A Far Wilder Magic

by: Allison Saft

Wednesday Books, March 8, 2022

384 pages

Review by: E Broderick

At first blush “A Far Wilder Magic“, the sophomore effort of author Allison Saft, may not seem an obvious choice for this blog. After all, it is a second world, roaring 20’s inspired, fantasy about a magical fox hunt. Nowhere in its pages does the word “Jewish” appear. However, only a fool would doubt that this is a very, very Jewish book.

The story is told in dual POV. The first, Maggie Welty, is the neglected daughter of an alchemist ostracized by her community due to her father observing the religion of the Yu’adir. The second, Weston Winters, is a bumbling but endearing student hoping to apprentice himself to Maggie’s absentee mother. Ostensibly it is a slow burn love story about two unlikely candidates teaming up to beat all the odds. Yet simmering beneath the small town turned speak easy vibe is something else entirely.

As someone who completed part of her education in an institution fondly known as “The WASP Capital,” it didn’t take more than a couple of chapters for me to grasp that this is the story of a Jewish girl and a Catholic boy confronting their fears, and societies bullies, to take down the Protestant establishment. Saft doesn’t pull her punches. The prejudice that Maggie and Weston face is very ugly, very real and very true to life. Even if the word “antisemitism” or “xenophobia” is never used. It is a universal language instantly recognized by anyone that has experienced it.

We had a tradition in school, a winter formal, in which everyone got dressed up in wedding attire and attended a huge party in a fancy hotel. It was a quasi Prom or debutante ball, only more geek-ish. For many, it was the highlight of the year. For me, it was an unattainable impossibility. Because, it was always held on a Friday night when I could not drive to the venue. Instead, I got all gussied up to attend the pre-party in our dorm and then waved at my classmates as they sped off without me.

Don’t get me wrong, they were good people. Kind people. They often expressed a desire that I could come. Yet they never seemed to realize that unlike the school sponsored senior dinner (also annually held on a Friday night and required driving across a highway to attend so I couldn’t even contemplate walking), this was a student run and organized event. They never talked about rotating the dates. It HAD to be a Friday night, because otherwise how would everyone sleep off the alcohol in time for class on Monday? Honestly, the possibility of change never even occurred to me. Much like Maggie Welty, I made myself small, attempted to blend in, and expected no better from the world around me.

Much like my life, this book is filled with people whose actions are not overtly villainous yet their inaction makes then just as reprehensible for aiding, abetting systemic prejudice and inequality. Saft gives them flesh and bones, taking pains to characterize them as fully as the more obvious heros and villains. Because their complicity is necessary for villains to thrive.

Although the book is slow at first, this is more than made up for by the exceptionally well thought out and fulfilling ending. As the story of Maggie and Weston came to a close I did not think about the feeling of sadness I felt as all my classmates peeled away in their Ubers towards the Ball that I could not attend. Instead, I was reminding of meeting up with the other Jewish students who had stayed behind, as well as the students from other minority faiths who for various reasons chose not to attend. We had chosen something different, but no less special.

My Shabbat candles may not have been as bright as the disco in that hotel. The Kiddush wine not as luxuriant as the open bar. But the faces around my table were open and friendly and the current of understanding that ran through us all was far more electric than anything happening on the dance floor. You might even say a far wilder magic ran through all of our veins that night.

Note: I initially attempted to obtain an arc via NetGalley and was turned down by the publisher. No harm no foul. It happens. However the author later posted on her Twitter that arcs were available for EVERYONE for a limited time and I swooped in and grabbed one. Thank you Allison for the hot tip, and please rest assured that I am not a stalker of your Twitter. I just like books. Especially this one.

E Broderick is a writer and speculative fiction enthusiast. When not writing she enjoys epic games of trivial pursuit and baking. She currently lives in the U.S. but is eagerly awaiting the day a sentient spaceship offers to take her traveling around the galaxy.

