argument has helped create. This<br />
may be the ultimate <strong>Jewish</strong> joke: After everything<br />
we’ve done to shape this free and modern<br />
world, this is the thanks we get? JDE<br />
ISRAEL STUDIES<br />
ISRAEL VS. UTOPIA<br />
Joel Schalit<br />
Akashic <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 253 pp. $15.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-933354-87-3<br />
Israel vs. Utopia is a left-wing Israeli-American<br />
Jew’s attempt to parse out some subtle<br />
distinctions about the Israeli-Arab conflict.<br />
Schalit, who openly aspires to depth of analy-<br />
Israel Studies<br />
REVIEWS<br />
sis, believes that too much dialogue on the<br />
subject in the diaspora, both from the right<br />
and left, deals with a fantasy Israel, rather<br />
than the one Israeli Jews and Arabs, and<br />
Palestinians deal with daily.<br />
Schalit, a former editor of Tikkun magazine,<br />
feels that Israel’s ties to the U.S. have<br />
been very much to Israel’s detriment and<br />
longs for Europe’s embrace. While he regrets<br />
that France and England parted ways with<br />
Israel as punishment for the Six Day War, he<br />
thinks of their having done so as “enlightened.”<br />
The Israelis act like “colonial subjects<br />
of America” in his view. Despite the withdrawal<br />
from Gaza, which one would think he<br />
would have approved, he believes that there<br />
was a “lack of meaningful progress” during<br />
the Bush years.<br />
In perhaps his most provocative chapter,<br />
he writes extensively on the rise of the word<br />
“apartheid” in left-wing circles to describe the<br />
situation in Israel, which he deplores as an<br />
inaccurate and obfuscating use of the word. It<br />
slowly becomes clear, however, that Schalit<br />
believes that word actually obscures the ‘fact’<br />
that Israel has “devised a strategy for maintaining<br />
power over the Palestinians that’s<br />
more insidious than the South African<br />
model...” and “in some instances transcending,<br />
in terms of its cruelty... ‘apartheid.’” So<br />
much for subtlety. For someone intent on<br />
using accurate language, Schalit frequently<br />
falls back on inaccurate and hyperbolic<br />
metaphors for a complex and unique reality,<br />
such as describing Israel as an “extremely brutal<br />
Colonial occupation.”<br />
His most telling (and damning) sentence<br />
comes toward the end of the book, however.<br />
“I am not sentimental about its (Israel’s) political<br />
existence the way I am, for example, about<br />
its cuisine.” The book is not without the occasional<br />
intriguing insight, but it is not a coherent<br />
whole. It is more a meandering pastiche of<br />
political analysis and a subjective expression of<br />
Schalit’s contradictory feelings about Israel’s<br />
situation, derived from his status as a “progressive”<br />
Israeli-American. His anguish is palpably<br />
sincere, and he himself is troubled by<br />
what he perceives as genuine anti-Semitism on<br />
the left, but his own bias is simply not subtle:<br />
America and Israel are invariably in the<br />
wrong, and not once does he suggest that the<br />
Arab nations or the Palestinians themselves<br />
may be even in small part responsible for the<br />
Palestinians’ plight. Just about every time<br />
Schalit says something somewhat interesting<br />
and not typically left-wing, he doubles back to<br />
reveal that, in fact, he really is to the left of<br />
most, and tiresomely so. EA<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 55
REVIEWS<br />
Israel Studies<br />
JERUSALEM: CITY<br />
OF LONGING<br />
Simon Goldhill<br />
Belknap Press of Harvard University, 2008. 356 pp. $27.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-674-02866-1<br />
Jerusalem holds a special place in the hearts<br />
of Christians and Muslims as well as Jews.<br />
Simon Goldhill, a professor of Greek at Cambridge,<br />
offers an interesting guide to the city<br />
using buildings to recount a history that often<br />
has many versions. Beginning with a walk<br />
along the wall of the Old City, Goldhill takes<br />
readers to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, a<br />
destination for Christians, noting that a Muslim<br />
family holds the keys to the building. He<br />
then visits the kotel and Haram al-<br />
Sharif/Dome of the Rock, explaining the significance<br />
of each site. He also visits other<br />
shrines in the city and comments on the many,<br />
often disputed, archaeological discoveries and<br />
the contributions of the Romans, the British,<br />
and the Americans to Jerusalem’s history.<br />
Goldhill depicts a beloved city that has survived<br />
and transcended violence and controversy<br />
to become the home of a diverse population.<br />
He explains how faith brought so many layers<br />
of different civilizations to this place and provides<br />
a guide for the thinking visitor. BMB<br />
LONE SOLDIERS:<br />
ISRAEL’S DEFENDERS<br />
FROM AROUND<br />
THE WORLD<br />
HerbKeinon<br />
Devora Publishing, 2009. 160 pp. $27.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-934440-60-5<br />
Lone Soldiers: Israel’s Defenders From<br />
Around the World explores the phenomenon<br />
of non-Israelis who come to Israel for the<br />
express purpose of enlisting in the Israel<br />
Defense Forces (IDF). The book profiles 14<br />
such soldiers as well as Tzvika Levy, the<br />
retired IDF officer who looks after these<br />
“lone soldiers.” Lone soldiers is the term used<br />
to describe soldiers who have no family or<br />
56 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
friends in Israel to support them during their<br />
IDF service. The lack of any kind of local<br />
support system makes the military experience<br />
that much more difficult.<br />
The book is geared more to a younger<br />
audience, which is unsurprising given that its<br />
focus is on the lives of soldiers who are themselves<br />
teenagers. The motivation of these soldiers<br />
and the unique challenges faced by foreign<br />
citizens joining what is essentially a<br />
foreign army occupies most of the book. The<br />
motivation ranged from a teenage desire for<br />
adventure to repaying an unstated ancestral<br />
The book is geared more to a younger<br />
audience, which is unsurprising given<br />
that its focus is on the lives of soldiers<br />
who are themselves teenagers.<br />
debt. Some of the volunteers were grandchildren<br />
of Holocaust survivors and although no<br />
one in their families suggested that these<br />
teens enlist in the IDF, the teens felt compelled<br />
to do something to balance their ancestors’<br />
helplessness in the face of the Holocaust.<br />
All four grandparents of one of the Lone Soldiers,<br />
Ariel Lindenfeld, suffered through the<br />
Holocaust. Two were in concentration camps<br />
and two spent the war in hiding. He stated,<br />
“The Holocaust is one of the biggest things<br />
for me, thinking about what would have been<br />
had the army, the state, been around then.<br />
How impossible it would have been for all<br />
that to happen. And now that we can defend<br />
ourselves, I want to be a part of doing that.”<br />
There are certain minor historical errors.<br />
For example, the author described the height<br />
of the second intifada as occurring in 2004.<br />
The height was in 2002. But for any non-<br />
Israeli teenager interested in learning what it<br />
would be like to join the IDF, the book is<br />
worthwhile. GE<br />
David Cesarani<br />
Da Capo Press, 2009. 320 pp. $26.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-306-81845-5<br />
MAJOR FARRAN’S<br />
HAT: THE UNTOLD<br />
STORY OF THE<br />
STRUGGLE TO<br />
ESTABLISH THE<br />
JEWISH STATE<br />
Aplaque on Ussishkin Street in Jerusalem,<br />
a short walk from where I live, marks<br />
the spot where a sixteen-year-old boy named<br />
Alexander Rubowitz was abducted by British<br />
police and murdered on May 6, 1947. He<br />
had been distributing news posters for the<br />
underground group LEHI, also known as the<br />
Stern Gang.<br />
At that time the British colonial administration<br />
was battling terrorist acts by LEHI as<br />
well as the Irgun Zvai Leumi, two dissident<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> military groups separate from the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Agency’s official Hagana army. The War<br />
Office appointed a war hero named Roy Farran<br />
to head a counterterrorist group to smash<br />
the <strong>Jewish</strong> guerilla units. He confessed to<br />
murdering the <strong>Jewish</strong> boy, but his written<br />
confession was judged inadmissible at his<br />
court-martial and he was acquitted.<br />
British historian David Cesarani, whose<br />
Becoming Eichmann won a National <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
<strong>Book</strong> Award, recounts this scandal of coverup,<br />
conspiracy, and diplomacy in the context<br />
of the last years of the British Mandate in<br />
Palestine. Major Farran’s Hat is a history of<br />
those years that closely scrutinizes the personalities<br />
of the leadership and the decisions they<br />
made as Britain’s hold on its empire was<br />
becoming increasingly tenuous and desperate.<br />
It is also a gripping, suspenseful account<br />
of a government’s intentional perversion of<br />
justice. Treating the Rubowitz case as a<br />
microcosm of the struggle for a <strong>Jewish</strong> state<br />
sheds new light on these world-historical<br />
events as well as on the case itself. Index,<br />
notes, sources. BG<br />
START-UP NATION:<br />
THE STORY OF<br />
ISRAEL’S ECONOMIC<br />
MIRACLE<br />
Dan Senor and Saul Singer<br />
Twelve, 2009. 304 pp. $26.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-446-54146-6<br />
Israel, a country the size of New Jersey and<br />
surrounded on all sides by hostile nations,<br />
has more companies listed on the NASDAQ<br />
stock exchange than the next five foreign<br />
countries combined. In this book, Dan Senor<br />
and Saul Singer, two Middle East experts,<br />
explain how Israel’s unique history and challenges<br />
have created such a favorable environment<br />
for high tech entrepreneurs.<br />
In short, the authors credit a combination<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
of five characteristics: Israel’s strategic isolation,<br />
the centrality of its military, its close<br />
connections with and support from its diaspora,<br />
and its pioneering origins. With references<br />
to history and by means of personal<br />
anecdotes, Senor and Singer introduce the<br />
reader to many of the people who have<br />
helped make household names of companies<br />
such as Intel, Cisco, Google, and many others<br />
equally important but less familiar as well as<br />
to visionaries such as David Ben-Gurion and<br />
President Shimon Peres who created a nation<br />
that values and encourages innovation.<br />
A <strong>Council</strong> on Foreign Relations <strong>Book</strong>,<br />
Start-Up Nation is highly readable and opens<br />
the reader’s eyes to Israel’s uniqueness and<br />
explains how it differs from other countries<br />
also known for their high-tech industries such<br />
as China, Japan, Singapore, and South Korea.<br />
Bibliography, index, notes. PLR<br />
MODERN JEWISH THOUGHT<br />
AND EXPERIENCE<br />
A HEART AFIRE:<br />
STORIES AND<br />
TEACHING OF<br />
THE EARLY<br />
HASIDIC MASTERS<br />
Zalman Schachter-Shalomi and Netanel Miles-<br />
Yepez; Arthur Green, fwd.<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society, 2009. 384 pp. $45.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8276-0884-9<br />
Speaking in one voice as “I,” Reb Zalman<br />
and his student Miles-Yepez comment on<br />
different voices in Hasidism, from the mystical<br />
rabbis who preceded the Ba’al Shem Tov,<br />
Yisra’el ben Eliezer, founder of Hasidism, to<br />
the teachers and disseminators of the 18th and<br />
19th centuries who followed him. The authors<br />
seek to reconnect readers with the contemplative<br />
practice of Hasidic tradition. They offer<br />
new interpretations of the teachings of Rashi,<br />
Yitzhak Luria, the Ba’al Shem Tov, Mikeleh<br />
of Zlotchov, Pinchas of Koretz, Ya’akov Yosef<br />
of Polonoyye, the Maggid of Mezritch, Rabbi<br />
Reb Melekh, and the writings about them.<br />
Schachter-Shalomi and Miles-Yepez question<br />
the zeal of disciples whom they feel lost touch<br />
with spirituality by repeating words without<br />
understanding or by manipulating stories so<br />
that text prevented words of prayer from fill-<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Modern <strong>Jewish</strong> Thought and Experience<br />
ing with light and rising up to heaven. In this<br />
mission to keep open the divine connection<br />
between God and people and to widen the<br />
circle of men and women Hasidism might<br />
inspire, the authors also discuss Adel Ashkenazi,<br />
the Ba’al Shem’s daughter, as a healer<br />
and herbalist, and forge connections to Buddhism<br />
and Sufism.<br />
Fluid and passionate, A Heart Afire draws<br />
on the authors’ personal knowledge and the<br />
sources themselves to promote spiritual<br />
reflection and to provide new relevance for<br />
readers both inside and outside of Hasidic<br />
practice. Appendix, bibliography, glossary,<br />
notes. SE<br />
THE SEDER NIGHT:<br />
AN EXALTED<br />
EVENING: THE<br />
PASSOVER<br />
HAGGADAH WITH<br />
A COMMENTARY<br />
BASED ON THE<br />
TEACHINGS OF<br />
RABBI JOSEPH<br />
B. SOLOVEITCHIK<br />
Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik; Rabbi Menachem<br />
Genack, ed.<br />
KTAV, 2009. 203 pp. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-60280-118-9<br />
The Bible tells us to recount the story of<br />
the Exodus annually. The Rabbis have<br />
taught that he who expands upon the story of<br />
the Exodus is most praiseworthy. This<br />
explains why there are more commentaries on<br />
the text of the Passover Haggadah than on<br />
any other <strong>Jewish</strong> text. Rabbi Joseph B.<br />
Soloveitchik, possibly the greatest rabbinic<br />
sage and thinker of the 20th century, did not<br />
write such a commentary. However, throughout<br />
his half century of teaching Talmud, writing<br />
essays and novellae, delivering lectures,<br />
and speaking at various forums in English<br />
and in Yiddish, he elaborated on many<br />
themes related to the Exodus, to Passover, to<br />
the Haggadah, and to cognate subjects.<br />
Rabbi Menachem Genack, a devoted and<br />
talented disciple, has gathered and arranged<br />
...this commentary is<br />
thematic and examines topics<br />
a bit more in depth.<br />
many of Rabbi Soloveitchik’s teachings from<br />
disparate sources into a commentary on the<br />
Haggadah. Unlike some commentaries which<br />
offer pithy observations or brief comments on<br />
the text, this commentary is thematic and<br />
examines topics a bit more in depth.<br />
Rabbi Soloveichik (“The Rav”) felt strongly<br />
that the recitation of the Haggadah should<br />
be an exercise in Torah study and his comments<br />
are informed by that philosophy. Simple<br />
acts such as eating the various seder foodstuffs<br />
are analyzed and elevated through the<br />
prism of Tamudic and rabbinic debate regarding<br />
the nature of the mitzvah, its sources, and<br />
its status. In one essay, the Rav analyzes the<br />
obligation of women to drink the four cups<br />
since they are normally exempt from time<br />
bound commandments, and elsewhere he<br />
comments on the custom to recite “Next year<br />
in Jerusalem” at the conclusion of the seder<br />
and the connection this has to a similar custom<br />
at the end of the Yom Kippur service.<br />
For those not privileged to have studied<br />
with the Rav, or not able to delve into his<br />
philosophical and rabbinic writings, this<br />
anthology of comments on the Haggadah is a<br />
wonderful introduction to the teachings of<br />
Rabbi Soloveitchik. WG<br />
Ira Bedzow<br />
Urim Publications, 2009. 192 pp. $19.95<br />
ISBN: 978-965-524-029-0<br />
REVIEWS<br />
HALAKHIC MAN,<br />
AUTHENTIC JEW:<br />
MODERN EXPRES-<br />
SIONS OF ORTHODOX<br />
THOUGHT FROM<br />
RABBI JOSEPH<br />
B. SOLOVEITCHIK<br />
AND RABBI ELIEZER<br />
BERKOVITS<br />
It is a daunting task to summarize the teachings<br />
of these two 20th century <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
thinkers in a slim volume. Still more challenging<br />
is selecting which pieces of their massive<br />
output to present. Even more quixotic is<br />
the attempt to challenge some of their positions.<br />
Most of the scholarship produced<br />
about Rabbi Soloveitchik has been to elucidate<br />
his teachings and make them understandable<br />
to a wider audience. Rabbi<br />
Berkovits’ writings have not yet found many<br />
interpreters.<br />
The author understands the technical,<br />
philosophical language of these two writers<br />
but may be out of his depth when he tries to<br />
differ with them. Presenting sophisticated<br />
ideas by avatars of modern Orthodoxy is an<br />
important exercise. One must ask, however,<br />
to whom is this book directed? If it is meant<br />
to be read by scholars it falls short of the<br />
mark. If it is meant for laymen, then the pres-<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 57
REVIEWS<br />
Poetry<br />
entation of the topics is inappropriate.<br />
Rabbi Soloveitchik and Berkovits sought<br />
to create a legion of Modern Orthodox Jews<br />
who are involved in full Orthodox observance,<br />
ongoing rabbinic text studies, a college<br />
education, a job in the secular or <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
world, and engagement in serious philosophic<br />
and theological studies.<br />
The absolute primacy of halakha in Rabbi<br />
Soloveitchik’s writings and the place of ethics<br />
in Rabbi Berkovits’ philosophy are crucial to<br />
