Modern Jewish Fiction
Explore the best modern Jewish fiction books with our curated list. Discover captivating stories, acclaimed authors, and timeless tales that celebrate Jewish culture and heritage.
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Lost Tribe
by Paul Zakrzewski
Funny, raw, dark, sometimes outrageous, the twenty-five contributors to Lost Tribe explore themes such as conflicted identities, sexual fetishes, religious intolerance, and even the troubled legacy of the Holocaust to create a stirring picture of contemporary Jewish life. Lost Tribe features stories and commentary from a brilliant mixture of critically acclaimed and emerging writers. Steve Almond Aimee Bender Gabriel Brownstein Judy Budnitz Nathan Englander Jonathan Safran Foer Myla Goldberg Ehud Havazelet Dara Horn Rachel Kadish Gloria DeVidas Kirchheimer Binnie Kirshenbaum Joan Leegant Michael Lowenthal Ellen Miller Tova Mirvis Peter Orner Jon Papernick Nelly Reifler Ben Schrank Suzan Sherman Gary Shteyngart Aryeh Lev Stollman Ellen Umansky Simone Zelitch
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For the Relief of Unbearable Urges
by Nathan Englander
A work of stunning authority and imagination, Englander's debut contains ten energized, irreverent stories rooted in the weight of Jewish history and the customs of Orthodox life.
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The Art of the Story
by Daniel Halpern
An anthology of some 80 stories, including two dozen translations. The latter range from The Elephant Vanishes, a look at Japanese society by Haruki Murakami, to My Father, the Englishman, and I, a satire on colonialism by the Somalian, Nuruddin Farah.
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Book Lust
by Nancy Pearl
What to read next is every book lover's greatest dilemma. Nancy Pearl comes to the rescue with this wide-ranging and fun guide to the best reading new and old. Pearl, who inspired legions of litterateurs with "What If All (name the city) Read the Same Book," has devised reading lists that cater to every mood, occasion, and personality. These annotated lists cover such topics as mother-daughter relationships, science for nonscientists, mysteries of all stripes, African-American fiction from a female point of view, must-reads for kids, books on bicycling, "chick-lit," and many more. Pearl's enthusiasm and taste shine throughout.
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Jewish Holiday Cooking
by Jayne Cohen
In Jewish Holiday Cooking, Jayne Cohen shares a wide-ranging collection of traditional Jewish recipes, as well as inventive new creations and contemporary variations on the classic dishes. For home cooks, drawing from the rich traditions of Jewish history when cooking for the holidays can be a daunting task. Jewish Holiday Cooking comes to the rescue with recipes drawn from Jayne Cohen's first book, The Gefilte Variations -- called an "outstanding debut" by Publisher's Weekly -- as well as over 100 new recipes and information on cooking for the holidays. More than just a cookbook, this is the definitive guide to celebrating the Jewish holidays. Cohen provides practical advice and creative suggestions on everything from setting a Seder table with ritual objects to accommodating vegan relatives. The book is organized around the major Jewish holidays and includes nearly 300 recipes and variations, plus suggested menus tailored to each occasion, all conforming to kosher dietary laws. Chapters include all eight of the major Jewish holidays -- Shabbat, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Hanukkah, Purim, Passover, and Shavuot -- and the book is enlivened throughout with captivating personal reminiscences and tales from Jewish lore as well as nostalgic black and white photography from Cohen's own family history.
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The Cambridge Companion to Jewish American Literature
by Hana Wirth-Nesher
For more than two hundred years, Jews have played important roles in the development of American literature. The Cambridge Companion to Jewish American Literature addresses a wide array of themes and approaches to the distinct yet multifaceted body of Jewish American literature. Essays examine writing from the 1700s to major contemporary writers such as Saul Bellow and Philip Roth. Topics covered include literary history, immigration and acculturation, Yiddish and Hebrew literature, popular culture, women writers, literary theory and poetics, multilingualism, the Holocaust, and contemporary fiction. This collection of specially commissioned essays by leading figures discusses Jewish American literature in relation to ethnicity, religion, politics, race, gender, ideology, history, and ethics, and places it in the contexts of both Jewish and American writing. With its chronology and guides to further reading, this volume will prove valuable to scholars and students alike.