How to Find What You’re Not Looking For

by: Veera Hiranandani

Kokila, September 2021

384 pages

Review by: E Broderick

Second person narratives are experiencing a renaissance. Everywhere I turn it seems someone new is attempting to craft a story utilizing this previously rare method of story telling. In inexperienced hands it is a disaster. Bumbling novices try to impress readers and appear “literary” by using a technique they think is sophisticated but in actuality leaves their writing pretentious, stilted and difficult to parse. Lucky for us, Veera Hiranandani is no novice. In her latest middle grade historical fiction novel, How to Find What You’re Not Looking For, she uses the second person to literally push the thoughts and emotions of her main character into the readers consciousness. There is no separation between us and the text. We are the main character and we feel her struggle as a visceral sucker punch because of it. 

The story follows Jewish twelve-year-old Ariel as her life is turned upside down in the summer following the Loving vs. Virginia ruling that declared the banning of interracial marriage was unconstitutional. Ariel has never given much thought to issues of the wider world but when her universe is turned upside down by her sister eloping with a Hindu Indian man that their parents do not approve of, she is forced to do so. We, in turn, are forced to confront these issues as well. To further complicate matters, Ariel is struggling in school due to what we as the reader can easily identify as an undiagnosed learning disability, being bullied by an anti Semitic classmate and her parents contemplating selling the family bakery due to financial difficulty. 

I’ve read and enjoyed Hiranandani’s work before and it is safe to say she does not shy away from tackling difficult issues like race, antisemitism, financial struggles and the internal prejudices that Jewish people have towards the wider world. She has proven she can tell a good story and make us think all at the same time. Yet what made this particular book a stand out for me was in fact the side characters. From the school bully Chris to Ariel’s best friend Jane and back to her babysitter Gabby, they were each so lovingly developed I felt they could carry their own narratives. They breathed life into the world. Made it full and rounded. Even the depictions of Ariel’s parents, who make decisions that Ariel, and by proxy we the readers, disapprove of, are drawn with suck a skillful hand that we never hate them. We simply wish they knew better. 

It would be lovely if I could say I identified with this book because I had a teacher as wonderful as Ariel’s or a friend as determined as Jane. But let’s be real. What I most identified with was seeing the prejudices in those around me and wishing I could change them. As Ariel learns, Holocaust trauma has led to a deeply rooted isolationism in many Jewish communities. We fear that which we view as “other” and the onus of continuing the Jewish people, of making up for all the lives that were lost, presses in on us like the walls of an ever shrinking room and stifles change. This may not be everyone’s experience, Judaism contains multitudes after all, but it really hit home for me. 

I also identified with the family’s Rabbi, whom we never meet, when his advice is relayed through Ariel’s father. In a twist I was not expecting, but that left me pleasantly surprised, he tells Ariel’s parents to do what is in their hearts. This, to me, has always been the definition of Judaism.

As the reader is forced into Ariel’s head, to literally become her by reading this second person story as well as the heart-aching poetry within it, we experience a similar phenomenon. Ariel must look into her own heart and find a way forward for her family. I invite you, the reader, to cast aside your preconceived notions, pick up this book, and do the same. 

E Broderick is a writer and speculative fiction enthusiast. When not writing she enjoys epic games of trivial pursuit and baking. She currently lives in the U. S. but is eagerly awaiting the day a sentient spaceship offers to take her traveling around the galaxy.

Love and Latkes

by: Stacey Agdern

Tule Publishing, October 2021

252 pages

Review by: E Broderick

I posted reviews a bit slower this September for several reasons, all of them related to the recent slate of Jewish holidays. Most of my reading is done on an e-reader which I cannot use on the holiday. In addition, I’ve been spending every free moment preparing holiday foods, both traditional and new, because where I’m from that’s how we mark the passage of time. We honor our past and look forward to our future by cooking and baking the comfort foods we all love.

Which is why it is only fitting that the first book I post after the end of this high holiday season is Stacey Agdern’s romance Love and Latkes. The third in the Friendship and Festivals series, the book follows aspiring Jewish food critic Batya Averman as she attempts to overcome stage fright and feature Jewish food on national television by hosting her town’s inaugural latke fry off. The catch? One of the contestants is Abe, her high school crush gone awry who is hoping to use the contestant to further his own dreams of opening a kosher deli.

Ostensibly, this is a sweet second chance romance featuring Hannukah themes. In reality, it is a love letter to Jewish food and I am here for it! Batya and Abe reconnect over food, flirt by sending each other gifts of food and even engage in the age old applesauce vs. sour cream debate. This, my friends, is the stuff that Jewish foodie dreams are made of.