understanding their respective outlooks. Theory<br />
must drive practice. The topics selected<br />
such as the study of Torah, performance of<br />
commandments, individual versus community,<br />
exile, the chosenness of the <strong>Jewish</strong> people,<br />
and the role of the Land of Israel are important<br />
and need to be clarified in layman’s<br />
terms. Using the language of philosophers<br />
only appeals to other philosophers.<br />
The Holocaust played an important role<br />
in Rabbi Berkovits’ writings and its omission<br />
in this discussion is unfortunate. Rabbi<br />
Soloveitchik’s writings require great effort to<br />
master. Not since Maimonides have we seen a<br />
master of the entire rabbinic corpus express<br />
himself in the idiom of the great philosophers.<br />
It is therefore important to disseminate<br />
and make accessible the writings of great <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
thinkers who worked to bridge the chasm<br />
which some think exists between modernity<br />
and traditional Judaism.<br />
Rabbi Soloveitchik showed the eternal verity<br />
of Judaism while Rabbi Berkovits favored a<br />
more developmental approach. In either case<br />
the synthesis is shown to work. WG<br />
POETRY<br />
Yakov Azriel<br />
Time Being Press, 2009. 118 pp. $15.95<br />
ISBN: 978-156809128-0<br />
BEADS FOR THE<br />
MESSIAH’S BRIDE:<br />
POEMS ON LEVITICUS<br />
Poetry about religion often implies a<br />
dichotomy between an ideal way of living<br />
inspired by the Divine and human evil. The<br />
split may become even more obvious when<br />
considering the <strong>Book</strong> of Leviticus, which<br />
58 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
details numerous religious prohibitions and<br />
the severe consequences of disobeying any of<br />
these laws. Yakov Azriel writes beyond the dry,<br />
relentlessly harsh quality of Leviticus and<br />
brings the heart to this topic in this collection.<br />
Consider the title poem, in which the author<br />
hopes that his meditations may expand<br />
beyond their surface appearance, “May songs<br />
I write be brought as beads—/ Beads for the<br />
Messiah’s wife...Perhaps she’ll take the beads I<br />
string/To wear when she celebrates.” Linking<br />
one’s humanity with a plea for prayer and<br />
deep worship is central to Azriel’s vision and<br />
quest in which, “...And there are the truly<br />
righteous...Their soul becomes a mirror they<br />
hold up/To God, reflecting His face,/To God,<br />
the soul of the world.” The beautiful sonnets<br />
and free verse of Beads are a wonderful starting<br />
point for Torah study, repentance, and true<br />
worship. DS<br />
IN MY BUSTAN:<br />
POEMS<br />
Michal Mahbgerefteh<br />
Poetica Publishing Company, 2009. 77 pp. $13.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-61539-247-6<br />
ustan” can be translated as life, gar-<br />
“Bden, or orchard. Many of Michal<br />
Mahbgerefteh’s poems are reflections on Israel<br />
beyond surface appearances, as in “Peaceful<br />
Thoughts to My Sleep,” “...I want to walk in<br />
your bustan to the scent/of the sweet lemon<br />
tree...My heart aches for/your laughter and<br />
spices, but tonight the/cold silvery skies<br />
brought a peaceful thought/to my sleep; your<br />
presence is a beacon/to my wondering<br />
thoughts stirring formless/beginnings full of<br />
strength and vigor.” The reader also perceives<br />
the anguish the author felt on watching her<br />
mother die from cancer and on considering<br />
the agony of terrorism and war that Israel continues<br />
to experience; but infusing these starker<br />
realities is a sensitive, hopeful vitality, as in<br />
“Psalm for Peace,” which repeats the refrain,<br />
“If I could only make the/dark fall in love with<br />
the light.” The last section returns to the defining<br />
identity of this very talented poet, “Yuk-<br />
Hay-Vav-Hay,” “...When your name/rests<br />
upon my lips/sweetness enriches/the edge of<br />
my soul/letter by letter.” DS<br />
SHADOW ARCHITECT<br />
Emily Warn<br />
Copper Canyon Press, 2008. 139 pp. $15.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-55659-277-5<br />
Poetry heightens the reader’s appreciation<br />
of material and spiritual experience,<br />
especially if that poetry adds an extraordinary<br />
perception about the power of letters which<br />
combine to form literal and figurative words.<br />
Emily Warn’s collection specifically addresses<br />
the Hebrew alphabet, each letter addressed in<br />
three poems intentionally focused on form,<br />
name, and number, followed by three short<br />
but apt quotations from notable authors.<br />
These are further divided into linear stories, a<br />
series of trials, and the insights of a “realized<br />
adept,” one who has plumbed the depths of<br />
exploration in this world encompassing the<br />
scale from traditional Gematria studies all the<br />
way to the contemporary meditative sensory<br />
images. While these poems can be experienced<br />
with the general appreciation one gives<br />
to literal or abstract art, familiarity and even<br />
scholarly study of the Hebrew alphabet can<br />
only enhance the realm one enters when reading,<br />
for example, “The Soul’s Chisel” (mem):<br />
“A wide brown river swirls through boulders./Downstream<br />
bubbles pop in calmer<br />
pools...You hide in a cleft of rock/to watch<br />
God pass by...” The rocks and water are one,<br />
each absorbing life from the other; so it is<br />
with faith touched by the letters of God. DS<br />
STEERAGE<br />
Bert Stern<br />
Ibbetson Street Press, 2009. 88 pp. $15.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-9795313-8-5<br />
Like children of the Holocaust, those<br />
whose parents suffered from pogroms or<br />
who were forced from their homeland<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
ecause of religious persecution carry the<br />
scars forever. The cost of such escape never<br />
seems to leave Bert Stern, one example of an<br />
adult son who knows, as he states so directly<br />
in “Lotty is Born,” “...let them tell me if they<br />
can/if I am recompense for what they<br />
endured.” The remaining five parts of this<br />
notable collection might be described as an<br />
appreciation for the beauty and fragility of<br />
life thereafter. In the title poem, Stern notes<br />
the full effect of such survival, “...he said what<br />
he hoped,/as if God gave us life/as we want it.<br />
But order is like houses children weave from<br />
grasses, twigs/and leaves.” Nature as it<br />
appears in upstate Buffalo, New York is a<br />
repeated mirror image of deep beauty and<br />
death, with the latter being existentially, not<br />
morbidly, depicted. One other outstanding<br />
poem is “Midrash: Abraham” in which after<br />
his son remains after the great sacrifice<br />
“...broken there, complete and alone,/bent by<br />
perfection.” Steerage is a celebration of new<br />
life forever renewed by the past. DS<br />
THESE MOUNTAINS:<br />
SELECTED POEMS<br />
OF RIVKA MIRIAM<br />
Rivka Miriam; Linda Stern Zisquit, trans.<br />
Toby Press, 2009. 260 pp. $14.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-159-264-249-6 (pbk.)<br />
These Mountains: Selected Poems of Rivka<br />
Miriam, translated and with an introduction<br />
by Linda Stern Zisquit, is the first<br />
time that a book-length translation of the<br />
poet’s work appears in English. As such, this<br />
new book makes an important contribution<br />
to contemporary Hebrew poetry available in<br />
English. Readers should be especially grateful<br />
that the publisher, Toby Press, continues to<br />
publish volumes of translated poetry that<br />
contain both the original Hebrew and the<br />
English side-by-side. This dual-language presentation<br />
adds depth even for those with only<br />
minimal Hebrew skills.<br />
Rivka Miriam, born in Israel in 1952, is a<br />
child of Holocaust survivors who became a<br />
published poet at the age of fourteen. Her<br />
earliest poems were inspired by what she had<br />
learned about the Holocaust and her family’s<br />
experience. She is similarly influenced by<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> texts and religious and theological<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
ideas, some of which seeps into and infuses<br />
the poetry.<br />
Rivka Miriam’s poems are deceptively<br />
simple at times. The language is straightforward,<br />
yet worlds are contained within it.<br />
Some lines come directly from Biblical or<br />
liturgical texts, while others could be everyday<br />
speech.<br />
Biblical characters are featured in many<br />
poems, as in “The Stripes in Joseph’s Coat”<br />
which employs an economy of language to<br />
paint a rich history of Joseph’s whole ancestry.<br />
“The Song to Jacob who Moved the<br />
Stone from the Mouth of the Well” is a powerful,<br />
moving interpretation of the relationship<br />
between Jacob and Leah, told from<br />
Leah’s perspective, which contains the lines,<br />
“Flocks of sheep hummed beneath our blankets,/tent-flies<br />
were pulled to the wind,” and<br />
ends with the lines, “And he didn’t know I<br />
was Leah/And flocks of sons broke through<br />
my womb to his hands.” This poem functions<br />
as modern midrash, which gives Leah a voice<br />
and adds a perspective missing from the Biblical<br />
text. God, too, appears frequently in the<br />
poems, an intimate presence with whom the<br />
poet is in relationship, as in “Still,” in which<br />
God knocks on the window and enters the<br />
room.<br />
Many of the poems use maternal imagery<br />
such as breasts and nursing, as in “I Nurse a<br />
Very Old Woman,” or “Oh My Mother.”<br />
Sometimes these images are comforting and<br />
nurturing, but they can also be quite disturbing,<br />
as in the images of children suckling ash<br />
and leaves in “Never Will I Be Like the Mother<br />
in the Picture” or fire asking to be nursed<br />
in “The Fire, Blushing from Fear.”<br />
The land of Israel is also a common theme<br />
in Miriam’s poetry. She writes of a mystical<br />
connection to the land, markedly different<br />
from so many of her Israeli peers who<br />
respond with irony when exploring a connection<br />
to the land. Hers is an unironic relationship,<br />
one that is deeply physical and sensual.<br />
The land in her poetry is a living being, a<br />
friend and sometimes a lover. In “These<br />
Mountains” the mountains sit in armchairs<br />
and eat cake like comfortable visitors while in<br />
“Lest it Be Revealed” in which “Only when<br />
my land is asleep/spread out before me/I<br />
whisper whisper her name/and she moans.”<br />
There are references in this poetry to the<br />
pain and trauma of the Holocaust that Miriam’s<br />
family experienced. The two related<br />
poems “Chaya’s Unborn Child” and “And<br />
Shalom, Chaya’s Husband” speak of violence<br />
and loss with poignancy while avoiding any<br />
hint of sentimentality. These poems are dis-<br />
Visual Arts<br />
quieting, disturbing. There is a sense that the<br />
poet cannot help but bring forth what her<br />
legacy has bequeathed her, and that she is<br />
continually trying, over and over, to make<br />
sense of her family history of European suffering<br />
and the struggle of modern Israel.<br />
Linda Zisquit has done a masterful job in<br />
these translations. She manages to convey<br />
both the directness and the richness of the<br />
Hebrew, while making the poems read as if<br />
they were always meant to be read in English.<br />
I can only hope that Miriam and Zisquit will<br />
continue to collaborate for years to come, and<br />
bring forth many more such volumes of<br />
achingly beautiful poetry. Interview with<br />
Rivka Miriam, notes, translator’s note. HEP<br />
VISUAL ARTS<br />
REVIEWS<br />
THE BOOK<br />
OF GENESIS<br />
Robert Crumb; Robert Alter, trans.<br />
W.W. Norton & Company, 2009. 214 pp. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-393-06102-4<br />
Finally! An adult version of one of the<br />
world’s most widespread and debated<br />
books gets inked. Esteemed artist and illustrator<br />
Robert Crumb greets this project with<br />
open arms; a graphical adaptation of all 50<br />
chapters of Genesis. Crumb is known for his<br />
distinctive drawing style, critical and satirical<br />
views of mainstream America, and involvement<br />
in the underground comic scene, often<br />
depicting content forbidden in conventional<br />
publications. Some feel Crumb is a wonderfully<br />
unlikely candidate to breathe new life into<br />
the founding narrative of privilege and authority<br />
in the Judeo-Christian world. To his<br />
defense, Crumb’s goals were not to be comedic<br />
or ironic but rather to interpret this sacred text<br />
completely through his own style of illustration.<br />
As he states in the introduction, “there<br />
was no monkeying around with the text.”<br />
Crumb has done a fantastic job of delivering<br />
all 50 chapters without deviation or<br />
abomination. To maintain authenticity, the<br />
entire book is drawn with ink and remains in<br />
black and white. Crumb refrains from delving<br />
into the typical grotesque and pornographic<br />
illustrations for which he is known, a challenge<br />
which he met with grace—despite his<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 59
REVIEWS<br />
Visual Arts<br />
daring and explicit past. There is indeed some<br />
fine artwork here; G-d’s endless white beard<br />
and flowing mane depict a sense of enlightenment<br />
and mightiness, his re-construction of<br />
Noah and his arc is masterful, and Abram’s<br />
haunted sleep when the Lord tells him his seed<br />
will be scattered for 400 years is powerfully<br />
delivered with perplexing dread.<br />
Reference the back of the book for<br />
Crumb’s personal comments and observations<br />
on each chapter. EF<br />
PHOTOGRAPHING<br />
THE JEWISH<br />
NATION, PICTURES<br />
FROM S. AN-SKY’S<br />
ETHNOGRAPHIC<br />
EXPEDITIONS<br />
Eugene M. Avrutin, Valerii Dymshits, Alexander<br />
Lvov, Harriet Murav, Alla Sokolova, eds.<br />
Brandeis University Press/UPNE, 2009. 212 pp. $39.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58465-792-7<br />
Shlyome-Zanvl Rappoport, known by his<br />
pen-name S. An-Sky (1863–1920), was<br />
not only “the father of <strong>Jewish</strong> anthropology<br />
and folklore,” but also the uncle of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
visual ethnography.<br />
He took his nephew, Solomon Borisovich<br />
Iudovin (1892–1954), then a young man of<br />
20, with him on his ethnographic expedition to<br />
Volynia, Podolia, and Kiev provinces as the<br />
expedition photographer. Iudovin took over<br />
2000 photographs, most of which An-Sky<br />
deposited, together with the rest of the material<br />
he collected during the three research seasons in<br />
1912–1914, in the museum of the <strong>Jewish</strong> Historical-Ethnographic<br />
Society (JHES) in St.<br />
Petersburg. However, apparently, Iudovin gave<br />
a portion of the photographs, for safe keeping,<br />
to the painter Natan Isaevich Al’tman<br />
(1889–1970). Upon his death, the theater<br />
designer Alexander Pasternak moved to his studio<br />
and there he found a trove of 350 photographs.<br />
He showed them to Alina Orlov who<br />
conducted research for a biography of Al’tman,<br />
and she, in turn, consulted with Viktor Kel’ner<br />
and Valerii Dymshits, both from Petersburg<br />
Judaica, a research center affiliated with the<br />
European University at St. Petersburg. They<br />
realized their provenence and value, acquired<br />
them for the institution and included them in<br />
a five volume collection Fotoarkhiv ekspeditsii<br />
An-skogo (St. Petersburg, 2005–2007). The 169<br />
photographs in the present volume are taken<br />
from this collection, and they are accompanied<br />
by six informative and interpretive essays by<br />
60 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
members of the Petersburg Judaica. The photographs<br />
are of utmost importance. They include<br />
portraits, some as mug-shots for anthropological<br />
documentation, craftsmen staged at their<br />
works, teachers and children in traditional<br />
schools and views of shtetl homes and squares.<br />
An-Sky set out on his expedition to discover<br />
and recover the <strong>Jewish</strong> folk culture and traditions<br />
in order to make them available for modern<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> artists as building blocks for the creation<br />
of modern national <strong>Jewish</strong> culture. 170<br />
photographs. BBA<br />
REINVENTING RITUAL:<br />
CONTEMPORARY ART<br />
AND DESIGN FOR<br />
JEWISH LIFE<br />
Daniel Belasco; Contributors: Arnold M. Eisen,<br />
Julie Lasky, Tamar Rubin, Danya Ruttenberg<br />
Yale University Press/The <strong>Jewish</strong> Museum, 2009.<br />
149 pp. $39.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-300-14682-0<br />
To judge this book by its illustrated cover<br />
and contents page is a challenge: witty or<br />
provocative? The <strong>Jewish</strong> Museum exhibition<br />
organizers probably aimed for ambivalence<br />
and they succeeded, in display and in this catalog,<br />
which accompanies an exhibition traveling<br />
from New York to San Francisco’s Contemporary<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Museum. This book is in<br />
the tradition of “Too <strong>Jewish</strong>?”—an earlier,<br />
controversial exhibition at the Museum.<br />
Interpretation of <strong>Jewish</strong> ritual objects, espe-<br />
AHMA, 2008 (Shalom Bat Chairs); acrylic on wood<br />
cially those focused on home-based ritual, is<br />
risky when done by practitioners of outrageous<br />
art, be they <strong>Jewish</strong> or non-<strong>Jewish</strong>, female or<br />
male. The curators/writers/artists don’t deny<br />
themselves lofty references—among others,<br />