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The Book of Lists: Horror
by Amy Wallace
The phenomenally popular Book of Lists series has sold millions of copies from coast to coast, enthralling trivia aficionados with fascinating infobits about simply everything! Now the latest edition turns an evil eye toward the strange, the blood-curdling, and the macabre with spine-tingling fun facts from the dark side of entertainment. Chock-full of creepy information from the netherworlds of movies, TV, literature, video games, comic books, and graphic novels, The Book of Lists: Horror offers a blood-feast of forbidden knowledge that horror fans are hungry to devour, including: Stephen King's Ten Favorite Horror Novels or Short Stories—learn what scares the master! Top Six Grossing Horror Movies of All Time in the United States— which big shocks translated into big bucks? Top Ten Horror-Themed Rock 'n' Roll Songs—maybe it is ‘devil's music' after all! And much, much more! Drawing on its authors' extensive knowledge and contributions from the (living) legends and greatest names in the horror and dark fantasy genres, The Book of Lists: Horror is a scream—an irresistible compendium of all things mysterious, terrifying, and gory . . . and so entertaining, it's scary!
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The Cambridge Companion to Philip Roth
by Timothy Parrish
From the moment that his debut book, Goodbye, Columbus (1959), won him the National Book Award, Philip Roth has been among the most influential and controversial writers of our age. Now the author of more than twenty novels, numerous stories, two memoirs, and two books of literary criticism, Roth has used his writing to continually reinvent himself and in doing so to remake the American literary landscape. This Companion provides the most comprehensive introduction to his works and thought in a collection of newly commissioned essays from distinguished scholars. Beginning with the urgency of Roth's early fiction and extending to the vitality of his most recent novels, these essays trace Roth's artistic engagement with questions about ethnic identity, postmodernism, Israel, the Holocaust, sexuality, and the human psyche itself. With its chronology and guide to further reading, this Companion will be essential for new and returning Roth readers, students and scholars.
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Philip Roth
by Derek Parker Royal
Of all contemporary American writers, Philip Roth is perhaps the most ambitious, yet he is one of the most underrepresented in terms of critical attention given his place in American letters. Unlike many aging novelists, whose production and creative mastery wane over time, Roth has demonstrated a unique ability not only to sustain his literary output, but also to surpass the scope and talent inherent in his previous writings. He has been awarded many literary honors, and in the 1990s alone he won every major American book award. This long-overdue collection of essays covers Roth's entire output and links themes across works, highlighting those thoughts and ideas that recur frequently. Unlike older introductions to Roth's writings, this volume will provide up-to-date coverage of all his works. Each chapter introduces the work or works under discussion, provides a brief summary of the story, and moves on to a lively analysis of its various literary elements and its significance in Roth's overall body of work. While each chapter focuses on the central issues in the specific work, several larger themes that run throughout many of his writings will be addressed, including the rise of suburbanization in post-war America, the problems and prominence of the family, American (Jewish) ethnicity, comedy and satire, the costs of literary celebrity, the promises and failures of the American dream, and others. Newcomers to and fans alike will find everything they need in this volume to build a better appreciation of Roth's work.
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Redemption
by Steven G. Kellman
In following author Henry Roth's tortured life from his childhood on the Jewish Lower East Side to his twilight years in New Mexico, literary critic Steven Kellman has uncovered FBI files, spoken with family members and friends, and gained access to the tape in which Roth discussed the long-buried incest of his youth.
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Mocking the Age
by Elaine B. Safer
Explores the comic devices Roth uses to satirize his times, the Jewish community, and himself.
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Philip Roth
by Debra B. Shostak
Looking at Philip Roth's writing life as a "book of voices," Debra Shostak listens in on the conversations that this prominent American novelist has conducted with himself and his times over forty years and twenty-four books. She finds that while Roth frequently shifts perspectives, he repeatedly returns to interrelated questions of cultural history, literary history, and, especially, selfhood.
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Requiem for Harlem
by Henry Roth
In the concluding book in this extraordinary, four-volume spiritual and literary odyssey, Roth tells the psychologically lacerating story of Ira Stigman, a senior at City College, who falls in love with Edith Welles, NYU professor and muse of modern poets.
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Call It Sleep
by Henry Roth
When Henry Roth published his debut novel Call It Sleep in 1934, it was greeted with considerable critical acclaim though, in those troubled times, lackluster sales. Only with its paperback publication thirty years later did this novel receive the recognition it deserves—--and still enjoys. Having sold-to-date millions of copies worldwide, Call It Sleep is the magnificent story of David Schearl, the "dangerously imaginative" child coming of age in the slums of New York.