As I braided my round, raisin challa dough for Rosh Hashana I appreciated the discussion on keeping breads pareve so that those who keep traditional kosher laws can still eat them with meat. I thought about the ice cream shop in the novel that tried to blend new flavors into a historic family establishment. Most of all, I luxuriated in the banter that flew faster than soofganiyot off the plate at a Hannukah party.

For readers that are concerned they need to read the other two books in the series, I would encourage you to let that fear go. I will likely be picking up the other two books because I enjoyed meeting the characters featured within them and would like to know more of their story, but this was in no way necessary to my understanding of this book. It stands on its own. It was also safe for work and my commute.

I did however, have one large issue: apple sauce? Are you kidding me? Sour cream is my preferred latke topping ALL THE WAY. However, the argument about needing a non-dairy option to improve latke accessibility was a sound one, so I will grudgingly overlook this travesty. I will also ignore the use of food processors despite the fact that I like the texture I get by using a box grater for my potatoes/turnips/root vegetables.

In short, I loved this unabashedly Jewish book a latke.

Note: I received an arc of this book, no string attached, from the author after I asked her for one.

The Achdus Club #5: On The Move

by: Faygie Holt

Menucha Publishers, 2021

144 pages

Review by: E Broderick

There is something special about picking up a book and knowing that the author did not spend an hour convincing their publisher not to italicize the Hebrew or agonizing over whether the average reader would know how to pronounce the name Hili. The words are freer to move within this world that is intimately familiar. The characters are more welcoming. The plot lines less “Othering” than what one typically finds in contemporary literature.

That was the gift Faygie Holt’s “Achdus Club” series gives readers. Set in an Orthodox Jewish girls school the books follow the transfer of a new student into the fourth grade class. If you’ve attended such a school, you recognize the upheaval that a new student represents to the tight knit group of friends that have been together since nursery school. Roles are questioned, cliques broken up. The entire social order tilts on its axis. The new addition might as well be an invading alien.

In the book’s case, the new girl, Hili Rosen, causes the Queen Bee Ruthie Somerfield to worry that she will be deposed. Ruthie lashes out predictably but not as viciously as might be seen in a non-orthodox Middle Grade book. As promised by the series title, everything does work out in the end thanks to achdus – the Jewish virtue of togetherness and friendship. In fact, in true Orthodox literature style we do not only get a redemption arc. We get a redemption book. The 5th book in the series follows Ruthie as she and her family face some moves of their own. Still, Holt has a light touch and the moral to the tale never feels forced or unearned.

I recently removed the Jewish adage “Achrona Achrona Chaviva” which roughly translates to “the last one is the dearest” from my own writing. I was afraid it would take gentile readers out of the story too much. Imagine my surprise when there, smiling out at me from the pages of the latest book the Achdus series was that very phrase.

Indeed, the last book was my favorite. I wish those girls well as they move past fourth grade. May they be greeted by a world that always understands how crucial matching Purim costumes are and never mispronounces their names.

E Broderick is a writer and speculative fiction enthusiast. When not writing she enjoys epic games of trivial pursuit and baking. She currently lives in the U.S. but is eagerly awaiting the day a sentient spaceship offers to take her traveling around the galaxy.

Recipe for Disaster

by: Aimee Lucido

Versify, September 2021

352 Pages

Review by: Jamie Krakover

Middle School was tough. Friend groups changed constantly, people you thought you knew one day abandoned you the next. Middle school as a Jew was even more complicated. I had Hebrew school twice a week and it prevented me from doing a lot of activities I otherwise wanted to. When Bat Mitzvah studies started it grew even more complicated. Despite my years of Hebrew school, sometimes I wondered if it was all worth it and what it really meant to be Jewish.

In Recipe for Disaster by Aimee Lucido, twelve-year-old Hannah attends her best friend Shira’s Bat Mitzvah, and finds herself drawn to the Jewish prayers. While her Grandma Mimi is Jewish and shared Jewish treats and traditions with her, Hannah never really attended temple. When Shira says Hannah’s not really Jewish, Hannah decides she going to have her own Bat Mitzvah to prove it, even if her parents won’t allow it.