Abraham Joshua Heschel’s comment that Gd’s<br />
revelation of the Torah is always ongoing.<br />
So empowered, artists conceive of limitless<br />
Bible portions rolled into gel capsules, perhaps<br />
to be ingested, on a regular basis. An austerely<br />
designed yad (pointer) incorporates a compass,<br />
verifying East; another includes a magnifying<br />
glass, reassuring impeccable Torah reading.<br />
Combining a kitchen apron and a tallit may be<br />
another matter for reader/viewer.<br />
Certainly some objects are refreshing, others<br />
vexing to consider, nevertheless the book<br />
is tied to a serious, nearly ponderous level by<br />
its topic, ritual—always ongoing. Acknowledgements,<br />
bibliography, contributors, exhibition<br />
checklist, index, notes. ABS<br />
TOBI KAHN:<br />
SACRED SPACES FOR<br />
THE 21ST CENTURY<br />
Ena Giurescu Heller, ed.<br />
GILES in association with The Museum of Biblical<br />
Art, 2009. 110 pp. $39.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-904832-64-5<br />
The book published to accompany the exhibition<br />
of the same name at the Museum of<br />
Biblical Art in New York City is comprised of<br />
short essays exploring themes of sacredness in<br />
abstract images and objects created by the artist<br />
Copyright: 2009 by Tobi Kahn.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
Tobi Kahn for ritual and meditative space.<br />
The exhibition, which was at MOBIA<br />
until January 2010, included Kahn’s reinterpretation<br />
of traditional ritual objects plus an<br />
ensemble of abstract art panels lining the glass<br />
walls of a congregation in Milwaukee, Wisconsin<br />
which “exalt the ritual function of the<br />
space,” according to Ena Heller, an expert on<br />
art and religion. Other contributors include a<br />
professor of religion, a museum curator, and<br />
Daniel Sperber, professor of Talmud at Bar-<br />
Ilan whose essay, “Sanctity in Space,” addresses<br />
Kahn’s obsession with sanctity in space and<br />
gives a concise explanation of Kahn’s success<br />
in creating an “ethereality of the dimension of<br />
holiness,” always seeking “for representation<br />
of the spiritual in the material.” Kahn’s<br />
memorial for victims of the 1995 Oklahoma<br />
bombing and the meditative space created for<br />
the Health Care Chaplaincy in New York<br />
City are also illustrative of this quest. Nessa<br />
Rapoport’s poems (“songs”) introduce and<br />
accompany a section of exquisite photographs<br />
of works in the exhibition. This book gives<br />
the exhibition the permanence it deserves. EN<br />
WOMEN’S STUDIES<br />
MITZVAH GIRLS:<br />
BRINGING UP THE<br />
NEXT GENERATION<br />
OF HASIDIC JEWS<br />
IN BROOKLYN<br />
Ayala Fader<br />
Princeton University Press, 2009. 280 pp. $22.95 (pbk.)<br />
ISBN: 978-0-691-13917-3 (pbk.)<br />
This fascinating work by a modern liberal<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> anthropologist explores daily life in<br />
the closed Hassidic community of Boro Park,<br />
Brooklyn. Dr. Ayala Fader, associate professor<br />
of anthropology at Fordham University, focuses<br />
on young Hassidic women, for it is they who<br />
will “bear and rear the next generation.”<br />
Submit a writing sample to jbc@jewishbooks.org<br />
Please include your name, address, phone<br />
number, e-mail address and areas of interest.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
She surveyed an array of generally unfamiliar<br />
subject matter, including the values of<br />
Hasidic femininity; the intricacies of Hasidic<br />
linguistics (e.g., two variation of Yiddish, one<br />
that girls speak to friends to fit in and another<br />
that they speak to older folks); the hierarchies<br />
of pious modesty; defiance of Hasidic young<br />
women; and how the standards of women’s<br />
modesty are established by male religious<br />
leadership.<br />
The work maintains a scholarly character<br />
and possesses the intellectual nature of a scientific<br />
exploration, while remaining a pleasurable<br />
casual read. This is because throughout<br />
the volume, the author elaborated upon her<br />
interactions and her warm personal experiences<br />
with members of the community she<br />
was investigating. 2009 National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong><br />
Award Winner in Women’s Studies. ShA<br />
STILL JEWISH:<br />
A HISTORY OF<br />
WOMEN AND<br />
INTERMARRIAGE<br />
IN AMERICA<br />
Keren R. McGinity<br />
New York University Press, 2009. 307 pp. $39.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8147-5730-7<br />
Once upon a time, women who married<br />
“out” were considered lost to the <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
faith; it was assumed they would follow their<br />
husbands into the Christian world, letting go<br />
of the <strong>Jewish</strong> culture and heritage they had<br />
been raised to honor, respect, and carry with<br />
them into the next generation. McGinity, a<br />
research fellow at the University of Michigan,<br />
set out to examine these assumptions and see<br />
whether they held up under the close scrutiny<br />
of a historian. The result is a very readable<br />
book, one which takes an academic topic and<br />
treats it with care and presence and manages,<br />
in a lively way, to unravel the tightly woven<br />
tapestry of women and interfaith marriage and<br />
expose the facts and feelings at its core.<br />
Women’s Studies<br />
REVIEWS<br />
Through detailed research, McGinity<br />
demonstrates, for example, that women who<br />
intermarried in the last half of the 20 th century<br />
were more likely than their counterparts in<br />
the earlier years to raise <strong>Jewish</strong> children. She<br />
documents how their <strong>Jewish</strong> identity followed<br />
them into their mixed marriage and<br />
provides a sharply defined historical perspective<br />
on the relationships that drove them and<br />
sustained them. The book is rich in history,<br />
and for those who desire more, the extensive<br />
notes at the back provide much additional<br />
information that supports and elucidates the<br />
text. Appendix, notes, selected index. LFB<br />
WOMEN AND<br />
JUDAISM<br />
Rabbi Malka Drucker, ed.<br />
Praeger, 2009. 300 pp. $65.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0275991548<br />
ight now I am the oldest and you are<br />
“Rthe youngest Bat Mitzvah” [sic], said<br />
Judith Kaplan Eisenstein to Rabbi Malka<br />
Drucker’s daughter on the Shabbat of her bat<br />
mitzvah. Drucker reflects on the significance of<br />
that poignant moment in the introduction to<br />
her book, Women and Judaism, many years after<br />
that occasion: “A single moment held seventy<br />
years of history as a gracious and wise woman<br />
blessed a bright-eyed and promising daughter of<br />
Israel.” The book is a collection of essays that<br />
address topics that are both diverse and broad:<br />
from the historical to the liturgical; from Biblical<br />
women to ‘women of the Holocaust’; from<br />
renewing ancient traditions to creating new ritual.<br />
Its strength, therefore, is also its weakness: the<br />
book tries to be too many things at once, bouncing<br />
from topic to topic, never truly finding its<br />
center. It is an ambitious book, a brave attempt<br />
to cover so many aspects of what it means (and<br />
has meant) to be a <strong>Jewish</strong> woman. JP<br />
Would you like to be a reviewer for <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World?<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 61
CHILDREN’S REVIEWS<br />
The Aleph-Bais Trip on the Aleph-Bais Ship<br />
Chanl Altein; Baruch Becker, illus.; D.L. Rosenfeld, ed.<br />
HaChai Publishing, 2009. 30 pp. $10.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1929628254<br />
Ahoy there Mateys! Gather ‘round and join the Aleph-Bais as they board their ship, ready to<br />
set sail. One by one the Hebrew letters make their way to the Aleph-Bais ship. Some hop<br />
by pogo stick, others fly in by airplane or hot air balloon, but come they do until they are all on<br />
board their old-time schooner. Well, almost everyone is there. It seems sof is missing. The letters<br />
set sail to find their lost companion. Once tucked safely aboard, the Aleph-Bet are ready to go.<br />
This is an adorable first look at the Aleph-Bet, according to the Ashkenazi pronunciation. The<br />
letters present themselves in Aleph-Bais order in the first half of the book, and then appear randomly<br />
in the latter half. They are cheerful card-shaped characters with smiley faces and sailor<br />
hats. The book pages are sturdy and plastic coated, perfect for little hands. For ages 2–5. MB<br />
An Adventure in<br />
Latkaland<br />
Karen Fisman; Thomas McAteer, illus.<br />
JoRa <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 64 pp. $13.50<br />
ISBN: 978-09812650-0-1<br />
It is refreshing to find an illustrated chapter<br />
book with a Hanukah theme. In 10 short<br />
chapters, Fisman creates the imaginative<br />
world of Latkaland. With the arrival of a<br />
magic dreidl and the utterance of “Nes Gadol<br />
Hayah Sham”, young Sarah and Jacob are<br />
transported to a fantasy land inhabited by<br />
“Oily” and other strange looking latka makers.<br />
Once in Latkaland, Sarah and Jacob join<br />
forces with these “Lunchkins” to foil the<br />
Hanukah goblins. The Hanukah goblins are<br />
boiling all the potatoes that are used for latkes<br />
and destroying the Lunchkins’ ability to fry<br />
them to make the traditional pancakes. The<br />
children encourage the Lunchkins to “be like<br />
the Maccabees who were fearless and believed<br />
in themselves.” Their battles and their triumphs<br />
are wonderful reading for young children,<br />
with just enough suspense to keep them<br />
interested. The story is accompanied by colorful<br />
watercolor illustrations and maps that<br />
enhance the story. Additionally, the end of<br />
the book contains two recipes—one for latkes<br />
and one for a jujube dreidl. This book is perfect<br />
for an emerging chapter book reader or<br />
for a parent to read to a child as a fanciful<br />
bedtime story. For ages 5–8. MLK<br />
Clever Rachel<br />
Debby Waldman; Cindy Revell, illus.<br />
Orca <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. 32 pp. $19.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-55469-081-7<br />
Riddles are the heart of this enjoyable<br />
retelling of a <strong>Jewish</strong> folktale. Young Rachel<br />
has been raised on riddles and is as clever as any<br />
boy, though her mother would prefer that she<br />
focus on learning to make kugel and setting a<br />
proper Shabbat table. Jacob, the baker’s son,<br />
doubts her ability to solve riddles as well as he<br />
does, so Rachel decides to teach him a lesson by<br />
stepping back when a distraught young woman<br />
named Miriam comes pleading for help. If<br />
Miriam doesn’t solve three riddles, her beloved<br />
will be forced to marry someone else. Jacob<br />
struggles with the riddles until he becomes flustered<br />
and finally turns to Rachel for the answers,<br />
remembering that true wisdom comes from<br />
working together. Although minimally sprinkled<br />
with old world phrasing, the text reads<br />
more like a picture book than a folktale. Appeal-<br />
ing full-page illustrations in golden hues depict<br />
traditionally garbed villagers with expressive<br />
faces that bring the story to life. But the true<br />
appeal of this book is the riddles, including a full<br />
page of them at the end just for fun. Read with<br />
Raisel’s Riddle by Erica Silverman and entries<br />
from While Standing on One Foot by Nina Jaffe<br />
for a great introduction to <strong>Jewish</strong> riddle and<br />
puzzle stories. For ages 7–9. TM<br />
Daniel’s Diary:<br />
How God Saved<br />
Me From the Lions<br />
Allia Zobel Nolan; Linda Clearwater, illus.<br />
Harvest House Publishers, 2009. 32 pp. $15.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-7369-2544-0<br />
Here’s a fresh bible story for the just graduating<br />
from picture books crowd. Age<br />
appropriate hip language and the cult of<br />
celebrity deliver the scoop in a first hand, personalized<br />
tell-all. Daniel’s diary speaks directly<br />
about more than his escapade in the lions’ den,<br />
the dramatic incident on which picture books<br />
focus. Young readers learn the royal politics of<br />
Babylonian exile as written in the first half of<br />
the <strong>Book</strong> of Daniel, although, make sure to<br />
note that this version is based on a Christian<br />
bible. This story accurately agrees with the<br />
Tanakh, but the order of some events are<br />
changed to make vignettes clear about location,<br />
characters and motives. Daniel’s diary<br />
explains his experience in administrative terms.<br />
He rises to power through honesty and dream<br />
interpretation. He discloses his friends’—<br />
Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego—escape<br />
from the fiery furnace. He works for three<br />
Kings, with co-workers, then promoted, above<br />
them. Envious cohorts devise a decree to get<br />
rid of Daniel whose crime is praying to God,<br />
not men. The tolerant King Darius, who<br />
accepts Daniel’s kosher habits, does not want<br />
to do this, but must obey his own laws. God’s<br />
angel saves Daniel and the happy king writes a<br />
new law. The breezy text adds annoying nicknames<br />
and names characters unnamed in the<br />
Hebrew Bible. The layout is enticing: the font,<br />
youthful; the illustrations, cute bordering on<br />
cartoon, but they deliver the message. Readers<br />
will chew over concepts of God, prayer and<br />
loyalty after reading this funny book where<br />
wild beasts and hateful men do not chew up<br />
our Daniel! For ages 8–10. EGC<br />
62 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010 www.jewishbookcouncil.org
Monika Schroder<br />
Front Street, 2009. 163 pp. $17.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59078-701-4<br />
The Dog in the<br />
Wood<br />
The Dog in the Wood is a fictional story<br />
focusing on the Soviet occupation of<br />
East Germany beginning in 1945. It was<br />
inspired by the life of the author’s father and<br />
by her 1989 visit to the village of his birth.<br />
She reminds us that not all victims of the<br />
German war machine were Jews, and certainly<br />
in the aftermath of the war, many German<br />
children endured great hardship. This book<br />
tells the heartbreaking story of nine-year-old<br />
Fritz, a boy who lives with his mother, sister<br />
and grandparents on a rural German farm.<br />
Fritz’s life is thrown into chaos when the<br />
Soviets arrive. His grandfather is a staunch<br />
Nazi supporter who commits suicide in the<br />
barn when he realizes the Germans have lost<br />
the war. Russian soldiers move into the family’s<br />
home, steal the cows, and eventually dispossess<br />
the family of their farm. The narrative<br />
relays the many disappointments Fritz<br />
endures as he leaves the home and garden he<br />
loves and moves in with relatives. Just when<br />
She reminds us that not all<br />
victims of the German<br />
war machine were Jews.<br />
he thinks life can get no worse, the Soviets<br />
accuse his mother of breaking the law and<br />
they march her away at gunpoint. An<br />
author’s note informs the reader that there<br />
were ten “special camps” run by the Soviets<br />
(some of the same ones used to imprison<br />
Jews) where many innocent Germans suffered<br />
and died. The unrelenting narrative of sad<br />
events may make the book more appropriate<br />
for older teens, as only the rare Russian soldier<br />
shows any kindness to the family. The<br />
reader does come away enlightened about the<br />
aftermath of the war and how difficult it was<br />
for ordinary Germans to simply survive. This<br />
riveting debut novel could serve as an additional<br />
read for those already familiar with<br />
Holocaust themed literature who would like<br />
to learn more about its aftermath. For ages 12<br />
and up. LK<br />
CHILDREN’S REVIEWS<br />
Fox Walked Alone<br />
Barbara Reid<br />
Albert Whitman & Company, 2009. 30 pp. $16.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8075-2548-7<br />
Fox wakes one morning feeling that “there<br />
was something in the air.” He notices pairs<br />
of animals marching by in a hurry and joins<br />
the procession without quite knowing why.<br />
After a long journey, including a night when<br />
“tooth and claw and fur and feather...lay<br />
down to sleep together” and a detour to free<br />
a pair of caged doves in an abandoned city,<br />
fox finds a she-fox waiting for him and they<br />
enter Noah’s Ark together. The rhyming text<br />
is serviceable, although there are few awkward<br />
moments as in the forced rhyming of<br />
“thought” and “not” and the sudden shifts<br />
from couplets to monorhyme. The internal<br />
logic is a little shaky as well: it’s odd that all<br />
the other animals, including the female fox,<br />
know what is going on while the fox does not.<br />
Noah’s appearance at the end of the story is a<br />
surprise to the fox, and the significance of the<br />
ark is not explained in the text. Reid has supplied<br />
a springboard from which the religious<br />
content can be supplied by readers who bring<br />
their own background knowledge with them.<br />
This book is best used as a supplement to<br />
more Torah-traditional retellings, rather than<br />
as an introduction to the Noah story. Despite<br />
the weaknesses of the text, Barbara Reid’s signature<br />
plasticine art elevates this book to a<br />
“must have” level. The bright colors, the variations<br />
in texture, the intricate detail, the<br />
changes in perspective, and the touches of<br />
silent humor all make this a book to pore over<br />
again and again. For ages 4–8. HE<br />
Hoppy Hanukkah!<br />
Linda Glaser; Daniel Howarth, illus.<br />
