Books


Are You There, God? It’s Me, Rachel!

By Beth Schwartzapfel

Although Judaism is front and center in Deborah Heiligman’s coming of age novel ‘Intentions,’ at the core of the story are questions of faith with which all teenagers grapple.Read More

Our Favorite Heretic

By Allan Nadler

The array of uses and misuses of Baruch Spinoza, perhaps Judaism’s most-famed heretic, is testimony to the boundlessness of the human imagination.Read More

A Curmudgeon’s Guide To Jewish History

By Eddy Portnoy

As Harvey Pekar reached the end of his life, the Jewish issue evidently came to interest him a great deal not only in a personal way, but also in a broader historical sense.Read More

No Straight Path From Dogma to Dissent

By Benjamin Ivry

Vasily Grossman took a complex path from syncophancy to dissidence under Soviet anti-Semitic oppression. A new biography takes an unsparing look at his career.Read More

The Liberation of Helène Aylon

By Debra Nussbaum Cohen

Helene Aylon grew up Orthodox in Brooklyn’s Boro Park, became a rebbetzin and then a feminist artist. A new memoir traces her remarkable journey.Read More

Stopping To Think About the Roses

By Ilan Stavans

There was a time when Latin American writers felt compelled — maybe the word is “constrained” — to focus their work on Latin America. Andrés Neuman takes a more global approach.Read More

Thoughts That Move in Space

By Jake Marmer

‘N18’ is a collection of Hank Lazer’s so-called ‘shape-poems,’ works in which the handwritten layout is at least as important as the actual words that comprise the verses.Read More

Life in British Mandate Palestine

By Jerome A. Chanes

‘Out of Palestine’ is a truly fascinating discussion of a period that is still incompletely and insufficiently understood: the last years of the British Mandate in Palestine.Read More

Hasidic Tales and Prayer-Poems

By Rachel Barenblat

The sheer number of names, rebbes, dynasties and towns may overwhelm readers of ‘A Hidden Light.’ To author Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, each one is an intimate friend.Read More

Unlikely Chronicler of Jewish Neighborhood

By Gary Shapiro

Clayton Patterson is an unlikely candidate to launch a history of the Jewish Lower East Side. He’s not Jewish, has a biker’s beard and runs the New York Tattoo Society.Read More




Find us on Facebook!
  • "Despite the great pain and sadness surrounding a captured soldier, this should not shape the face of this particular conflict – not in making concessions and not in negotiations, not in sobering assessments of this operation’s achievements or the need to either retreat or move forward." Do you agree?
  • Why genocide is always wrong, period. And the fact that some are talking about it shows just how much damage the war in Gaza has already done.
  • Construction workers found a 75-year-old deli sign behind a closing Harlem bodega earlier this month. Should it be preserved?
  • "The painful irony in Israel’s current dilemma is that it has been here before." Read J.J. Goldberg's latest analysis of the conflict:
  • Law professor Dan Markel waited a shocking 19 minutes for an ambulance as he lay dying after being ambushed in his driveway. Read the stunning 911 transcript as neighbor pleaded for help.
  • Happy birthday to the Boy Who Lived! July 31 marks the day that Harry Potter — and his creator, J.K. Rowling — first entered the world. Harry is a loyal Gryffindorian, a matchless wizard, a native Parseltongue speaker, and…a Jew?
  • "Orwell would side with Israel for building a flourishing democracy, rather than Hamas, which imposed a floundering dictatorship. He would applaud the IDF, which warns civilians before bombing them in a justified war, not Hamas terrorists who cower behind their own civilians, target neighboring civilians, and planned to swarm civilian settlements on the Jewish New Year." Read Gil Troy's response to Daniel May's opinion piece:
  • "My dear Penelope, when you accuse Israel of committing 'genocide,' do you actually know what you are talking about?"
  • What's for #Shabbat dinner? Try Molly Yeh's coconut quinoa with dates and nuts. Recipe here:
  • Can animals suffer from PTSD?
  • Is anti-Zionism the new anti-Semitism?
  • "I thought I was the only Jew on a Harley Davidson, but I was wrong." — Gil Paul, member of the Hillel's Angels. http://jd.fo/g4cjH
  • “This is a dangerous region, even for people who don’t live there and say, merely express the mildest of concern about the humanitarian tragedy of civilians who have nothing to do with the warring factions, only to catch a rash of *** (bleeped) from everyone who went to your bar mitzvah! Statute of limitations! Look, a $50 savings bond does not buy you a lifetime of criticism.”
  • That sound you hear? That's your childhood going up in smoke.
    • from-cache

Would you like to receive updates about new stories?




















We will not share your e-mail address or other personal information.

Already subscribed? Manage your subscription.