“You’re not really Jewish” or “not Jewish enough” are phrases that hit home for me. While no one ever told me I wasn’t really Jewish, part of me has never felt Jewish enough despite Judaism being thrust upon me from birth and my Bat Mitzvah not being a choice. Therefore, I pushed back against the formality of Judaism. 

Like Hannah, I loved the songs of Judaism and grew up learning and experiencing them in Jewish venues such as Hebrew School and Jewish day camp. But as a logical science minded person, I’ve often struggled with organized religion. Also like Hannah and her recipe making Mimi, being Jewish for me was all about the traditions that I loved. Break the fast at my aunt’s house, Passover around a huge table at my grandmother’s house, and the food that we all grew up on. Matzah Ball Soup anyone?

Though it was hard for me to understand that being Jewish wasn’t just the formalities, as I grew older I began to realize it was about the cultures and traditions too. It didn’t mean you had to go to temple every week or even on the holidays. Being Jewish was a part of who I was, and I was allowed to experience it in a way that’s meaningful to me.

As Hannah prepares for her secret Bat Mitzvah, she realizes she can still have a connection to her Jewish roots and be part of a community that was in some ways kept from her. While her initial desire to be a Bat Mitzvah was initially for the wrong reasons, as she studies Torah and discovers her Jewish identity, she soon discovers for herself what being Jewish means. And while that’s something that is personal for each Jewish person and paths can vary widely, I think it’s an important part of the journey. As Hannah learns, “Judaism is about what’s in your heart, not about what’s in your blood or what’s in your head.”

For anyone struggling with what being Jewish means, not feeling Jewish enough, or just wanting to learn more about Jewish perspectives make sure to check out Recipe for Disaster by Aimee Lucido. And don’t forget to check out all the amazing recipes inside as well, because for many of us, being Jewish is also tied to the traditional things we eat at each holiday.

Through Snowy Wings Publishing, Jamie Krakover is the author of Tracker220 (October 2020). She also has two female in STEM short stories published in the Brave New Girls anthologies and two engineering-centered nonfiction pieces published in Writer’s Digest’s Putting the Science in Fiction. Jamie lives in St. Louis, Missouri with her husband, Andrew, their son, and their dog Rogue (after the X-Men, not Star Wars, although she loves both).

I Kissed a Girl

by: Jennet Alexander

Sourcebooks 2021

400 pages

Review by: Felicia Grossman

There has been quite a bit of discussion as of late over whether a book with a cute cartoon couple on its front and marketed as a “Rom-Com,” can be guaranteed to live up to the promise of the packaging. I Kissed a Girl, Jennet Alexander’s debut featuring the romantic coupling of two Jewish heroines, delivers not just as a fabulous “Rom-Com,” but in a whole bunch of other ways this reader didn’t know she wanted or needed.

Now, fully disclosure. I know Jennet—not super well, but we’re in a writer group-chat together. We have definitely talked and I’ve always found her fun and nice. But, let’s be real, I wouldn’t be obsessively typing out my every thought on this book (which I read in a single sitting) if I didn’t actually adore it. And I completely adored it.

Anyway, let’s talk about the book. Our leads are Lilah and Noa. Lilah is an up-and-coming horror movie actress and Noa is a scrapy make-up artist itching for her union card. They meet on the set of a movie, Noa’s first big job which will hopefully lead to a real career and Lilah’s big leading role which will hopefully help her leap to bigger budget features. Noa has a crush on Lilah but tries to keep it professional, especially after her boss warns her not to date “the talent.”

Also, besides not wanting to come off like an obsessed fan, Noa isn’t even sure Lilah would be interested in her, as while Lilah is bi, she isn’t exactly out due to her own unsureness about life in general. Lilah and Noa are both pretty young. However, Lilah is fairly inexperienced—not only with dating but with making decisions based on what she wants, not just what would be best for the career she’s been working towards since she was a child.

The two, however, are adorably awkward together in a way that is fresh and real and fun. I laughed out loud enough that I scared my dog more than once. Their relationship is slow burn but very sweet and you just want good things for them. Their mistakes and natural and understandable and just very real.