Albert Whitman and Company, 2009. 24 pp. $15.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8075-3378-9.<br />
Two small bunnies, Simon and Violet, do<br />
not remember previous Hanukkahs, but<br />
are old enough this year to help their parents<br />
place candles in the menorah. They are excited<br />
to hear about the customs of Hanukkah from<br />
their parents, and enjoy both smelling and<br />
eating grandma’s latkes. Grandpa successfully<br />
teaches them to play dreidel, and also is<br />
depicted wearing a blue kippa while lighting<br />
the hanukkiah. There is enough introductory<br />
information for a young reader with little or<br />
no <strong>Jewish</strong> background, while the book is also<br />
satisfying for the reader who knows what holiday<br />
customs to expect. This is a holiday story<br />
filled with sweetness and family love, written<br />
for pre-schoolers. Illustrations are charming<br />
and colorful and are totally appropriate to the<br />
juvenile text. For ages 2–5. SF<br />
Simone Elkeles<br />
Flux, 2009. 264 pp. $9.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0738718798<br />
How to Ruin<br />
Your Boyfriend’s<br />
Reputation<br />
i, my name is Amy Barak-Nelson. My<br />
“Hmom is a Nelson and my dad is a<br />
Barak and just in case you were wondering,<br />
I’m aware I have two last names. If you don’t<br />
know me, I’m a seventeen year old American<br />
teenager with red, white, and blue blood running<br />
through my veins. You’re probably wondering<br />
why right now I’m on a bus in Israel<br />
on my way to an Israeli boot camp.”<br />
In Simone Elkeles’ third book of her<br />
“How To” series, How to Ruin Your Boyfriend’s<br />
Reputation, you don’t have to wonder long.<br />
Amy Barak-Nelson—drama queen—holds<br />
nothing back. This Chicago princess has<br />
signed up for one week of Israeli boot camp<br />
in order to see her boyfriend, Avi, who is stationed<br />
there. Accompanied by her friends,<br />
Amy deals with the heat, her hair, the language,<br />
and the unexpected discovery that her<br />
boyfriend has kissed another girl behind her<br />
back. The Israeli boot camp experience provides<br />
challenges for the Americans, but no<br />
real danger. Although the tone of the narrative<br />
is always fun and light-hearted, this book<br />
offers themes that include friendship, loyalty,<br />
forgiveness, as well as pride in Israel. Some<br />
readers might find Amy shallow or superficial,<br />
but all will find her fun loving, and when<br />
it counts, able to pull it together. Chick lit<br />
readers will love this series. The humorous<br />
tone and content is suitable for readers 12<br />
and up. SA<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 63
The Champion<br />
of Children:<br />
The Story of<br />
Janusz Korczak<br />
Tomek Bogacki<br />
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009. 40 pp. $17.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0374341367<br />
In death as in life, the story of Dr. Janusz<br />
Korczak, the <strong>Jewish</strong>-Polish physician and<br />
Warsaw orphanage director continues to captivate<br />
people around the world. When I was<br />
in Poland recently, it was clear that Korczak,<br />
the pen name of Henryk Goldszmit, had<br />
become the hero Jew of the nation. His story<br />
of love and devotion for all children was<br />
widely known and widely honored, as it<br />
should be. In this beautiful picture book,<br />
Tomek Bogacki puts a human touch on Korczak’s<br />
life through the use of sensitive text<br />
and evocative acrylic paintings. From early<br />
childhood, Korczak dreamt of a society in<br />
which children would be treated with dignity<br />
and respect. As an adult, his pedagogical writings<br />
and children’s books built his reputation.<br />
In his orphanage, children were allowed to<br />
govern themselves democratically, in effect<br />
creating a caring family environment. Even<br />
when the Nazis forced the removal of the<br />
orphanage into the enclosed walls of the War-<br />
I Am God’s<br />
Paintbrush<br />
Sandy Eisenberg Sasso; Annette Compton, illus.<br />
SkyLights Path Publishing, 2009. 24 pp. $7.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1594732652<br />
Rabbi Sasso has complemented her earlier<br />
book, God’s Paintbrush, with this new toddler<br />
board book that could help a child establish<br />
the relationship between God and man, in<br />
the first person. I Am God’s Paintbrush introduces<br />
the concept that God is within all of us<br />
and that we are conduits for God’s colors and<br />
paintbrush here on earth. The book is presented<br />
as serving as an inter-faith, multicultural,<br />
non-denominational and non-sectarian format.<br />
Sasso begins by introducing the colors in the<br />
world and then switches to music, song and<br />
64 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
saw Ghetto, Korczak tried, with great hardship,<br />
to maintain that level of living. He<br />
declined offers to save himself and boarded<br />
the train to Treblinka with his children.<br />
“Though he couldn’t save his orphans from<br />
the horror of the Holocaust, his insistence<br />
that children have the right to be loved, educated,<br />
and protected has continued to inspire<br />
people all over the world.” For ages 8–12. NHF<br />
Even Higher! A Rosh<br />
Hashanah Story<br />
I.L. Peretz; Eric A. Kimmel, adapter; Jill Weber, illus.<br />
Holiday House, 2009. 24 pp. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8234-2020-9<br />
In the original Yiddish short story by I.L.<br />
Peretz, the rabbi of Nemirov disappears on<br />
the days preceding the holy days of Rosh<br />
Hashanah. The Ukrainian villagers believe he<br />
has gone to speak to God on their behalf. A<br />
doubting Litvak, sceptical as men from Lithuania<br />
have a reputation for being, questions the<br />
truth of their belief. Kimmel opens his picture<br />
book adaptation with the core question,<br />
“Where did the rabbi go?” The Litvak determines<br />
to find out. Playful, gouache illustrations,<br />
chock full of cats, chickens, mice, and a<br />
nibbling goat, follow the human rabbi and spying<br />
Litvak as the Litvak hides under the rabbi’s<br />
bed and sneaks behind when the rabbi, dis-<br />
dance. The change feels unexpected and out of<br />
sync with the overall tone and title of the book,<br />
making it especially difficult to initiate these<br />
hard to grasp concepts with young toddlers. A<br />
more consistent approach would have been to<br />
address only the developing metaphor of color,<br />
painting and paintbrush to God throughout<br />
the book rather than additionally embarking<br />
on song and dance. Sasso does return to color<br />
...introduces the concept that<br />
God is within all of us and that<br />
we are conduits for God’s colors<br />
and paintbrush here on earth.<br />
in the closing two pages. The illustrations by<br />
Annette Compton are reminiscent of the<br />
Woodstock era and are bright and abstracted<br />
watercolors that have a sense of childlikeness.<br />
The inside cover provides a statement to adults<br />
on exploring spirituality with children and further<br />
resource titles are also given. In all, the<br />
guised as a peasant, chops wood in the forest<br />
and then lights the fire for a sick woman in the<br />
poorest section of the village. An endnote tells<br />
that the next scene was inspired by Kimmel’s<br />
own grandmother at age 95 - The rabbi sings a<br />
Ukrainian drinking song and pulls the old<br />
woman up to dance - before returning to the<br />
traditional tale. Afterwards, the Litvak, now a<br />
disciple, asserts that the rabbi of Nemirov has<br />
gone even higher than heaven. Aside from a<br />
curious three pages which slow the story down<br />
to over-explain how the Litvak is a doubter, this<br />
is the most child-friendly version of Peretz’s<br />
classic story now in print. Light, upbeat art<br />
with figures like paper doll cut-outs and clear<br />
black font help connect this accessible tale of<br />
truly unselfish giving for readers ages 6–9. SF<br />
Tropical Secrets:<br />
Holocaust<br />
Refugees in Cuba<br />
Margarita Engle<br />
Henry Holt and Company, 2009. 199 pp. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0805089363<br />
Very little has been written about the Holocaust<br />
refugees who, denied entry to the<br />
United States and other countries, found<br />
book attempts to cover a variety of needs: philosophy,<br />
religion, inter-faith, multiculturalism;<br />
however is not entirely successful in doing so.<br />
For ages 1-3. CM<br />
Noah’s Notebook:<br />
How God Saved<br />
Me, My Family, and<br />
the Animals From<br />
the Flood<br />
Allia Zobel Nolan; Linda Clearwater, illus.<br />
Harvest House Publishers, 2009. 32 pp. $14.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-7369-2508-2<br />
There are many books about Noah’s ark,<br />
and quite a few from the perspective of<br />
different animals, but the imagined journal<br />
Noah kept gives a new point of view. Noah<br />
describes his conversations with God, build-<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
efuge in Cuba. This book uses poetry to<br />
tell the story of one such escapee from Nazi<br />
Germany who lands in Cuba with nothing<br />
but his woollen coat and winter clothes. A<br />
beautiful young girl helps him to acclimate<br />
to the island life style, but she has her own<br />
reasons to want to escape. Daniel shares his<br />
fear of the horrors he left behind and his<br />
reluctance to embrace the island life<br />
through a series of poems in his voice.<br />
Paloma tells her story in poetry also as she<br />
tries to help Daniel and the other refugees<br />
despite the fact that her father is “El<br />
Gordo,” the man who is keeping the other<br />
refugee ships from landing and who is<br />
threatening to send the refugees already in<br />
Cuba back to Germany. David, an old man<br />
who came to Cuba from Russia, and who<br />
is <strong>Jewish</strong> like Daniel, helps the two children<br />
as they learn to share their feelings<br />
and overcome their fears.<br />
The poems are haunting in their<br />
imagery and honesty. Each character<br />
speaks with a distinctive voice. Although<br />
the story has some action, it is mostly a<br />
novel of character. The reader gets to<br />
know each character and watch as Daniel<br />
and Paloma change and grow. This book<br />
is highly recommended for middle school<br />
and high school students who want a different<br />
Holocaust story. A historical note at<br />
the end of the book puts the actual historical<br />
events in a context that will help<br />
young readers relate to the events in the<br />
story. For ages 12 and up. SD<br />
ing the ark, loading food for the animals, and<br />
how the other people made fun of him.<br />
Entries Six, Seven and Eight detail the rain<br />
and flood and life on the ark. Entry Nine, the<br />
final one, is about life after Noah and the animals<br />
leave the ark. There is a short glossary<br />
and some interesting facts at the end of the<br />
text. There are several clues that this book is<br />
written from a Christian perspective. In the<br />
glossary, “Hebrew” is defined as “the name<br />
given to God’s chosen people who were also<br />
called Israelites.” Neither moniker was used<br />
until much later in time. Noah was not <strong>Jewish</strong>.<br />
In a picture where Noah and his family<br />
are praying, the people are kneeling and have<br />
their hands together. The book emphasizes<br />
God’s love for Noah as opposed to his disappointment<br />
with what was wrong with the<br />
world. While the colorful illustrations are<br />
cute and full of energy, the humor and puns<br />
(“What does Noah know-ah?”) of the text, as<br />
well as the wordiness, are for an older audi-<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
ence than the illustrations. This book is an<br />
optional choice at best, for ages 5–8. KSP<br />
Surviving the Angel<br />
of Death<br />
Eva Mozes Kor and Lisa Rojany Buccieri<br />
Tanglewood Publishing, 2009. 141 pp. $14.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-933718-28-6<br />
Eva and Miriam Mozes were just 10 years old<br />
when their family was sent to Auschwitz.<br />
When their parents and older sisters were sent<br />
to the gas chambers, their lives were spared and<br />
because they were twins, they became subjects<br />
of Dr. Josef Mengele’s experiments. In Surviving<br />
the Angel of Death, Eva recounts the harrowing<br />
ordeals she and Miriam faced. She provides<br />
plenty of detail, though there are gaps she cannot<br />
fill in—for example, she was deliberately<br />
infected with a disease Mengele expected to be<br />
fatal so that he could kill Miriam when Eva<br />
died and compare the healthy body to the diseased<br />
one. She survived, though she still does<br />
not know what illness he gave her. Even after<br />
the camp was liberated, Eva and Miriam did<br />
not have an easy time. They eventually went to<br />
Israel, and then to America. Eva describes her<br />
difficult early years in Indiana and the anti-<br />
Semitism she faced. In 1984, Eva and Miriam<br />
founded a support group for people who had<br />
been victims of Mengele’s sadistic experiments,<br />
and in 1995 Eva opened a Holocaust museum<br />
their parents and older sisters were<br />
sent to the gas chambers, their lives<br />
were spared and because they<br />
were twins, they became subjects<br />
of Dr. Josef Mengele’s experiments.<br />
in Terre Haute, Indiana. (She is also known as<br />
the subject of a recent controversial documentary<br />
entitled “Forgiving Dr. Mengele” which<br />
highlights her ideas about justice, revenge and<br />
the possibility of healing through forgiveness.)<br />
Kor and Buccieri include maps to help readers<br />
place the events and photos to help make the<br />
people seem more real. Though painful to read,<br />
Surviving the Angel of Death provides an<br />
informative first-hand account of the harrowing<br />
experiences of one set of twins at<br />
Auschwitz. For ages 14 and up. MLB<br />
CHILDREN’S REVIEWS<br />
The Waiting Wall<br />
Leah Braunstein Levy; Avi Katz, illus.<br />
Hachai Publishing, 2009. 30 pp. $12.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-929628-49-0<br />
The Waiting Wall presents young children<br />
with the history and the importance of<br />
the Western Wall in Jerusalem. The book is<br />
written from an Orthodox perspective as evidenced<br />
by the word choices of “Kosel<br />
HaMaarovi,” “Beis Ha Mikdosh,” and<br />
“Moshiach.” It describes people swaying in<br />
prayer, placing letters to G-d in the cracks of<br />
the wall, crying and watching the ceaseless<br />
movement and energy that surrounds the<br />
wall. “The Kosel reaches arms across the shining<br />
empty space, holding it quiet and still,”<br />
Levy writes. The gentle words and appealing<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 65
2010 SYDNEY TAYLOR BOOK AWARDS<br />
April Halprin Wayland and Stephane Jorisch, author and illustrator of New Year at<br />
the Pier: A Rosh Hashanah Story, Robin Friedman, author of The Importance of<br />
Wings, and Margarita Engle, author of Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba,<br />
are the 2010 winners of the prestigious Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award.<br />
The Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award honors new books for children and teens that exemplify<br />
the highest literary standards while<br />
authentically portraying the <strong>Jewish</strong> experience.<br />
The award memorializes Sydney<br />
Taylor, author of the classic All-of-a-Kind<br />
Family series. The winners will receive<br />
their awards at the Association of <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Libraries convention in Seattle this July.<br />
Six Sydney Taylor Honor <strong>Book</strong>s were<br />
named for 2009. For Younger Readers,<br />
Honor <strong>Book</strong>s are: Nachshon Who Was<br />
Afraid to Swim by Deborah Bodin<br />
Cohen with illustrations by Jago (Kar-<br />
Ben), Benjamin and the Silver Goblet by<br />
Jacqueline Jules with illustrations by Natascia Ugliano (Kar-Ben), Yankee at the Seder<br />
by Elka Weber with illustrations by Adam Gustavson (Tricycle Press) and You Never<br />
Heard of Sandy Koufax? by Jonah Winter with illustrations and an amazing lenticular<br />
cover by Andre Carrilho (Schwartz & Wade <strong>Book</strong>s, an imprint of Random House). Two<br />
illustrations communicate its meaning to<br />
children, to give them a sense that it is their<br />
wall, too, and to let them know that they can<br />
find spirituality there as well. “It’s easy to feel<br />
close to Hashem here,” she writes. Levy concludes<br />
the book with her hope that the Messiah<br />
will come soon. “Maybe today someone<br />
will say that one tefillah that will finally bring<br />
peace and happiness to the world,” she writes.<br />
“Maybe you will be the one.” If teaching your<br />
children about the Messiah and the Western<br />
Wall is important to you, this is a good introductory<br />
read for young children. It is a book<br />
written with a warm, gentle love of Judaism<br />
and a fervent belief in the coming of the Messiah.<br />
For ages 4–7. LK<br />
When I First Held<br />
You: A Lullaby<br />
from Israel<br />
Mirik Snir; Eleyor Snir, illus.<br />
Kar-Ben Publishing, 2009. 32 pp. $9.95<br />
ISBN 978-0-7613-5098-9<br />
With captivating illustrations by the<br />
author’s daughter, this “lullaby” from<br />
Israel serves as a quiet and calming end to the<br />
day for the very youngest children. Animals<br />
with their young are beautifully depicted within<br />
a peaceful world into which babies arrive<br />
with purpose. There are only two or three<br />
66 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
words per page (a’ la Goodnight Moon), used<br />
