Welcome to the Forward’s coverage of books and literature, including both non-fictional and fictional works.
Books
The Latest
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Culture An Israeli-American author’s debut brings the road trip novel back to life
There may be no better way of handling a death in the family, at least in the American imagination, than hopping in the car and driving somewhere — anywhere. A road trip, especially to some meaningful destination, can be a gesture of respect for the mourned or a step towards renewal for the mourner. It’s…
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Community Is there any good time to publish a book during a pandemic?
“Timing is everything.” Larry Cohler-Esses wrote that line in 1995 in a Forward news story about my book contract with Simon and Schuster. I was the American Jewish Committee’s expert on antisemitism at the time. I had written a report on the militia movement ten days before the Oklahoma City bombing predicting attacks on government…
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Culture In ‘Little Eyes,’ a human gaze more frightening than the digital
There’s a gut-clenchingly tender moment midway through “Little Eyes,” Samanta Schweblin’s deft and ineffably creepy new novel, when Emilia, a lonely Peruvian widow, gazes on a pair of closed eyes. “It had been a very long time since she had seen anyone with their eyes closed,” she observes; not since her son, a banker based…
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Culture Are you there, Judy Blume? It’s me, Molly.
I spent my childhood summers in a small beach town near Mystic, Conn., swimming in the frigid Fishers Island Sound, catching crabs by affixing sliced hot dogs — or, in a pinch, mussels crushed beneath a paving stone — to thick white string and dangling the bait off the dock. I accompanied my older cousin…
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Fast Forward In a change of heart, Amazon has dropped white nationalist books
Amazon has removed several white nationalist and anti-Semitic books from its website, a change from its past policy of defending the sale of objectionable publications, The New York Times reported Sunday. While the online marketplace has frequently removed things like anti-Semitic action figures and Christmas ornaments listed for purchase by third-party sellers, it has traditionally…
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Israel News What books should Jared Kushner have read about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
White House senior advisor Jared Kushner was widely mocked after telling Sky News Arabia that he was qualified to propose a new Israeli-Palestinian peace plan because he had “read 25 books” about the conflict. While the White House refused to tell the Forward what those books were, our reporting uncovered four of them. But it…
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Culture The history of Hasidism: A New History by those who wrote it
Editor’s Note: In 2018, the Forward published this essay raising concerns about female representation in Jewish Studies, focused on a 2017 book about Hasidism. One of its authors responded this month with a broader critique of diversity in the field. The original critics then had another take, and now more of the authors are responding….
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Culture Discovering Louisa May Alcott’s Jewish history on Portuguese tour
Louisa May Alcott was often told as a child that her dark hair and dark eyes came from her Sephardic Jewish ancestry. Her mother, Abigail May Alcott, who had similar coloring, had learned this from her father, Joseph May, a late 18th-century Boston businessman whose Portuguese Jewish ancestors immigrated to Sussex, England, just before 1500….
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Fast Forward ‘Rabbi rebellion’: 33 Orthodox rabbis endorse Harris
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Opinion I was a Bernie supporter. This year, I’m voting Trump. Here’s why liberal Jews like me made the switch
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Opinion Here’s why Orthodox Jews are loyal to Trump — even if they don’t love him
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FIRST PERSON As a rabbi, he helped others mourn. So why wouldn’t his daughter say kaddish for him?
In Case You Missed It
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Film & TV Why movies are tackling a real pain: memory and Holocaust tourism
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Yiddish טשיקאַווער ראָמאַן וועגן פֿרוי וואָס זוכט אַ גײַסטיקע היים אין ירושלים — דורך ייִדישUnique novel about woman who seeks a spiritual home in Jerusalem — through Yiddish
די העלדין פֿון „דאָ איז נאָך אַלץ דאָ“ טראָגט אױף זיך דעם לאַסט פֿון איר באָבעס חורבן־טראַװמע.
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Fast Forward Many Israelis are celebrating Trump’s win, seeing him as more likely to back their country
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Fast Forward Eugene Vindman, whose Jewish immigrant story played a role in Trump’s impeachment, elected to Congress
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