The book is simply a fun read with some really great discussions of genre—horror and romance, and the reasons why they and the emotions they evoke and promises they deliver resonate and create devoted fans. There is also plenty of excitement with on-set drama due to delays, budget cuts, a secret dog, and a stalker. We also get some wonderful action sequences worthy of any great horror flick, which brought a smile to my face, not to mention all the great movie references the premise demands.

But, obviously, we can’t forget the Jewishness. As I mentioned above, both Noa and Lilah are Jewish and the representation is beautiful. Now it’s important to recognized that there is no right way for us to do our own representation, as well as the fact that there are tons of different Jewish experiences which all deserve to be reflect on the page. However, for me, this felt so familiar that it took my breath away and I didn’t realize until reading it how much I personally needed to see characters like this and their Jewish experience in a wonderful book like this.

In I kissed a Girl, Jewish identity and Judaism wasn’t a conflict. It wasn’t problematized or criticized or analyzed. Both Lilah and Noa were just Jewish in a very American way that was merely presented as an important part of the lives and way they saw the world and it just filled me with joy.

Their cultural references were natural and easy and adorable. And while the existence of antisemitism was acknowledged (something that is very important to do, especially in these times) in their hesitation at disclosing being Jewish to strangers in a way that was not belabored but familiar and real. They each were insecure and neurotic and over analytical about a thousand things but this wasn’t one of them and it rang so true for me that I feel lucky to have been able to read it.

Anyway, I adored this book so much and I feel equally lucky that I got asked to guest review it. It’s super special and just a warm, fuzzy, lovely, fun read that gives you exactly what you want from a fun, charming, slow-burn rom-com. I recommend it a million times over and am super willing to excitedly gush about it to anyone who will listen to me.  

Felicia Grossman is an author of historical romance, usually featuring Jewish protagonists and lots of food references. A Delaware native, she now lives in the Rustbelt with her family and Scottish Terrier. When not writing romance, she enjoys eclairs, cannolis, and Sondheim musicals. She is represented by Rebecca Podos of Rees Literary. Follow her on Twitter, instagram, facebook or her Website.

Unwritten Rules

by: KD Casey

Carina Press, October 12 2021

Review by E Broderick

I watched baseball live for the first time in seats that were right behind home plate. I schlepped out to the Stadium on public transportation, carrying Snapples and a turkey sandwich in my bag because I had no idea what the kosher food situation would be. I also had no idea what the rules of the game were or how much those seats cost. They were a gift from someone who loved me and that was all I needed to know.

I think the important parts came across.

It is obvious that KD Casey is well versed in all things baseball. In the opening pages of Unwritten Rules she managed to teach me all about pitch framing, spring training, All-Star games and minor leagues without making it obvious that this was what she was doing. Because as the main character would tell you, framing matters almost as much as the pitch. And in this case the framing was love.

Love of sport. Love of family. Love of an old flame. I could understand all those things, therefore I could understand baseball and this book. The protagonist, Zach Glasser, is a catcher and major league baseball player who also happens to be gay, closeted and in love with his former teammate. When the two reunite at an All-Star game I expected my heart to ache for Zach’s failed relationship. It did. However, I was not prepared for Zach’s disappointment in the much anticipated All-Star game and his career in general to hit me quite as hard. The poignancy of those scenes, the emotional devastation of an athlete contemplating the price they have paid to play a sport that does not always love them back, struck very close to the bone.

Watching Zach and Eugenio first fall in love through a series of flashbacks makes it easy to see how much the machine that churns out major league baseball players mimics real life relationship politics. From the one night stands invited out to spring training and never picked up to the struggle of wondering how much to reveal about ones personal life to a new teammate, the parallels were undeniable.

I harbor no false conviction that this ease of metaphor came about because I am a baseball savant discovering my latent gifts late in life. I still can’t tell a strike from a foul. A fastball from a curveball. Or even what the difference between the infield and the outfield is. No, the secret lies in the author, who clearly knows a thing or two about both love and baseball. And my life was enriched because she decided to put both those things down on the page together.

For the romance fans among us, yes the book bangs. For the Jews among us, yes there is babka. For the baseball fans among us, yes you will be shocked at how hot baseball terminology can be in the right hands.