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The Outside World
by Tova Mirvis
Tzippy Goldman was born for marriage. She and her mother had always assumed she’d graduate high school, be set up with the right boy, and have a beautiful wedding with white lace and pareve vanilla cream frosting. But at twenty-two, Tzippy’s fast approaching spinsterhood. She dreams of escape; instead, she leaves for a year in Jerusalem.There she meets–re-meets–Baruch, the son of her mother’s college roommate. When Tzippy last saw him, his name was Bryan and he wore a Yankees-logo yarmulke. Now he has adopted the black hat of the ultra-orthodox, the tradition in which Tzippy was raised. Twelve weeks later, they’re engaged...and discovering that desire and tradition, devotion and individuality aren’t the easiest balance. Hilarious, compassionate, and tremendously insightful, The Outside World illuminates an insular community, marvelously depicting that complicated blend of faith, love, and family otherwise known as life in a modern world.
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Exploring Jewish Literature of the Second Temple Period
by Larry R. Helyer
Larry R. Helyer provides an introduction and historical context for the wealth of Jewish literature outside the Hebrew Bible, and he explores the pressures, realities, questions and dreams that nurtured and provoked these written works.
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Women's Minyan
by Naomi Ragen
"Naomi Ragen's first play premiered in 2002 at Israel's National Theater, Habimah, and had its American premiere at Duke University in North Carolina in 2005. It is based on a true story: a Haredi (ultra-Orthodox) woman, wife of a rabbi, mother of twelve, leaves her family for unspecified reasons. The woman is punished; the community's "modesty squad" prevents her from seeing her children, and the friend she is staying with is physically attacked. Desperate to regain access to her children, she determines that the women of her community must stand in judgement, hoping that once they hear the truth of why she left, they will allow her to be reunited with her children."--BOOK JACKET.
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The Ghost of Hannah Mendes
by Naomi Ragen
The ghost of a real-life historical figure helps elderly Catherine da Costa convince her granddaughters to travel across Europe with her and helps them find a link between past and present by leaving mysterious journal entries along their travel route.
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Welcome to Heavenly Heights
by Risa Miller
Viewed through the pinhole of one ragged apartment building's door, Miller's prose illuminates the families, friendships, loves, sorrows, and religious faith that make up a completely unique American dream."--BOOK JACKET.
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Red Sea
by Emily Benedek
Based on real intelligence, this debut novel takes readers on a frighteninglyplausible thrill ride into the dark heart of international terrorism.
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The Romance Reader
by Pearl Abraham
Widely applauded when it was published last year, Pearl Abraham's debut novel The Romance Reader possesses that quality that distinguishes all great fiction—a fresh look at the universal truths that bind us together. Like Chaim Potok, who revealed the Orthodox Jewish world from a young man's perspective in The Chosen, Abraham explores new ground, offering readers a tender story of a young Hasidic woman facing the challenges of growing up and the demands of her religion. Rachel Benjamin is the daughter of a quixotic rabbi who dreams of building a synagogue in the secluded upstate New York bungalow colony where his family now lives. As the rabbi's eldest daughter, Rachel is expected to set an example for her five siblings and for the other girls in the community: she must wear thick opaque tights with seams; she is forbidden to wear a bathing suit in public; and she can never read books in English. But like all young adults, Rachel bristles at the stringent rules set by her family and her religion, rebelling in ways that become increasingly apparent. Whether sneaking sheer nylons in and out of the house or applying for an illicit library card that will allow her access to the romance novels that she loves, Rachel is determined to do things her way. Dreaming of a life that mirrors that of the heroines in her favorite novels, Rachel craves the independence she will never have as a Hasidic woman in an arranged marriage. And yet, as her impending marriage draws inevitably nearer, the pulls of family and faith weigh against the frightening and unknown world beyond her own. This coming-of-age tale is both unusual and familiar—an intriguing, heartfelt look at the power of family and religion in the Hasidic community and the universal desire to leave the nest.
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Off the Derech
by Faranak Margolese
Off the Derech is the phrase used within the Orthodox Jewish community to describe those who have left Jewish observance. Using questionnaires, extensive interviews with psychologists and rabbis, and her Off The Derech website, the author reveals the multilayered reasons for the defection of so many observant Jews from Judaism. At the same time, she presents solutions to this growing problem, thereby creating an invaluable handbook for parents, teachers and rabbis. Each chapter of this well-researched book deals with a different element of the Off the Derech syndrome as it explains, in detail, how parents can reach children who have become alienated and disaffected from their culture and their people.