mostly as a cue for children to enjoy the bright,<br />
folk art style illustrations. The last pages contain<br />
a place for your child’s name and photo<br />
and a tender quote by Rabbi Nachman of<br />
Breslov—“The day you were born is the day<br />
God decided that the world could not exist<br />
without you.” This is the only clue that the<br />
book may be targeted for a <strong>Jewish</strong> audience. It<br />
certainly would make a nice gift and keepsake<br />
for any family with a new baby, regardless of<br />
religious background. However, the fact that it<br />
is paperback limits the gift/photo album<br />
appeal. For ages birth–3 years.<br />
Zvuvi’s Israel<br />
Tami Lehman-Wilzig; Ksenia Topaz, illus.<br />
Kar-Ben Publishing, 2009. 32 pp. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8225-8759-0<br />
Join Zvuvi, the fly, and his cousin Zahava<br />
as they buzz all around Israel. Beginning in<br />
Jerusalem, they zoom to dozens of interesting<br />
sites. With a smattering of facts about each<br />
location, accentuated by a few words in<br />
Hebrew and lots of excitement, the two flies<br />
show readers things that make Israel so special.<br />
Join them for lunch as Zvuvi nibbles “on a<br />
works in translation were named Honor <strong>Book</strong>s for Older Readers: Anne Frank: Her<br />
Life in Worlds and Pictures by Menno Metselaar and Ruud van der Rol (translated by<br />
Arnold J. Pomerans) (Roaring Brook Press/Flash Point, an imprint of Macmillan Children’s<br />
Publishing Group) and A Faraway Island by Annika Thor (translated by Linda<br />
Schenck) (Delacorte <strong>Book</strong>s for Young Readers, an imprint of Random House). Lost, a<br />
historical novel by Jacqueline Davies<br />
(Marshall Cavendish) and Naomi’s Song,<br />
a biblical fiction by Selma Kritzer Silverberg<br />
(JPS) were named Honor <strong>Book</strong>s in<br />
the Teen Reader Category.<br />
The JPS Illustrated Children’s Bible<br />
by Ellen Frankel with illustrations by Avi<br />
Katz (JPS) was named a Notable <strong>Book</strong><br />
for All Ages.<br />
In addition to the medal-winners,<br />
the Award Committee designated twenty-two<br />
Notable <strong>Book</strong>s of <strong>Jewish</strong> Content<br />
for 2010: eight in the Younger<br />
Readers Category, eight in the Older Readers Category, and six for Teens. Notable<br />
titles, and more information about the Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award, may be found<br />
online at www.SydneyTaylor<strong>Book</strong>Award.org. A blog about the awards can be found at<br />
www.sydneytaylorbookaward.blogspot.com.<br />
falafel ball that has fallen to the ground at<br />
Machaneh Yehudah...” Then find him as he<br />
hides in Soreq Cave and learn about stalactites<br />
and stalagmites along the way. The adventurous<br />
Zvuvi is almost swatted by a cook in Abu<br />
Ghosh, then barely escapes the jaws of an alligator<br />
in Hamat Gader. From lunch at Lake<br />
Kinneret to scuba diving in Eilat, the two flies<br />
cover the entire country. A map of Israel is<br />
included to help readers locate their many<br />
stopping points. Zvuvi’s Israel is both entertaining<br />
and informative; an excellent introduction<br />
to the many wonderful cities and attractions<br />
Israel has to offer. For ages 6–10. MB<br />
YOUR AUDIENCE IS<br />
HERE. REACH THOUSANDS<br />
OF DEDICATED<br />
JEWISH READERS.<br />
ADVERTISE YOUR<br />
PROGRAM, EVENT OR BOOK<br />
IN JEWISH BOOK WORLD.<br />
EMAIL<br />
jbc@jewishbooks.org<br />
FOR RATE SCHEDULE.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
A CHAT WITH ZACHARYSHAPIRO<br />
By Barbara Bietz<br />
I am thrilled to welcome Zachary<br />
Shapiro to the blog. His first children’s<br />
book, We’re All in the Same<br />
Boat (Putnam), is a delightful<br />
retelling of the story of Noah’s Ark,<br />
beautifully illustrated by Jack E.<br />
Davis. Zach has inspired people of all<br />
ages through original story-telling,<br />
music and heartfelt humor. As the<br />
Rabbi of Temple Akiba in Culver City,<br />
California, Zach finds many ways to<br />
bring new life to old legends. He wrote We’re All in the Same Boat to teach<br />
children and adults how we can motivate and support each other in the face<br />
of tough circumstances. A native of Massachusetts, Zach Shapiro lives in<br />
Southern California with his partner and their dog, “Daisy,” who has barked<br />
her share of complaints on a rainy day!<br />
What was the inspiration for writing<br />
We’re All in the Same Boat?<br />
A few years ago, my sister-in-law, Leora Krygier, published her novel, First the<br />
Raven. At one of her readings, she described how the raven was the first bird to<br />
fly free from Noah’s Ark. And in relating the drama of the book, she used the<br />
phrase, “We’re all in the same boat.” At the moment, something stirred in me.<br />
Noah had always been a favorite story, and I loved making it come to life with<br />
children. And so, I began to think about the tired, restless creatures on Noah’s Ark,<br />
from the ants to the zebras. I went home that night and wrote the first draft of<br />
my manuscript.<br />
Can you share a bit about your writer’s journey?<br />
In my work, I tell stories all the time. But writing stories was a new animal<br />
(pun intended). I had always dreamed of writing a children’s picture book, but I<br />
really had no idea about the process. So I went out and bought The Everything<br />
Guide to Writing Children’s <strong>Book</strong>s. I read it cover to cover. In the back is an index<br />
of publishers, and I researched each of them on line. I made lists of which publishers<br />
would be appropriate for my book. And I considered whether the book should<br />
specifically target the <strong>Jewish</strong> market or not. And so, I carefully selected a handful<br />
of publishers, prepared cover letters, and send out my manuscript.<br />
And I waited. And waited. And waited. And I was rejected. Many times. But all<br />
it takes is one. And when I got a response from Putnam, I leapt for joy!<br />
The illustrations in We’re All in the Same<br />
Boat are delightful. What was your response<br />
when you first saw them?<br />
When Putnam first told me that it usually takes 2-3 years for the book to hit the<br />
shelves, I nearly plotzed. It seems liked forever. But they insisted that we find the<br />
right illustrator. When I learned that they had selected Jack E. Davis, I was thrilled. A<br />
full year went by before I saw Jack’s first sketches. And though I adore Jack’s art, I<br />
didn’t know what to expect. I was a little scared. But my nervous anticipation transformed<br />
into delight. I could never have begun to imagine such amazing illustrations,<br />
and I am in awe that an artist can convey words like, “Vexed” and “Impatient.”<br />
CHILDREN’S REVIEWS<br />
How has your congregation reacted<br />
to your book?<br />
To launch the book, I worked with Temple Akiba to host a premier reading<br />
along with a “blessing of the animals.” We encouraged members and guests to<br />
brings their pets to synagogue after Sunday School. Our front courtyard was filled<br />
with dogs, cats, bunnies, frogs, and even a snake! After the reading, I offered a<br />
special blessing for the joy that our furry friends bring to our lives each day. Later<br />
in the year, our Nursery School embarked on a Noah’s Ark project that received an<br />
award from the Bureau of <strong>Jewish</strong> Education. Young and old alike have been so<br />
enthusiastic about We’re All in the Same Boat. We have sold over 200 copies<br />
through our gift store alone.<br />
What are some fun facts about you?<br />
I grew up in Boston and have lived in the Los Angeles areas since my ordination<br />
from the Hebrew Union College—<strong>Jewish</strong> Institute of Religion in 1997. I was<br />
the Associate Rabbi at University Synagogue in Brentwood for eight years before<br />
becoming the Senior Rabbi at Temple Akiba. My goal in life is to help bring goodness<br />
into the world, one act of purposeful kindness at a time. I am big aviation<br />
fan, and I have a vast library of books about commercial aviation and airports. I<br />
love to bike ride and I enjoy good theatre. My partner, Ron Galperin, and I have a<br />
poodle named Daisy. Who knows... someday you may be reading a book about her<br />
as well!<br />
Thanks so much for sharing your journey with us! To learn more, visit<br />
Zachary Shapiro’s web site: www.allinthesameboat.com<br />
Barbara Bietz is a freelance writer and children’s book reviewer. She is currently<br />
a member of the Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award Committee. Barbara is the author<br />
of the middle grade book, Like a Maccabee. She has a blog dedicated to <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
books for children at www.BarbaraB<strong>Book</strong>Blog.Blogspot.com.
CHILDRENS’ BOOK PROFILE<br />
DUTCH GRAPHIC NOVELS IN TRANSLATION<br />
FIND A TEEN AUDIENCE<br />
By Hillary Zana<br />
These graphic novels were originally published in conjunction with the Anne<br />
Frank house in Amsterdam. Both are historical fiction about World War II. A<br />
Family Secret, written in cooperation with the Resistance Museum of Friesland, gives<br />
an overview of the Netherlands during the war, through the story of Helena, a Dutch<br />
girl, and her good friend Esther. The Search, which was written in cooperation with<br />
the <strong>Jewish</strong> Historical Museum of Amsterdam, tells the same story, but centers specifically<br />
on the experiences of Jews deported from the Netherlands to Auschwitz.<br />
A Family Secret<br />
Eric Heuvel; Lorraine T. Miller, trans.<br />
Farrar, Straus Giroux, 2009. 64 pp. $18.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-374-32271-7<br />
The Search<br />
Eric Heuvel, Ruud van der Rol, and Lies Schippers;<br />
Lorraine T. Miller, trans.<br />
Farrar, Straus Giroux, 2009. 64 pp. $9.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-374-46455-4<br />
AFamily Secret gives a very detailed overview of the<br />
war, from the Dutch point of view. The information<br />
could be overwhelming to a young reader without much<br />
background knowledge. For example, many children<br />
might not understand the discussion of the Japanese<br />
occupation of the Dutch colony in Indonesia. Characters<br />
in the book represent the spectrum of morality—from<br />
innocent victims and heroic resistance fighters, to passive<br />
bystanders, collaborators, or evil Nazis. Because of<br />
the graphic novel format, there isn’t much elaboration<br />
as to the nuances of each character’s choices. The violence<br />
is kept low key in the illustrations; guns are aimed,<br />
but there is no blood or dead bodies. This too, however,<br />
might mislead young readers, as the worst violence<br />
depicted is a Japanese guard whipping a Dutch woman.<br />
The Search features the same characters, but concentrates<br />
on the Holocaust, as it affected Dutch Jews. As<br />
its focus is narrower, it is would be easier for American<br />
children to understand. One character is hidden during<br />
the war by Dutch farmers; the second survives<br />
Auschwitz. While the illustrations are not graphic, the narration is fairly specific as to<br />
the horrors the characters experience. The illustrations are in a realistic style, very<br />
similar to the drawings in the Tintin comics. This gives the books an old-fashioned<br />
look, appropriate to the subject matter. The graphic novel medium will lure reluctant<br />
readers or students who enjoy this format. Unfortunately, the cartoon format may<br />
attract readers who are too young for the subject matter. The Search could be an<br />
introduction to the Holocaust for middle school students, while A Family Secret<br />
would be best for someone with some background knowledge of World War II. The<br />
books should also appeal to readers interested in Anne Frank’s life. For ages 11–14.<br />
Hillary Zana has a BA and teaching credential from Princeton University. She was a<br />
day school librarian for many years and has written many Hebrew textbooks available<br />
through Behrman House Publishers. She currently teaches English and history in<br />
the Los Angeles public school system and is a National Board Certified teacher.<br />
© Eric Heuvel
Please note that all book descriptions have been<br />
taken from information provided by the publisher.<br />
AMERICAN JEWISH STUDIES<br />
AMERICAN SKETCHES: GREAT LEADERS,<br />
CREATIVE THINKERS, AND HEROES OF<br />
A HURRICANE<br />
Walter Isaacson<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2009. $25.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4391-8064-8<br />
Thirty-seven individual pieces, selected<br />
from among the articles, op-ed pieces, book<br />
<strong>reviews</strong>, and commentaries that Isaacson has<br />
written, encompass such subjects as Henry<br />
Kissinger, Albert Einstein, and Woody Allen.<br />
BECOMING AMERICAN JEWS:<br />
TEMPLE ISRAEL OF BOSTON<br />
Meaghan Dwyer-Ryan, Susan L. Porter,<br />
and Lisa Fagin Davis<br />
Brandeis University Press, 2009. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58465-790-3<br />
From its beginning in 1854 as a traditional<br />
German shul to its current status as the<br />
largest Reform synagogue in New England,<br />
Temple Israel has been an important force in<br />
Boston and American <strong>Jewish</strong> life. Based on<br />
hundreds of archival documents, demographic<br />
data, and oral histories, and illustrated with<br />
more than 200 images, bringing to life a community<br />
of over 150 years.<br />
CHARITABLE CHOICES: PHILANTHROPIC<br />
DECISIONS OF DONORS IN THE<br />
AMERICAN JEWISH COMMUNITY<br />
Arnold Dashefsky and Bernard Lazerwitz<br />
Lexington <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. $65.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-7391-0987-8<br />
Examining the incentives and barriers to<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
charitable behavior, this book discusses the<br />
motivations for charitable giving.<br />
THE MAKING OF A REFORM JEWISH<br />
CANTOR: MUSICAL AUTHORITY,<br />
CULTURAL INVESTMENT<br />
Judah M. Cohen<br />
Indiana University Press, 2009. $39.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-253-35365-8<br />
Provides an unprecedented look into the<br />
meaning of attaining musical authority<br />
among American Reform Jews at the turn of<br />
the 21 st century.<br />
RED BLACKAND JEW: NEW FRONTIERS<br />
IN HEBREW LITERATURE<br />
Stephen Katz<br />
University of Texas Press, 2009. $60.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-292-71926-2<br />
Between 1890 and 1924, more than two<br />
million <strong>Jewish</strong> immigrants landed on America’s<br />
shores. The story of their integration into<br />
American society, as they traversed the difficult<br />
path between assimilation and retention<br />
of a unique cultural identity, is recorded in<br />
many works by American Hebrew writers.<br />
This book charts the ways in which the<br />
Native American and African American creative<br />
cultures served as a model for works produced<br />
within the <strong>Jewish</strong> community.<br />
BIOGRAPHY, AUTOBIOGRAPHY<br />
& MEMOIR<br />
GABY BRIMMER: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY<br />
IN THREE VOICES<br />
Gaby Brimmer and Elena Poniatowska<br />
Brandeis University Press, 2009. $26.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58465-758-3<br />
Born with cerebral palsy, Brimmer was a<br />
BOOKS OF NOTE<br />
writer, poet, and one of Mexico’s first disability<br />
rights activist. An account of a woman who witnessed<br />
and participated in a tumultuous period<br />
in Mexico’s cultural and political history.<br />
LEV SHTERNBERG: ANTHROPOLOGIST,<br />
RUSSIAN SOCIALIST, JEWISH ACTIVIST<br />
Sergei Kan<br />
University of Nebraska Press, 2009. $ 65.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8032-1603-7<br />
Biography of Lev Shternberg (1861–1927)<br />
illuminating the development of professional<br />
anthropology in late imperial and early Soviet<br />
Russia. Shternberg was a political exile during<br />
the late tsarist period and was one of the<br />
anthropologists who played a major role in<br />
influencing the professionalization of anthropology<br />
in the Soviet Union.<br />
MAIMONIDES IN HIS WORLD: PORTRAIT<br />
OF A MEDITERRANEAN THINKER<br />
Sarah Stroumsa<br />
Princeton University Press, 2009. $39.50<br />
ISBN: 978-0-691-13763-6<br />
This book challenges prevailing views of<br />
Maimonides by revealing him to have wholeheartedly<br />
lived, breathed, and espoused the rich<br />
Mediterranean culture of his time.<br />
WHAT I THOUGHT I KNEW<br />
Alice Eve Cohen<br />
Viking, 2009. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-670-02095-9<br />
At age forty-four, Alice starts experiencing<br />
mysterious symptoms. After years of hormone<br />
replacement therapy and months of Xrays<br />
she is diagnosed with an abdominal<br />
tumor. One CAT scan later reveals that she is<br />
in fact six months pregnant.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 69
BOOKS OF NOTE<br />
ONLY IN NEW YORK: AN EXPLORATION<br />
OF THE WORLD’S MOST FASCINATING,<br />
FRUSTRATING, AND IRREPRESSIBLE CITY<br />
Sam Roberts<br />
St. Martin’s Press, 2009. $23.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-312-38777-6<br />
For years, Sam Roberts has been covering<br />
what makes New York City tick in his popular<br />
New York Times podcasts. He considers the<br />
puzzling questions about this city that most<br />
would never have thought to ask.<br />
WALTER BENJAMIN AND BERTOLT<br />
BRECHT: THE STORY OF A FRIENDSHIP<br />
Erdmut Wizisla, Christine Shuttleworth, trans.<br />
Yale University Press, 2009. $45.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-300-13695-1<br />
The story of the friendship between Benjamin,<br />
the acclaimed critic and literary theorist,<br />
and Brecht, one of the 20 th century’s<br />