I have returned to baseball stadiums many times. I’ve sat in the front row, the nosebleeds and everywhere in between. I can tell you exactly where to find the kosher food so you don’t have to sneak in turkey sandwiches. But I never before understood the love of the game in quite the same way I do now. I look forward to returning again, when it is safe to do so, with my new perspective.

*KD Casey has written guest posts for BookishlyJewish and kindly gave me an arc, no strings attached, when I asked for one.

E Broderick is a writer and speculative fiction enthusiast. When not writing she enjoys epic games of trivial pursuit and baking. She currently lives in the U.S. but is eagerly awaiting the day a sentient spaceship offers to take her traveling around the galaxy.

Honey on the Page

Edited and Translated by Miram Udel

NYU Press 2020

352 pages

Review by Valerie Estelle Frankel

Those like myself who grew up with the Chelm stories adore them—they focus on an entire village of silly people who nonetheless persevere and celebrate their Judaism. Still, those who study the Chelm stories or the other authentic Jewish folktales quickly notice there’s a short supply. Only a few authors transmitted and translated those stories from Yiddish-speaking Eastern Europe, and so many of our books repeat the same collection of tales. Frustratingly, more is available, free from The YIVO Institute for Jewish Research, but almost all remains in Yiddish…until now.

Honey on the Page: A Treasury of Yiddish Children’s Literature brings readers something we’ve rarely experienced—more Jewish stories from a century past. The title, of course, references the Jewish custom of introducing little children to study by having them lick honey from the page and experience sweetness. This book is likewise a taste of the vanished Jewish world—one many modern children have never gotten to explore. The editor, Professor and Rabbi Miriam Udel, did the research and translation herself in order to share the best of the stories in archive.

This large book is perfect for reading aloud. It begins with holiday tales from Shabbat to Lag B’Omer, as are popular to share with today’s kids. Isaac Bashevis Singer fans will quickly fall into familiar patterns: magic and moral tales blend smoothly, offering readers sweet new Jewish fairytales of rabbis and princesses. After holidays, there’s a massive folklore section with some stories from everyone’s favorite fictional place: the silly town of Chelm. There are also fables, including the delightful rhyming “The Horse and the Monkeys” by Der Tunkeler, a popular cartoonist. Charmingly, Ida Maze contributed a ballad on “Where Stories Come From.” Authors hail from everywhere, from South America to Israel, with plenty of writing from Europe and the United States. There are animal stories, silly stories, and serious ones, all standing out for their moral teachings and the Jewish culture they embody.

Some of the stories focus on education with metafictional fun like “The Alphabet Gets Angry” by Moyshe Shifris. Others are particularly deep, as a tale of sprouting children, “Children of the Field” by Levin Kipnis, becomes a diaspora and assimilation metaphor. Similarly, “The Girl in the Mailbox” is a light story but hints at the confusion of children evacuated to distant lands ahead of the Nazis. “Boots and the Bath Squad” mixes a “Cat in the Hat” type story with the reality of life in the USSR as Soviet agents arrive to bathe a particularly dirty child in a rhyming poem. A historical fiction section also appears with tales of the Gur Aryeh, Judah Abravanel, and the Jews of Spain and Frankfurt. The collection is curated for children, but as with nursery rhymes, the stories offer vague hints of a dark past. As such, they could be used as gateways for teaching about history.

There’s also an insightful introduction by fairytale scholar Jack Zipes and lengthy biographies on the original authors, some of whom have other available works in English. It’s a delightful taste of a vanished world, and more fascinatingly, it’s a collection of stories never available before in English.

Valerie Estelle Frankel has won a Dream Realm Award, an Indie Excellence Award, and a USA Book News National Best Book Award for her Henry Potty parodies. She’s the author of over 80 books on pop culture, including Hunting for Meaning in The Mandalorian; Inside the Captain Marvel Film; and Star Wars Meets the Eras of Feminism. Her Chelm for the Holidays (2019) was a PJ Library book, and now she’s the editor of Jewish Science Fiction and Fantasy, publishing an academic series for Lexington Press. Once a lecturer at San Jose State University, she now teaches at Mission College and San Jose City College and speaks often at conferences. Come explore her research at www.vefrankel.com or Her amazon author page or on Twitter @valeriefrankel