Leaving Lucy Pear
Award-winning novelist Anna Solomon’s second novel Leaving Lucy Pear, now out in paperback, is a masterfully woven web of ambition and lies.
Muck: A Novel
In this re-telling of the life of Jeremiah, the second major prophet in the Hebrew Bible, Dror Burstein, an Israeli poet and novelist who teaches literature at Tel Aviv and Hebrew universities, interweaves all aspects of the modern world, including cell phones, fax machines, computers, and high-speed transit with the ancient Jerusalem in which the First Temple dominates the horizon. T
Mavericks, Mystics & False Messiahs: Episodes from the Margins of Jewish History
In Mavericks, Mystics & False Messiahs: Episodes from the Margins of Jewish History, Pini Dunner provides a series of bizarre stories describing how some Jews crashed through conventional guardrails of staid Jewish tradition and sped forward onto aberrant lanes of false messiahs, forgers of Passover Haggadot, rabbis searching for subversive religious meanings of Hebrew amulets, and an 18th-century British lord who converted to Judaism.
America's Jewish Women: A History From Colonial Times to Today
What does it mean to be a Jewish woman in America? What did it mean to be a Jewish woman throughout American history? These are questions Dr. Pamela Nadell, Patrick Clendenen Chair in Women’s and Gender History and director of Jewish Studies at American University, asks in her important new book, America’s Jewish Women: A History From Colonial Times to Today.
Ben Hecht: Fighting Words, Moving Pictures
In her new book, Ben Hecht: Fighting Words, Moving Pictures (Yale University Press), essayist and biographer Adina Hoffman captures the turbulent life of one o
Galilee Diary: Suburban Sprawl
On a recent perfect early spring day (warm sun, cooling breeze, brilliant wild flowers) we took the children and grandchildren on a short hike to the mountainside adjacent to Shorashim, picnicking under an olive tree. On the way, we encountered toads, lizards, a scorpion, and caterpillars; our lunch was serenaded by the muezzin of the village of Shaab, with the backup chorus of the jackals that live in the open areas.
What Do Jews Have to Do with Jazz? Plenty!
If you love jazz and Jewish culture, as I do, it seems only natural to seek out connections between the two. That’s exactly what a select group of jazz lovers in New Jersey did this past fall and winter, bringing to the fore the exceptional exhibit, Jazz, Jews and African Americans: Cultural Intersections in Newark and Beyond. The show was a collaboration of the Institute of Jazz Studies (Rutgers University-Newark), New Jersey Performing Arts Center, WBGO, the Jewish Museum of New Jersey, New Jersey City University, and Congregation Ahavas Sholom, an historic synagogue in Newark that houses the museum.
How My Jewish Values Inspired My New Business
When I think of the many factors that helped shape me into the woman I am today, I think, in particular, of lessons from my mother. Her wisdom inspired me and imbued me with a strong voice and commitment to social justice. That commitment led me, in part, to the business I recently started.
Need a New Way to Teach Jewish Values to Your Kids? Shaboom! Is the Answer
Last spring, the team at BimBam (formerly G-dcast) approached the URJ’s Families with Young Children staff in their effort to ensure that Shaboom!, the company’s new videos for families accurately reflect Reform Jewish values and philosophies. My colleagues and I were happy to help.
4 Ways to Celebrate Pride Month 2016
Here are three things you can do during the month of June to honor and celebrate LGBT rights.