most influential theater artists, during the<br />
crucial interwar years in Berlin.<br />
CONTEMPORARY JEWISH LIFE<br />
BE A MENSCH: WHY GOOD CHARACTER<br />
IS THE KEY TO A LIFE OF HAPPINESS,<br />
HEALTH, WEALTH, AND LOVE<br />
Moshe Kaplan<br />
Gefen Publishing House, 2009. $12.95<br />
ISBN: 978-965-229-433-3<br />
Kaplan addresses a central problem of our<br />
times: what is good character, and why<br />
should we care about it? This is an anthology<br />
of people telling us that the most important<br />
achievement in life is character development.<br />
BUILDING A SUCCESSFUL VOLUNTEER<br />
CULTURE: FINDING MEANING IN<br />
SERVICE IN THE JEWISH COMMUNITY<br />
Rabbi Charles Simon<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Lights Publishing, 2009. $16.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58023408-5<br />
Cultivating successful volunteers in the<br />
21 st century is increasingly more challenging.<br />
Simon draws on over thirty years of experience<br />
to provide you with the resources you<br />
need to build and retain a thriving volunteer<br />
culture for your organization.<br />
DEAREST GEORG: LOVE, LITERATURE,<br />
AND POWER IN DARK TIMES. THE<br />
LETTERS OF ELIAS, VEZA, AND<br />
GEORGES CANETTI, 1933-1948<br />
Karen Lauer, Kristian Wachinger, eds.<br />
David Dollenmayer, trans.<br />
Other Press, 2010. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59051-297-5<br />
In 1934, Veza Taubner and Elias Canetti<br />
were married in Vienna. Meanwhile, an<br />
intense intellectual love affair develops<br />
between Veza and Georges, a young doctor<br />
suffering from tuberculosis and Elias’ brother.<br />
A window into the private life of Nobel Laureate<br />
Elias Canetti, through letters discovered<br />
by chance in a Paris basement.<br />
A FORMULA FOR PROPER LIVING:<br />
PRACTICAL LESSONS FROM LIFE<br />
AND TORAH<br />
Abraham J. Twerski<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Lights Publishing, 2009. $19.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58023-402-3<br />
Twerski draws from his experience as a<br />
psychiatrist and spiritual counselor to give us<br />
lessons for life that we can put to daily use in<br />
dealing with ourselves and others. Combination<br />
of anecdotes, personal musings, and<br />
insights and wisdom from various sources<br />
ranging from Freud to the Talmud.<br />
IN SEARCH OF MILKAND HONEY:<br />
THE THEATER OF “SOVIET JEWISH<br />
STATEHOOD” (1934–49)<br />
Ber Boris Kotlerman<br />
Slavica, 2009. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0893573478<br />
In the mid-1930’s, when the Soviet regime<br />
established Birobidzhan as the “Soviet <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
state” with Yiddish as its official language, the<br />
local Yiddish theater assumed new prominence.<br />
This book focuses on the theater’s role<br />
as the standard bearer and guiding spirit for<br />
this controversial exercise in nation building.<br />
THE JEWISH PHENOMENON: SEVEN<br />
KEYS TO THE ENDURING WEALTH<br />
OF A PEOPLE<br />
Steven Silbiger<br />
M. Evans, 2009. $22.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59077-154-9<br />
Why have Jews risen to the top of the<br />
business and professional world in numbers<br />
staggeringly out of proportion to their percentage<br />
of the American population? This<br />
book sets forth seven principles that form the<br />
bedrock of <strong>Jewish</strong> financial success.<br />
JEWISH SAGES OF TODAY: PROFILES<br />
OF EXTRAORDINARY PEOPLE<br />
Aryeh Rubin<br />
Targum Shlishi, 2009. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-934440-96-4<br />
Who are our <strong>Jewish</strong> Heroes? Who inspires<br />
us, makes us think, gives us hope? Here are the<br />
profiles of twenty-seven accomplished individuals<br />
dedicated to improving our world.<br />
70 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010 www.jewishbookcouncil.org
THE LIFE WORTH LIVING:<br />
FAITH IN ACTION<br />
Byron L. Sherwin<br />
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2009. $18.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8028-6293-8<br />
Sherwin lays out the path to abundant,<br />
fulfilled living—by cultivating religious<br />
virtues such as love, wisdom, gratitude, and<br />
humility. It demonstrates how living in partnership<br />
with God can provide us with the<br />
means to craft our lives into works of art.<br />
RELIGIOUS COMPULSIONS AND<br />
FEARS: A GUIDE TO TREATMENT<br />
Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski<br />
Feldheim Publishers, 2009. $29.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59826-358-9<br />
The accumulated experience of a psychologist<br />
and rabbi who has treated OCD and related<br />
disorders for decades in Jerusalem. The<br />
combination of immersion in Torah values and<br />
knowledge of cognitive-behavioral therapy<br />
makes it uniquely accessible for sufferers, family<br />
members, rabbis, teachers, and therapists.<br />
THE SEVEN QUESTIONS YOU’RE<br />
ASKED IN HEAVEN: REVIEWING AND<br />
RENEWING YOUR LIFE ON EARTH<br />
Ron Wolfson<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Lights Publishing, 2009. $16.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58023-407-8<br />
Supported by wisdom from the <strong>Jewish</strong> tradition,<br />
life’s experiences, and personal anecdotes,<br />
Wolfson writes about the transformative<br />
seven questions you’ll be asked in heaven<br />
and explores the values that are at the heart of<br />
a life that matters.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
WHENCE MY HELP COME: CAREGIVING<br />
IN THE JEWISH TRADITION<br />
Yisrael Kestenbaum<br />
Mazo Publishers, 2009. $18.95<br />
ISBN: 978-965-7344-60-6<br />
This book gives those who provide spiritual<br />
care, both rabbis and others motivated to<br />
serve as instruments of healing, the conceptual<br />
models and practical tools to do the holy<br />
work of chesed, loving-kindness. Makes a passionate<br />
argument for the <strong>Jewish</strong> view on pastoral<br />
care that is derived form <strong>Jewish</strong> Scriptures,<br />
experience and custom.<br />
FICTION<br />
GOD’S WATER<br />
Berel Arrow<br />
Xlibris, 2009. $19.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4415-1778-4<br />
Jacob was shot by an S.S officer in World<br />
War II. He wakes up and realizes he is in heaven.<br />
An angel named Judith leads him on a journey<br />
through his life. She gives him the decision<br />
to be alive again and make the most of it.<br />
THE JERICHO SCROLLS<br />
Rafael Ruppin<br />
Mazo Publishers, 2009. $27.95<br />
ISBN: 978-965-7344-56-9<br />
The historical recollections of Guria Julius<br />
Antigonos, The Jericho Scrolls, were recently<br />
discovered by an antique dealer in Jericho,<br />
buried in a chest sealed with tar from the<br />
Dead Sea. The diary includes stories that even<br />
Josephus Flavius could not tell about the Jews.<br />
BOOKS OF NOTE<br />
POLYGLOT: STORIES OF THE WEST’S<br />
WET EDGE<br />
Wendy Marcus<br />
Beth Am Press, 2009. $12.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-615268-04-0<br />
Chronicles lives between Washington state<br />
and Vancouver, British Columbia—the wet<br />
edge of North America. The stories reflect<br />
Marcus’ years in the Northwest’s musical,<br />
newspaper, and <strong>Jewish</strong> communities.<br />
SMASHER: A SILICON VALLEY THRILLER<br />
Keith Raffel<br />
Midnight Ink, 2009. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-7387-1874-3<br />
The richest, most ruthless executive in Silicon<br />
Valley is gunning for control of Ian<br />
Michaels’ rising tech company. When his<br />
wife is mysteriously run down during their<br />
morning jog, Ian suspects foul play and sets<br />
out to expose the attacker.<br />
THE SPELLMANS STRIKE AGAIN<br />
Lisa Lutz<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2009. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-9340-9<br />
The final installment in the series featuring<br />
the intrepid private investigator Izzy<br />
Spellman and her lovable—if somewhat paranoid—family.<br />
HISTORY<br />
THE DEPARTMENT OF STATE IN THE<br />
MIDDLE EAST, 1919–1945<br />
Phillip J. Baram<br />
KTAV Publishing, 2009. $49.50<br />
ISBN: 978-1-60280-122-6<br />
Using the declassified files of State<br />
Department correspondence and its wartime<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 71
BOOKS OF NOTE<br />
plans for the postwar period, in addition to<br />
manuscript collections and interviews, Baram<br />
reveals the internal structure and behind-thescenes<br />
nuances, the subtleties and texture, of<br />
Departmental decision-making.<br />
THE EMERGENCE OF MODERN HEBREW<br />
CREATIVITY IN BABYLON, 1735–1950<br />
Lev Hakak<br />
Purdue University Press, 2009. $39.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-57753-514-6<br />
Begins with a brief history about the Jews<br />
in Babylon (Iraq), their Hebrew creativity, and<br />
the fact that this creativity was excluded from<br />
the history of Modern Hebrew literature<br />
because it was unknown to the scholars. Presents<br />
the secular Hebrew poetry written at that<br />
time, the folktales, journalistic articles, epistles,<br />
research of Hebrew literature, and much more.<br />
GERMANS INTO JEWS: REMAKING<br />
THE JEWISH SOCIAL BODY IN THE<br />
WEIMAR REPUBLIC<br />
Sharon Gillerman<br />
Stanford University Press, 2009. $50.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8047-5711-9<br />
Turns to an often overlooked and misunderstood<br />
period of German and <strong>Jewish</strong> History—the<br />
years between the world wars. Gillerman<br />
demonstrates that Weimar Jews sought<br />
to rejuvenate and reconfigure their community,<br />
as a means to strengthen the German<br />
nation and create an autonomous <strong>Jewish</strong> entity<br />
within Germany.<br />
JUDAISM OF THE SECOND TEMPLE<br />
PERIOD: VOL. 2: THE JEWISH SAGES<br />
AND THEIR LITERATURE<br />
David Flusser<br />
Wm. B. Eerdmans Co., 2009. $42.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8028-2458-5<br />
72 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
This second volume of essays is devoted to<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> sages, their Wisdom literature, and the<br />
impact that they have made on both contemporary<br />
Judaism and early Christianity.<br />
WERE THE JEWS A MEDITERRANEAN<br />
SOCIETY? RECIPROCITY AND<br />
SOLIDARITY IN ANCIENT JUDAISM<br />
Seth Schwartz<br />
Princeton University Press, 2009. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-691-14054-4<br />
How well integrated were Jews in the<br />
Mediterranean society controlled by ancient<br />
Rome? This book argues that <strong>Jewish</strong> social relations<br />
in antiquity were animated by a core tension<br />
between biblical solidarity and exchangebased<br />
social values such as patronage, vassalage,<br />
formal friendship, and debt slavery.<br />
HOLOCAUST STUDIES<br />
AFTER REPRESENTATION?<br />
THE HOLOCAUST, LITERATURE,<br />
AND CULTURE<br />
R. Clifton Spargo and Robert M. Ehrenreich, eds.<br />
Rutgers University Press, 2009. $49.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8135-4589-9<br />
Explores one of the major issues in Holocaust<br />
studies—the intersection of memory<br />
and ethics in artistic expression, particularly<br />
within literature.<br />
THE BUGS ARE BURNING: THE ROLE<br />
OF EASTERN EUROPEANS IN THE<br />
EXPLOITATION, SUBJUGATION AND<br />
MURDER OF THEIR JEWISH NEIGHBORS<br />
DURING THE HOLOCAUST<br />
Sheldon Hersh and Rober Wolf<br />
Devora Publishing, 2009. $21.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-934440-39-1<br />
An enormous contingent of self-serving<br />
Eastern European accomplices participated in<br />
the extermination of Jews and helped assure<br />
Germany’s goal of a “final solution.” Without<br />
them, Hitler’s forces would unlikely have been<br />
as successful in their homicidal campaign.<br />
JEWISH RESPONSES TO PERSECUTION<br />
1933–1946 VOLUME I, 1933–1938<br />
Jurgen Matthaus and Mark Roseman<br />
Altamira Press, 2009. $39.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-7591-1908-6<br />
Offers a new perspective on Holocaust<br />
history by presenting documentation that<br />
describes the manifestations and meanings of<br />
Nazi Germany’s “final solution” from the<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> perspective. This volume takes us from<br />
Hitler’s rise to power through the to the aftermath<br />
of Kristallnacht.<br />
LIVING WITNESSES: FACES OF THE<br />
HOLOCAUST<br />
Sabrina Must, Monni Must<br />
Naturally Photography by Monni, 2009. $54.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-615-30813-5<br />
Monni and Sabrina Must, mother and<br />
daughter, teamed up to create this book. A<br />
book of portraits and experiences of Detroitarea<br />
Holocaust survivors, it captures the survivors’<br />
personalities and honors who they<br />
were before the war, vividly depicting their<br />
experiences during the war, and honoring<br />
who they became afterward.<br />
SOME MEASURE OF JUSTICE: THE<br />
HOLOCAUST ERA RESTITUTION<br />
CAMPAIGN OF THE 1990’S<br />
Michael R. Marrus<br />
University of Wisconsin Press, 2009. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-299-23404-1<br />
During the 1990’s—triggered by lawsuits<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
in the United States against Swiss banks, German<br />
corporations, insurance companies, and<br />
owners of valuable works of art—claimants<br />
and their lawyers sought to rectify terrible<br />
wrongs committed more than a half century<br />
earlier. This book explores this wave of justice-seeking<br />
for the Holocaust.<br />
ISRAEL STUDIES<br />
CIRCLES OF EXCLUSION: THE POLITICS<br />
OF HEALTH CARE IN ISRAEL<br />
Dani Filc<br />
Cornell University Press, 2009. $ 35.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8014-4795-2<br />
In its early years, Israel’s dominant ideology<br />
led to public provision of health care for all<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> citizens. However, the system has shifted<br />
in recent decades, becoming increasingly<br />
privatized and market-based. In a familiar paradox,<br />
the wealthy, the young, and the healthy<br />
have relatively easy access to health care, and<br />
the poor, the old, and the very sick confront<br />
increasing obstacles to medical treatment.<br />
EMBODYING CULTURE: PREGNANCY<br />
IN JAPAN AND ISRAEL<br />
Tsipy Ivry<br />
Rutgers University Press, 2009. $28.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8135-4636-0<br />
An ethnographically grounded exploration<br />
of pregnancy in two different cultures—Japan<br />
and Israel—both of which medicalize pregnancy.<br />
Ivry focuses on “low risk” or “normal”<br />
pregnancies, using cultural comparison to<br />
explore the complex relations among ethnic<br />
ideas about procreation, local reproductive<br />
politics, medical models of pregnancy care,<br />
and local modes of maternal agency.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
PSYCHIATRIC AND BEHAVIORAL<br />
DISORDERS IN ISRAEL: FROM<br />
EPIDEMIOLOGY TO MENTAL<br />
HEALTH ACTION<br />
Itzhak Levav, ed.<br />
Gefen Publishing, 2009. $40.00<br />
ISBN: 978-965-229-468-5<br />
This is a book that reflects the flourishing<br />
of psychiatric epidemiology in Israel over the<br />
past decade. It encompasses the many facets<br />
of psychiatric epidemiology within the multicultural<br />
mosaic of Israeli society.<br />
MODERN JEWISH THOUGHT<br />
AND EXPERIENCE<br />
AND YOU SHALL SURELY HEAL<br />
Jonathan Wiesen<br />
KTAV Publishing, 2009. $35.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-60280-126-4<br />
The first medical halakha publication<br />
produced by <strong>Jewish</strong> medical students from a<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> medical school. The culmination of<br />
an intensive program, this publications<br />
works to further the knowledge and understanding<br />
of the increasingly complex world<br />
of medical halakha.<br />
DANCING IN THE FOOTSTEPS OF EVE:<br />
RETRIEVING THE HEALING GIFT OF<br />
THE SACRED FEMININE FOR THE<br />
HUMAN FAMILY THROUGH MYTH<br />
AND MYSTICISM<br />
Heather Mendel<br />
O-<strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. $24.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-84694-246-4<br />
An odyssey of transformation that moves<br />
to a feminine beat. Through mysticism and<br />
mythology, this book offers an original perspective<br />
to women of diverse spiritual and<br />
BOOKS OF NOTE<br />
religious communities, seeking authenticity<br />
of the feminine experience.<br />
THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS ON SEXUALITY:<br />
ATTITUDES TOWARDS SEXUALITY<br />
IN SECTARIAN AND RELATED<br />
LITERATURE AT QUMRAN<br />
William Loader<br />
Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2009. $44.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8028-6391-1<br />
Loader investigates the Dead Sea Scrolls,<br />
mining every potentially relevant document<br />
aside form the biblical writings for understanding<br />
ancient attitudes towards sexuality.<br />
DELIVERY FROM DARKNESS:<br />
A JEWISH GUIDE TO PREVENTION<br />
AND TREATMENT OF POSTPARTUM<br />
DEPRESSION<br />
Baruch Finkelstein, Michal Finkelstein,<br />
and Doreen Winter<br />
Feldheim Publishing, 2009. $19.99<br />
ISBN: 978-1-59826-258-2<br />
The first book looking at postpartum<br />
depression from a <strong>Jewish</strong> perspective. This<br />
book was written with <strong>Jewish</strong> women in<br />
mind, offering the latest clinical information<br />
while taking into account the unique lifestyle<br />
of the <strong>Jewish</strong> woman.<br />
ONE GOD, MANY PATHS: FINDING<br />
MEANING AND INSPIRATION IN<br />
JEWISH TEACHINGS<br />
Amy Hirshberg Lederman<br />