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Seven Blessings
by Ruchama King
The closed, secret world of matchmaking in contemporary Israel provides the titillating pivot for a story of uncommon proportions. In Ruchama King's skillful hands, Seven Blessings maps out the complicated lives of five expatriate women and men whose search for a soul mate, in many ways, mirrors their search for God. At the center of this fascinating novel is Beth, who at age thirty-nine longs to be married but despairs she ever will be. When she finally meets the man of her dreams, he has what she believes to be an insurmountable flaw. Can she overcome her repugnance in order to forge a new life? Binyamin, a talented painter and student, lacks the humility to identify a worthy wife. He strains the matchmakers' patience until his search for perfect love finally becomes ridiculous, even to himself. Tsippi and Judith, the matchmakers, are stumbling themselves, with marriages that need propping up. In this land of miracles, seeking the right match, whether between singles, husband and wife, student and teacher, or man and God, becomes a quest that opens the Bible to us in a new way. Rich characters, an intriguing setting, writing that offers unique nuances, and ultimately a story that keeps you turning the pages all combine to introduce a remarkable newcomer. Seven Blessings redefines the Jewish experience, with a story that will ring with truth for anyone who's ever considered getting married.
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Unchosen
by Hella Winston
When Hella Winston began talking with Hasidic Jews for her doctoral dissertation in sociology, she was excited to be meeting with members of the highly insular Brooklyn Satmar sect. Several Jewish journalists and scholars have produced admiring books describing the Lubavitch way of life and the groups outreach efforts, but very little has been written about the other Hasidic sects, despite their combined greater numbers. Unlike Lubavitch, members of these other groups do not engage in outreach and are raised to avoid all unnecessary contact with outside society. Winstons access was unprecedented.She never could have guessed what would happen next-that she would be introduced, slowly and covertly, to Hasidim deeply unhappy with their highly restrictive way of life and sometimes desperately struggling to leave their communities. First there was Yossi, a young man yearning to leave but, like most male Hasidim, a Yiddish speaker with only fourth grade English and math skills. Then she met Dini, a wife and mother called before the all-male modesty patrol because someone had spotted her outside a bar in a T-shirt and miniskirt. There were others still who had actually left.Unchosen tells the story of these and other "rebel" Hasidim, serious questioners who long for greater personal and intellectual freedom than their communities allow. In so doing, Unchosen forces us to reexamine the history of these communities and asks us to consider what we choose not to see when we romanticize them.
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Tales of Nehama
by Leah Abramowitz
Who was Nehama Leibowitz? This question is thoroughly and lovingly explored in Tales of Nehama, by Lea Abramowitz. The result is a fascinating, in-depth exploration of a leading bible scholar, and renowned and revered teacher. Through hundreds of anecdotes and memories, told by Leibowitzs students, colleagues and friends, Tales of Nehama outlines Leibowitzs profound personal impact on thousands of people, and on Jewish learning and biblical criticism. Nehama Leibowitz had requested only one word to be inscribed on her tombstone: teacher. This comprehensive volume details her personal qualities that contributed to her outstanding success as an educator -- her devotion to people and acts of kindness, her modesty, her tolerance and openness to all, and her sense of humour. But Tales of Nehama goes further, to explore Leibowitzs teaching methods, in which actualisation and entertaining played a major role. From an intimate analysis of her character and beliefs -- her stand on feminism and Zionism, her views on Hareidim, the secular world, and on education -- to the central chapter, which recounts dozens of Tales of Nehama, concise, true stories that serve to outline the tremendous impact and inner workings of this great scholar, the book also comprises comprehensive sections exploring many aspects of her intellectual endeavours. These include her studies of the weekly Torah portions; an appraisal of her teaching methods; a review of her pedagogical approach; her commentaries on certain Psalms; her essay entitled "Active Learning in the Teaching of History"; an exchange of letters between Nehama Leibowitz and Professor Hugo Bergman, portraying a fascinating dialogue between two very brilliant and committed Jewish scholars; and a section exploring published articles that recognise Leibowitzs unique contribution to Jewish thought and study. The book not only answers the question Who was Nehama Leibowitz? but it also creates a vivid portrayal of a genius whose impact on Judaism was unparalleled, and will reverberate for generations to come.
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In My Mother's House
by Margaret McMullan
In My Mother's House is a beautiful, haunting, and expertly told novel about a daughter's obsession to understand her mother's commitment to silence about their family's experiences during WWII Vienna. The story of Elizabeth and her mother Jenny is remarkable for its fullness of details: the pieces of family silver the grandmother mails to Jenny, piece by piece, over the years; Jenny's vivid memories of her uncle's viola d'amore lessons; the smell of the wood floors in the family's Vienna home. It's an emotional story of what is inherited from one generation to the next.
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Scream Queens of the Dead Sea
by Gilad Elbom
Newly repatriated from the Israeli army, a young man decides to take a job in a mental institution, but he soon discovers himself trapped in the asylum, where the madness inside mirrors the insanity currently gripping the nation of Israel itself. Reprint.