Wheatmark, 2008. $18.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-58736-736-6<br />
Celebrates the joy and wisdom that the<br />
teachings of Judaism can bring to everyday life.<br />
The stories provide new insights into love,<br />
family, work, relationships, tradition and God.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 73
BOOKS OF NOTE<br />
RELIGION OR ETHNICITY? JEWISH<br />
IDENTITIES IN EVOLUTION<br />
Zvi Gitelman, ed.<br />
Rutgers University Press, 2009. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8135-4451-9<br />
Examines Judaism from the Greco-<br />
Roman age, through medieval times, modern<br />
Western and Eastern Europe, to today. <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
identity has been defined as an ethnicity, a<br />
nation, a culture, and even a race, but what<br />
does it really mean to be <strong>Jewish</strong>?<br />
REVEALED TEXTS, HIDDEN MEANINGS:<br />
FINDING THE RELIGIOUS SIGNIFICANCE<br />
IN TANAKH<br />
Hayyim J. Angel<br />
KTAV Publishing, 2009. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-60280-128-8<br />
In this second collection of his essays on<br />
Tanakh, Angel continues to present his learning<br />
methodology and in-depth text studies to<br />
a wider readership.<br />
SHABBAT THE RIGHT WAY: RESOLVING<br />
HALACHIC DILEMMAS<br />
Rabbi J. Simcha Cohen<br />
Urim Publications, 2009. $19.95<br />
ISBN: 978-965-524-021-4<br />
74 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Provides both the answers to questions on<br />
Shabbat observance and a look at the process<br />
by which the answers are derived. Cohen also<br />
analyzes contemporary, controversial, Shabbat<br />
issues.<br />
SCHOLARSHIP<br />
BEYOND THE QUMRAN COMMUNITY:<br />
THE SECTARIAN MOVEMENT OF THE<br />
DEAD SEA SCROLLS<br />
John J. Collins<br />
Wm. B. Eerdmans Co., 2009. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8028-2887-3<br />
With the full publication of the Dead Sea<br />
Scrolls, fresh analysis of the evidence presented<br />
can be—and indeed, should be—made.<br />
Beyond the Qumran Community does just that,<br />
reaching a surprising conclusion: the sect<br />
described in the Dead Sea Scrolls developed<br />
later than has usually been supposed and was<br />
never confined to the site of Qumran.<br />
ENOCH AND THE MOSAIC TORAH:<br />
THE EVIDENCE OF JUBILEES<br />
Gabriele Boccaccini & Giovanni Ibba, eds.<br />
Wm. B. Eerdmans Co., 2009. $55.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8028-6409-3<br />
The early Enoch literature does not refer<br />
to the Mosaic Torah or emphasize the distinctively<br />
Mosaic laws designed for Israel. But the<br />
book of Jubilees gives room to both Mosaic<br />
and Enochic traditions within the Sinaitic<br />
revelatory framework. Readers will find a<br />
lively debate among the most distinguished<br />
international specialists, striving for a better<br />
understanding of this document.<br />
SEPHARDIC STUDIES<br />
MAQAM AND LITURGY: RITUAL,<br />
MUSIC, AND AESTHETICS OF SYRIAN<br />
JEWS IN BROOKLYN<br />
Mark L. Kligman<br />
Wayne State University Press, 2009. $34.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8143-3216-0<br />
Syrian Jews in Brooklyn, NY, number<br />
more than 40,000 and constitute the largest<br />
single group of immigrant Jews from Syria in<br />
the world. Kligman investigates the multidimensional<br />
interaction of music and text in<br />
Sabbath prayers of the Syrian Jews to trace<br />
how Arab and <strong>Jewish</strong> traditions have merged<br />
in this culture.<br />
Would you like to be a reviewer for <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World?<br />
Submit a writing sample to<br />
jbc@jewishbooks.org<br />
Please include your name, address, phone<br />
number, e-mail address and areas of interest.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
THE BOOK<br />
OF PSALMS:<br />
A TRANSLATION<br />
WITH<br />
COMMENTARY<br />
Robert Alter<br />
W. W. Norton & Company, 2009. $19.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-393-33704-4<br />
GENESIS:<br />
THE BEGINNING<br />
OF DESIRE<br />
Avivah Gottlieb Zornberg<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society, 2009. $25.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8276-0915-0<br />
HE IS...I SAY:<br />
HOW I LEARNED TO<br />
STOP WORRYING<br />
AND LOVE NEIL<br />
DIAMOND<br />
David Wild<br />
Da Capo Press, 2009. $14.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-306-81835-6<br />
HUNTING<br />
EICHMANN<br />
Neal Bascomb<br />
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009. $15.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-547-24802-8<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
JEWISH AMERICAN<br />
FOOD CULTURE<br />
Jonathan Deutsch and<br />
Rachel D. Saks<br />
University of Nebraska Press,<br />
2009. $17.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0-8032-2675-3<br />
THE JEWISH<br />
BRIGADE: AN<br />
ARMY WITH TWO<br />
MASTERS 1944–45<br />
Morris Beckman<br />
Spellmount Limited, 2008. $29.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1-862274-23-5<br />
KLEZMER AMERICA:<br />
JEWISHNESS,<br />
ETHNICITY,<br />
MODERNITY<br />
Jonathan Freedman<br />
Columbia University Press,<br />
2009. $22.50<br />
ISBN: 978-0-231-14279-3<br />
NOW IN PAPERBACK<br />
MY FATHER’S<br />
PARADISE:<br />
A SON’S<br />
SEARCH FOR<br />
HIS FAMILY’S PAST<br />
Ariel Sabar<br />
Algonquin <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. $14.95<br />
ISBN: 978-1565129337<br />
PARTNERSHIP:<br />
THE MAKING OF<br />
GOLDMAN SACHS<br />
Charles D. Ellis<br />
Penguin <strong>Book</strong>s, 2009. $20.00<br />
ISBN: 978-0141035246<br />
THE RETURN<br />
OF DEPRESSION<br />
ECONOMICS<br />
AND THE CRISIS<br />
OF 2008<br />
Paul Krugman<br />
W. W. Norton & Company,<br />
2009. $16.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0393337808<br />
For book club resources, please visit www.jewishbookcouncil.org.<br />
Be sure to check back often, as new resources are added monthly!<br />
RHYMING LIFE<br />
AND DEATH<br />
Amos Oz; Nicholas de Lange, trans.<br />
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt,<br />
2009. $13.95<br />
ISBN: 978-0547-33684-4<br />
SASHENKA<br />
Simon Montefiore<br />
Simon & Schuster, 2008. $15.00<br />
ISBN: 978-1-4165-9555-7<br />
SOTAH<br />
Naomi Ragen<br />
St. Martin’s Griffin, 2009. $14.99<br />
ISBN: 978-0-312-57024-8<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 75
CONTRIBUTORS<br />
MIRIAM BRADMAN ABRAHAMS (MBA) lives in<br />
Woodmere, NY. She is the mother of three,<br />
an avid reader, Hadassah Nassau Region One<br />
<strong>Book</strong> Coordinator, Hadassah Hewlett Herald<br />
editor and webmaster, and book fair chair.<br />
ERIC ACKLAND (EA) is a freelance writer, and<br />
edits the Ideas and Innovation section for Presentense<br />
Magazine.<br />
SHELOMO ALFASSA (ShA) is a writer and historian<br />
who researches the Jews of Iberia and the<br />
Ottoman Empire. He is based at the Center<br />
for <strong>Jewish</strong> History in New York City where he<br />
oversees Special Projects for the American<br />
Sephardi Federation. He has written several<br />
books including, A Window Into Old<br />
Jerusalem and The Sephardic Anousim. He can<br />
be reached at: shelomo@alfassa.com.<br />
BARBARA ANDREWS (BA) holds a Masters in<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Studies from the University of Chicago<br />
and has taught <strong>Jewish</strong> adult education classes.<br />
SARAH ARONSON (SA) holds an MFA in Writing<br />
for Children and Young Adults from Vermont<br />
College. She is a full time writer and<br />
has recently published her first novel, Head<br />
Case (Roaring Brook) for young adult. Sara<br />
blogs every Thursday for the Lilith blog.<br />
BATSHEVA BEN-AMOS (BBA) has two Ph.D.s,<br />
one in sociology from the U. of Pennsylvania,<br />
the other in clinical psychology from Hahnemann<br />
University/Hospital. In 2007, she<br />
received a fellowship for The Summer Institute<br />
on the Holocaust and <strong>Jewish</strong> Civilization<br />
at Northwestern University.<br />
MARCIA BERNEGER (MB) is a wife, mother of<br />
two teenage sons, second grade teacher, and<br />
in her spare time (lol) a writer of stories and<br />
articles for children’s magazines. Her goal is<br />
that one day she will have her own book<br />
reviewed in <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World.<br />
BARBARA M. BIBEL (BMB) is a librarian at the Oakland<br />
Public Library in Oakland, CA; and at<br />
Congregation Netivot Shalom, Berkeley, CA.<br />
JACK BIELER (JB) is currently Rabbi of Kemp<br />
Mill Synagogue in Silver Spring, MD. He has<br />
been associated with <strong>Jewish</strong> day school education<br />
for over thirty years. Rabbi Bieler served<br />
as a mentor for the Bar Ilan University Lookstein<br />
Center Principals’ Seminar and he has<br />
published and lectured extensively on the<br />
philosophy of Modern Orthodox education.<br />
BARBARA BIETZ (BB) is a freelance writer and<br />
children’s book reviewer. She is currently a<br />
member of the Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award<br />
Committee. Barbara is the author of the middle<br />
grade book, Like a Maccabee. She has a<br />
blog dedicated to <strong>Jewish</strong> books for children at<br />
www.BarbaraB<strong>Book</strong>Blog.Blogspot.com.<br />
MARCIE LAVINE BLOCH (MLB) earned her MLS<br />
from the University of Maryland, a BA from<br />
the University of Pennsylvania and an MA in<br />
English literature from Fordham University.<br />
She has worked in synagogue and day school<br />
libraries and is currently finishing her term on<br />
the Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award Committee.<br />
JEFF BOGURSKY (JHB) reads a lot, writes a little<br />
and talks quite a bit. He is a media executive<br />
and expert in interactive multimedia.<br />
BILL BRENNAN (BB) is an independent scholar<br />
and entertainer based in Las Vegas.<br />
ADA BRUNSTEIN (AB) is a freelance writer and<br />
an acquisitions editor for MIT Press. She has<br />
an MA in Linguistics from NYU and an MS<br />
in Science Writing from MIT. Her writing<br />
has appeared in The New York Times, New Scientist,<br />
Discover, and The Vocabula Review.<br />
LINDA F. BURGHARDT (LFB) is a New York-based<br />
journalist and author who has contributed<br />
commentary, breaking news and features to<br />
major newspapers across the U.S., in addition<br />
to having three non-fiction books published.<br />
She writes frequently on <strong>Jewish</strong> topics.<br />
DAVID COHEN (DC) is a professional copy editor<br />
from Cherry Hill, NJ, and the husband of<br />
Deborah Bodin Cohen, a 2006 National <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
<strong>Book</strong> Award winner.<br />
ELLEN G. COLE (EGC), the librarian of the Levine<br />
Library of Temple Isaiah in Los Angeles, a past<br />
judge of the Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Awards, and a<br />
past chairperson of that committee. She is a coauthor<br />
of the AJL guide, Excellence in <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Children’s Literature, and the recipient of two<br />
major awards for contribution to Judaism<br />
Librarianship, the Fanny Goldstein Merit<br />
Award from the Association of <strong>Jewish</strong> Libraries,<br />
and the Dorothy Schroeder Award from the<br />
Association of <strong>Jewish</strong> Libraries of Southern<br />
California. She is on the board of AJLSC.<br />
MICHAEL DOBKOWSKI (MND) is a professor of<br />
religious studies at Hobart and William Smith<br />
Colleges. He is co-editor of Genocide and the<br />
Modern Age and On the Edge of Scarcity (Syra-<br />
cuse University Press); author of The Tarnished<br />
Dream: The Basis of American Anti-Semitism;<br />
and co-editor of The Nuclear Predicament.<br />
STEPHEN G. DONSHIK (SGD), D.S.W., is a lecturer<br />
at the Hebrew University’s Community<br />
Leadership and Philanthropy Program. He<br />
writes on the non-profit sector and has a consulting<br />
firm focused on strengthening nonprofits<br />
and their leadership for tomorrow.<br />
ERIKA DREIFUS (ED), who most recently<br />
reviewed Norah Labiner’s German for Travelers<br />
for <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World, has reviewed books<br />
for Fiction Writers Review, The Forward,<br />
J<strong>Book</strong>s.com, Kenyon Review Online, The<br />
Missouri Review, and The Writer, among others.<br />
She lives and writes in New York City.<br />
SUSAN DUBIN (SD) was the first librarian honored<br />
with a Milken Family Foundation <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Educator Award. She is the owner/director<br />
of Off-the-Shelf Library Services and<br />
Library Instructional Consultant at Valley<br />
Beth Shalom Day School in Encino, CA.<br />
JOSHUA DANIEL EDWIN (JDE) was born into a<br />
family of incurably compulsive readers in Baltimore,<br />
MD. He now lives in Brooklyn,<br />
where he writes poems and <strong>reviews</strong> and reads<br />
anything he can lay his hands on.<br />
GIL EHRENKRANZ (GE) is a lawyer in the District<br />
of Columbia specializing in telecommunications<br />
law and international transactions.<br />
He has been previously published in MID-<br />
STREAM Magazine including an article concerning<br />
Israeli military options regarding<br />
Iran’s nuclear weapons program.<br />
SHARON ELSWIT, (SE) is the author of The <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Story Finder, head librarian at Claremont<br />
Preparatory School in New York City, and an<br />
adjunct professor with the Palmer School of<br />
Library and Information Science.<br />
MALVINA D. ENGELBERG (MDE), an independent<br />
scholar, has taught composition and literature<br />
at the university level for the past fifteen<br />
years. She is a Ph.D. candidate at the University<br />
of Miami.<br />
HEIDI ESTRIN (HE) is librarian for the Feldman<br />
Children’s Library at Congregation B’nai Israel<br />
in Boca Raton, FL. She is a past chair of the Sydney<br />
Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award Committee and hosts<br />
The <strong>Book</strong> of Life podcast, a monthly audio program<br />
about <strong>Jewish</strong> books, music, film, and web,<br />
online at www.bookoflifepodcast.com.<br />
76 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010 www.jewishbookcouncil.org
SHELLY FEIT (SF) has an M.L.S. and a Sixth-year<br />
Specialist’s Certificate in Information Science.<br />
She is the library director and media specialist<br />
at the Moriah School in Englewood, NJ.<br />
JUDITH FELSENFELD’S (JuF) stories have appeared<br />
most recently in The Southwest Review, The<br />
Chicago Review, The Blue Mesa Review and on<br />
NPR’s ‘Selected Shorts.’ She is completing a<br />
collection of stories.<br />
NORMAN H. FINKELSTEIN (NHF), a retired public<br />
school librarian, is a long-term instructor at<br />
Boston’s Hebrew College. He is the author of<br />
fifteen nonfiction books and the recipient of<br />
the Golden Kite Honor Award for Nonfiction<br />
and two National <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> Awards. His<br />
most recent book is the JPS Guide to American<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> History (<strong>Jewish</strong> Publication Society).<br />
JACK FISCHEL (JF) is professor emeritus of history<br />
at Millersville University, Millersville, PA<br />
PAUL A. FLEXNER (PAF), is an adjunct professor<br />
of education at Georgia State University. He<br />
serves on the Board of the <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong><br />
<strong>Council</strong> and is co-editor of the recently published<br />
What We NOW Know about <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Education: Perspectives on Research for Practice<br />
(Torah Aura, 2008).<br />
ELLIOT FOX (EF) received a BA from American<br />
University in Washington, DC. He is the<br />
Director of Marketing & Promotions at<br />
JDub Records.<br />
AUDREY FRESHMAN (AF), Ph.D., LCSW,<br />
CASAC, is a psychotherapist with a private<br />
practice located in Rockville Centre, NY. Dr.<br />
Freshman is the associate director of an outpatient<br />
substance abuse agency and the assistant<br />
editor of the Journal of Social Work Practice<br />
in the Addictions.<br />
BOB GOLDFARB (BG) is president of the Center<br />
for <strong>Jewish</strong> Culture and Creativity and vicepresident<br />
of Zeek: A <strong>Jewish</strong> Journal of Thought<br />
and Culture. He lives in Jerusalem.<br />
WALLACE GREENE (WG), received rabbinic ordination<br />
and holds a Ph.D. in <strong>Jewish</strong> history<br />
and Rabbinics.<br />
KAREN SUGAR HAUSER (KSH) received a B.A. in<br />
art history from Stanford. She has worked at<br />
various museums and at Sotheby’s and currently<br />
does communal volunteer work.<br />
JESSICA B. HORWITZ (JBH) lives in Minneapolis,<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
MN and works in book publishing.<br />
MARGE KAPLAN (MLK) is a retired English as a<br />
Second Language teacher. She is a consultant<br />
for the children’s literature group for the<br />
Roseville, MN school system and is a storyteller<br />
of <strong>Jewish</strong> tales.<br />
GARY KATZ (GK) received an MA in English<br />
from the University of Nebraska-Omaha. He<br />
is the library administrator for the Kripke<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Federation Library in Omaha, Nebraska,<br />
one of the largest Judaica libraries in the<br />
United States.<br />
LAUREN KRAMER (LK) is a Vancouver-based journalist,<br />
wife and mother with a lifelong passion<br />
for literature. Born in Cape Town, South Africa<br />
she has won awards for her writing and reported<br />
from many corners of the world. Read more<br />
of her work at www.laurenkramer.net.<br />
NAOMI KRAMER (NDK) is a retired reading consultant<br />
teacher who developed curriculum for<br />
using literature to educate children and adults<br />
in the history of the Holocaust. She is a docent<br />
and educator at the Nassau County Holocaust<br />
Memorial and Tolerance Education Center.<br />
NOEL KRIFTCHER (NNK) is a professor and<br />
administrator at Polytechnic University, having<br />
previously served as Superintendent of<br />
New York City’s Brooklyn & Staten Island<br />
High Schools district.<br />
DANIÈLE GORLIN LASSNER (DGL) (wife, mother<br />
and grandmother) recently retired after 35<br />
years at Ramaz where she served as Dean of<br />
Admissions, Foreign Language Department<br />
Chair, and teacher of French and Spanish.<br />
She owns more than 1,000 cookbooks. She is<br />
presently translating a book from the<br />
Hebrew. She has translated several children’s<br />
books from French into English. Whatever<br />
the language, food is a “constant.”<br />
JUDD KRUGER LEVINGSTON (JKL) is a rabbi and<br />
he serves as a teacher and as the Director of<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Studies at Barrack Hebrew Academy<br />
(formerly Akiba Hebrew Academy) in Bryn<br />
Mawr, Pennsylvania. Also an adjunct professor<br />
in the Temple University Department of Religion,<br />
he is the author of Sowing the Seeds of<br />
Character: The Moral Education of Adolescents<br />
in Public and Private Schools (Praeger, 2009).<br />
ROBIN K. LEVINSON (RKL) is an award-winning<br />
journalist and author of a dozen books,<br />
including the Gali Girls series of <strong>Jewish</strong> his-<br />
CONTRIBUTORS<br />
torical fiction for children. She currently<br />
works as an assessment specialist for a global<br />
educational testing organization. She lives in<br />
Hamilton, NJ.<br />
NICOLE LEVY (NL) has completed graduate<br />
work in Judaic studies. She writes about <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
art, culture, history and literature from<br />
her home in Swampscott, Massachusetts.<br />
CHRISTINE MAASDAM (CM) holds a Masters in<br />
Humanities, certifications in Museum Studies<br />
and Cultural Property Protection. She is<br />
currently completing her M.L.I.S. Her interests<br />
are philosophy and the impact of art and<br />
technology on culture.<br />
TERI MARKSON (TM) has been working with<br />
children in public and school libraries for over<br />
18 years. She has also been a book reviewer for<br />
many years, and is still delighted when a children’s<br />
book makes her laugh, cry, or both. She<br />
is currently a children’s librarian at the Fairfax<br />
Branch of the Los Angeles Public Library,<br />
where children and books go together like a<br />
cat in a hat.<br />
PENNY METSCH (PGM), MLS, formerly a school<br />
librarian on Long Island and in New York<br />
City, now focuses on early literacy programs<br />
in Hoboken, NJ.<br />
ESTHER NUSSBAUM (EN), the head librarian of<br />
Ramaz Upper School for 30 years, is now<br />
education and special projects coordinator of<br />
the Halachic Organ Donor Society. A past<br />
editor of <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World, she continues to<br />
review for this and other publications.<br />
JULIE PELC (JP) is a rabbi and a co-editor of the<br />
anthology Joining the Sisterhood: Young <strong>Jewish</strong><br />
Women Write Their Lives (State University of<br />
New York Press, 2003). She is the assistant<br />
director of the Kalsman Institute on Judaism<br />
and Health at HUC in Los Angeles and also<br />
teaches undergraduate courses in the Literature<br />
and Communications Department at the<br />
American <strong>Jewish</strong> University.<br />
HARA E. PERSON (HEP) was ordained by<br />
Hebrew Union College-<strong>Jewish</strong> Institute of<br />
Religion. She is a writer and editor.<br />
KATHE PINCHUCK, (KSP), MLIS, is the librarian<br />
of Congregation Beth Sholom in Teaneck,<br />
New Jersey. She is currently the chair of the<br />
Sydney Taylor <strong>Book</strong> Award Committee of the<br />
Association of <strong>Jewish</strong> Libraries.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 77
JBW 28.1_JBW 28.1 1/29/10 12:27 PM Page 78<br />
CONTRIBUTORS<br />
MARCIA WEISS POSNER (MWP), Ph.D., is a librarian<br />
and program director at the Holocaust<br />
Memorial and Tolerance Center of Nassau<br />
County.<br />
CARL J. RHEINS (CJR) is Executive Director Emeritus<br />
of the YIVO Institute for <strong>Jewish</strong> Research.<br />
He received his Ph.D. in Modern European<br />
History from the State University of New York<br />
at Stony Brook and has taught courses on the<br />
Holocaust at several major universities.<br />
PETER L. ROTHHOLZ (PLR) headed his own Manhattan-based<br />
public relations agency and<br />
taught at the Business and Liberal Arts (BALA)<br />
program at Queens College. He lives in East<br />
Hampton, NY and Santa Barbara, CA and is a<br />
frequent contributor to <strong>Jewish</strong> publications.<br />
PHIL SANDICK (Phs) S)<br />
s) is is a graduate of the Univer- Univer- University<br />
of Pennsylvania and the MFA creative<br />
writing program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.<br />
He has taught English and<br />
Writing at Philadelphia University and Harcum<br />
College. Originally from Fresh Meadows,<br />
NY, Phil currently lives in Irvine, CA.<br />
JEFFREY SCHEIN (JS) is Professor and Director<br />
of <strong>Jewish</strong> education at the Siegal College in<br />
Cleveland. He is the author of numerous articles<br />
and books in <strong>Jewish</strong> education. His doctoral<br />
dissertation was in the area of moral<br />
education, the same topic as in the book<br />
reviewed in this issue.<br />
DEBORAH SCHOENEMAN (DS), is a former English<br />
teacher/Writing Across the Curriculum<br />
78 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World Spring 5770/2010<br />
Center Coordinator at North Shore Hebrew<br />
Academy High School and coeditor of Modern<br />
American Literature: A Library of Literary<br />
Criticism, Vol. VI, published in 1997.<br />
SYDELLE SHAMAH (SS) has been leading book<br />
club discussions for many years, and is a published<br />
science fiction writer. She was president<br />
of the Ruth Hyman <strong>Jewish</strong> Community<br />
Center of Monmouth County, NJ.<br />
LAURIE GWEN SHAPIRO (LGS) is the author of<br />
ALA Notable <strong>Book</strong> The Unexpected Salami<br />
and The Matzo Ball Heiress and other books<br />
for adults. She has also written two books for<br />
young adults, most recently for Random<br />
House. She is also a winner of an Independent<br />
Spirit Award for co-directing the IFC documentary<br />
“Keep the River on Your Right.” She<br />
is currently working on YA novel The O’Leary<br />
Bat Mitzvah, and producing a documentary<br />
about Iggy Pop. LaurieGwenShapiro.com<br />
ARLENE B. SOIFER (ABS) earned degrees in English,<br />
and has had many years of experience as<br />
a freelance writer, editor, and public relations<br />
professional.<br />
SARA LEOPOLD SPINNELL (SLS) is a co-founder<br />
of Travelujah.com, a website that promotes<br />
Christian travel to Israel. She lives in New<br />
York City with her husband and two children<br />
LESLEY SUSSMAN (LS) is the author of more than<br />
20 non-fiction books—including two on Kabbalah.<br />
He is an award-winning journalist and<br />
publicist who lives and works in New York City.<br />
MARGARET TEICH (MT) is a freelance environmental<br />
writer and eco-consultant living in<br />
New York City. Check out her blog, Gspotting.net.<br />
JACLYN TROP (JT) is a business reporter for The<br />
Detroit News and a graduate of Columbia<br />
University’s Graduate School of Journalism.<br />
JANE WALLERSTEIN (JW) worked in public relations<br />
for many years. She is the author of<br />
Voices from the Paterson Silk Mills and coauthor<br />
of a national criminal justice study of<br />
parole for Rutgers University.<br />
WENDY WASMAN (WW) has been a professional<br />
librarian since 1988. She is the former assistant<br />
librarian at The Temple-Tifereth Israel in<br />
Beachwood, Ohio, and is currently the librarian<br />
at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History<br />
MARON L. WAXMAN (MLW), retired editorial<br />
director, special projects, at the American<br />
Museum of Natural History, was also an editorial<br />
director at HarperCollins and <strong>Book</strong>-ofthe-Month<br />
Club. She also leads editorial<br />
workshops<br />
HILLARY ZANA (HZ) has a BA and teaching credential<br />
from Princeton University. She was a<br />
day school librarian for many years and has<br />
written many Hebrew textbooks available<br />
through Behrman House Publishers. She currently<br />
teaches English and history in the Los<br />
Angeles public school system and is a National<br />
Board Certified teacher.<br />
YOUR AUDIENCE IS HERE. REACH THOUSANDS<br />
OF DEDICATED JEWISH READERS.<br />
ADVERTISE YOUR PROGRAM,<br />
EVENT OR BOOK<br />
IN JEWISH BOOK WORLD.<br />
EMAIL jbc@jewishbooks.org<br />
FOR RATE SCHEDULE.<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org
An index of all titles included in the XXXXXX issue of <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World<br />
BR = <strong>Book</strong> Review<br />
CBR = Children’s <strong>Book</strong> Review<br />
BN = <strong>Book</strong>s of Note<br />
Title, Author, BR, CBR or BN<br />
1939, Phelan, BR 45<br />
188 th Crybaby Brigade, Chasnoff, BR 28<br />
36 Arguments for the Existence<br />
of God, Goldstein, BR 45<br />
Aaron’s Journey, Herskowitz, BR 28<br />
Adventure in Latkaland, Fisman, CBR 62<br />
After Representation?, Spargo, BN 72<br />
Aleph-Bais Trip on the Aleph-Bais Ship,<br />
Altein, CBR 62<br />
Amen, Amen, Amen, Sher, BR 38<br />
American Experience, Loeb, BR 26<br />
American Sketches, Isaacson, BN 69<br />
And You Shall Surely Heal, Wiesen, BN 73<br />
Angel Time, Rice, BR 45<br />
Annie’s Ghosts, Luxenberg, BR 28<br />
Aristocrat, Sutton, BR 28<br />
Arnold Daghani’s Memories of<br />
Mikhailowka, Schultz, BR 53<br />
Art of Giving, Bronfman, BR 37<br />
Baseball Talmud, Megdal, BR 26<br />
Be a Mensch, Kaplan, BN 70<br />
Beads for the Messiah’s Bride,<br />
Azriel, BR 58<br />
Becoming American Jews,<br />
Dwyer-Ryan, BN 69<br />
Betrayal, Kirtzman, BR 36<br />
Beyond the Qumran Community,<br />
Collins, BN 74<br />
Big Kahn, Kleid, BR 46<br />
Bob Dylan, Rogovoy, BR 37<br />
<strong>Book</strong> of Genesis, Crumb, BR 59<br />
Briss, Tregebov, BR 47<br />
Bugs are Burning, Hersh, BN 72<br />
Building a Successful Volunteer<br />
Culture, Simon, BN 70<br />
Center Of The Universe, Bachrach, BR 39<br />
Champion of Children, Bogacki, CBR 64<br />
Charitable Choices, Dashefsky, BN 69<br />
Circles of Exclusion, Filc, BN 73<br />
City of God, Swerling, BR 47<br />
Clever Rachel, Waldman, CBR 62<br />
Conquering Fear, Kushner, BR 38<br />
Conscious Cook, Ronnen, BR 40<br />
Curriculum Vitae, Hoffmann, BR 31<br />
Dancing in the Dark, Dickstein, BR 51<br />
Dancing in the Footsteps of Eve,<br />
Mendel, BN 73<br />
Daniel’s Diary, Nolan, CBR 62<br />
Dead Sea Scrolls on Sexuality,<br />
Loader, BN 73<br />
www.jewishbookcouncil.org<br />
Dearest Georg, Lauer, BN 70<br />
Death of the Shtetl, Bauer, BR 54<br />
Delivery from Darkness,<br />
Finkelstein, BN 73<br />
Department of State in the<br />
Middle East, Baram, BN 71<br />
Devil’s Workshop, Burger, BR 32<br />
Devora In Exile, Cherne, BR 47<br />
Devotion, Shapiro, BR 32<br />
Do One Nice Thing, Tenzer, BR 38<br />
Dog in the Wood, Schroder, CBR 63<br />
Driven to Darkness, Brook, BR 39<br />
Eating Animals, Foer, BR 32<br />
Embodying Culture, Ivry, BN 73<br />
Emergence of Modern Hebrew<br />
Creativity in Babylon, Hakak, BN 72<br />
Enoch and the Mosaic Torah,<br />
Boccaccini, BN 74<br />
Evading The Nazis, Abrami, BR 30<br />
Even Higher!, Peretz, CBR 64<br />
Everything Is God, Michaelson, BR 39<br />
Exiles, Krieger, BR 47<br />
Family Secret, Heuvel, CBR 68<br />
Formula for Proper Living, Twerski, BN 70<br />
Fox Walked Alone, Reid, CBR 63<br />
Gaby Brimmer, Brimmer, BN 69<br />
Germans into Jews, Gillerman, BN 72<br />
Gertruda’s Oath, Oren, BR 33<br />
Getting to the Heart of Interfaith,<br />
Mackenzie, BR 42<br />
Girls Of Room 28, Brenner, BR 33<br />
God’s Water, Arrow, BN 71<br />
Gone To the Dogs, Guterson, BR 48<br />
Good For The Jews, Spark, BR 48<br />
Halaklhic Man, Bedzow, BR 57<br />
Happy Marriage, Yglesias, BR 48<br />
Heart Afire, Schachter-Shalomi, BR 57<br />
Here, There Are No Sarah’s,<br />
Orbuch, BR 34<br />
Hitler’s Intelligence Chief, Dorries, BR 55<br />
Hoppy Hanukkah!, Glaser, CBR 63<br />
Hound Dog, Leiber, BR 34<br />
House Rules, Sontag, BR 38<br />
How to Ruin Your Boyfriend’s<br />
Reputation, Elkeles, CBR 63<br />
I Am God’s Paintbrush, Sasso, CBR 64<br />
I Drink for a Reason, Cross, BR 55<br />
I Choose Life, Jennings, BR 34<br />
Icon Of Loss, Weinrib, BR 52<br />
In a Pale Blue Light, Miller, BR 46<br />
In My Bustan, Mahbgerefteh, BR 58<br />
In Search of Milk and Honey,<br />
Kotlerman, BN 70<br />
Iron Will of Shoeshine Cats, Kestin, BR 48<br />
Is It Good For The Jews?, Biro, BR 49<br />
Israel vs. Utopia, Schalit, BR 55<br />
Jericho Scrolls, Ruppin, BN 71<br />
Jerusalem, Goldhill, BR 56<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Mama’s Kitchen, Phillips, BR 40<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Phenomenon, Silbiger, BN 70<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Responses to Persecution<br />
1933–1946 Volume I, Matthaus, BN 72<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Sages of Today, Rubin, BN 70<br />
<strong>Jewish</strong> Slow Cooker Recipes,<br />
Frankel, BR 41<br />
Jews, God, and Videotape,<br />
Shandler, BR 42<br />
Judaism, Gelernter, BR 43<br />
Judaism of the Second Temple<br />
Period, Flusser, BN 72<br />
Learning and Community,<br />
Wertheimer, BR 44<br />
Lev Shternberg, Kan, BN 69<br />
Life Worth Living, Sherwin, BN 71<br />
Living Witnesses, Must, BN 72<br />
Lone Soldiers, Keinon, BR 56<br />
Love Is Like Park Avenue, Levin, BR 49<br />
Lucinella, Segal, BR 49<br />
Madoff With The Money,<br />
Oppenheimer, BR 36<br />
Madoff’s Other Secret, Weinstein, BR 36<br />
Maimonides in His World, Stroumsa, BN 69<br />
Major Farran’s Hat, Cesarani, BR 56<br />
Making of a Reform <strong>Jewish</strong> Cantor,<br />
Cohen, BN 69<br />
Maqam and Liturgy, Kligman, BN 74<br />
Mitzvah Girls, Fader, BR 61<br />
Murderer’s Daughters, Meyers, BR 50<br />
My Father’s Bonus March, Langer, BR 35<br />
My Footprint, Garlin, BR 54<br />
New Jew, Friedes, BR 35<br />
Nitzotz, Zuoff, BR 52<br />
Noah’s Notebook, Nolan, CBR 64<br />
One God, Many Paths, Lederman, BN 73<br />
One Step Ahead Of Hitler, Gross, BR 30<br />
Only in New York, Roberts, BN 70<br />
Operation Last Chance, Zuroff, BR 52<br />
Photographing the <strong>Jewish</strong> Nation,<br />
Avrutin, BR 60<br />
Polyglot, Marcus, BN 71<br />
Prague Spring, Bourgo, BR 50<br />
Psychiatric and Behavioral Disorders<br />
in Israel, Levav, BN 73<br />
Red Black and Jew, Katz, BN 69<br />
Reinventing Ritual, Belasco, BR 60<br />
Religion or Ethnicity?, Gitelman, BN 74<br />
Religious Compulsions and Fears,<br />
Twerski, BN 71<br />
Remember Us, Small, BR 52<br />
Remembering Survival, Browning, BR 52<br />
INDEX<br />
Title, Author, BR, CBR or BN Title, Author, BR, CBR or BN Title, Author, BR, CBR or BN<br />
Revealed Texts, Hidden Meanings,<br />
Angel, BN 74<br />
Screening a Lynching, Bernstein, BR 51<br />
Search, Heuvel, CBR 68<br />
Seder Night, Soloveitchik, BR 57<br />
Sense of Purpose, Eban, BR 35<br />
Servant’s Quarters, Freed, BR 46<br />
Seven Questions You’re Asked<br />
in Heaven, Wolfson, BN 71<br />
Shabbat the Right Way, Cohen, BN 74<br />
Shadow Architect, Warn, BR 58<br />
Smasher, Raffel, BN 71<br />
Some Measure of Justice, Marrus, BN 72<br />
Sowing the Seeds of Character,<br />
Levingston, BR 44<br />
Spellmans Strike Again, Lutz, BN 71<br />
Start-Up Nation, Senor, BR 56<br />
Steerage, Stern, BR 58<br />
Still <strong>Jewish</strong>, McGinity, BR 61<br />
Surviving, Ohiso, BR 36<br />
Surviving the Angel of Death,<br />
Kor, CBR 65<br />
Ten Lost Tribes, Benite, BR 51<br />
There Shall Be No Needy, Jacobs, BR 43<br />
These Mountains, Miriam, BR 59<br />
This Must Be the Place, Winger, BR 50<br />
Tobi Kahn, Heller, BR 60<br />
Too Good To Be True, Arvedlund, BR 36<br />
Toolbox for Teachers and Mentors,<br />
Solomon, BR 45<br />
Treasury of <strong>Jewish</strong> Holiday Baking,<br />
Goldman, BR 42<br />
Tropical Secrets, Engle, CBR 64<br />
Uranium Wars, Aczel, BR 53<br />
Waiting Wall, Levy, CBR 65<br />
Walter Benjamin and Bertolt Brecht,<br />
Wizisla, BN 70<br />
We Remember with Reverence<br />
and Love, Diner, BR 26<br />
Were the Jews a Mediterranean<br />
Society?, Schwartz, BN 72<br />
What I Thought I Knew, Cohen, BN 69<br />
What Would Susie Say?, Essman, BR 54<br />
When I First Held You, Snir, CBR 66<br />
Whence My Help Come,<br />
Kestenbaum, BN 71<br />
Why Are Jews Liberals?, Podhoretz, BR 43<br />
Why The Dreyfus Affair Matters,<br />
Begley, BR 44<br />
Winter’s Journey Of My Youth,<br />
Studley, BR 30<br />
Women And Judaism, Drucker, BR 61<br />
Yom Kippur in Amsterdam,<br />
Shrayer, BR 51<br />
Zvuvi’s Israel, Lehman-Wilzig, CBR 66<br />
Would you like to be a reviewer for <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World?<br />
Submit a writing sample to<br />
jbc@jewishbooks.org<br />
Please include your name, address, phone<br />
number, e-mail address and areas of interest.<br />
Spring 5770/2010 <strong>Jewish</strong> <strong>Book</strong> World 79
NEW:<br />
JBC Social<br />
Network<br />
Join JBC <strong>Book</strong>space today at<br />
http://jbclit.ning.com/<br />
We want to facilitate and encourage connections<br />
among <strong>Jewish</strong> interest readers and authors, so<br />
we decided to provide a resource for that...<br />
JBC <strong>Book</strong>space, a MySpace/Facebook-like<br />
social networking page!<br />
We hope you will take advantage of this<br />
and create a forum for whatever kind<br />
of discussion you are interested in.