Bookishly Jewish

Sometimes the setting of a book can be a character in and of itself. Sure, every story has to take place somewhere, but in the books I’m talking about, the plot literally could not take place anywhere else. The story, the characters, the vibes, and the theme are so closely linked to the location in which the drama unfolds there is no way to separate them. Here’s a list of some of my favorite examples. If you’re looking to beef up your own integration of setting, or simply to fully immerse yourself in a time and place, these are a great place to start. I might even suggest taking your book on a tour of the sites. It’s really fun if you can!

Today Tonight Tomorrow by Rachel Lynn Solomon is a YA romance that perfectly encapsulates the bittersweet moment of graduating high school. While new journeys are exciting, they still mean saying goodbye to a place and community where one has lived for a formative piece of their life. Nothing will ever be the same. Which is why this book is a love story not only between high school rivals Rowan and Neil, it is also a love song to their home of Seattle Washington.

Rowan and Neil are competing in an epic scavenger hunt across the city, and after another classmate makes antisemitic comments about them, they agree to put aside their differences for the weekend to team up for the win. Rowan learns to look at Neil in a new light and the reader gets a tour de force through the city. if you’ve been to Seattle, you’ll happily recognize lots of tourist traps like the gum wall and rainbow sidewalks. If you haven’t, Today, Tonight, Tomorrow will give you a fine list of potential places to visit if you ever get the chance.

Another book that uses a city wide scavenger hunt as a plot device is A.J. Sass’s Ellen Outside the Lines. Ellen is a neurodivergent middle schooler on a trip with her Spanish class to Barcelona. On the way, she meets a new nonbinary classmate, triggering some mild panic as Ellen figures out how to handle a whole new set of pronouns and learns some new things about herself and her family. As Ellen is forced to navigate an unfamiliar city she realizes new truths about things she thought were familiar – her best friend, her own pronouns and sexuality, and even her fathers religious observance. Change can be hard, but sometimes it’s what is needed to return home a fuller, more complete person.

Nobody knows that better than the protagonist of Marisa Kanter’s Finally Fitz. On a trip to New York City for a summer internship in fashion, Instagram influencer and high school student Fitz finds her life turned upside down when her girlfriend dumps her. Fitz reconnects with an old friend, promptly starts fake dating him to make her ex-girlfriend jealous, and they run all over the city rescuing plants. From the Brooklyn Flea to Washington Square park and every sweaty subway stop in between, Finally Fitz gives us a realistic picture of what it is like to see manhattan through the eyes of a young person struggling to find their way, deal with emerging mental health issues, and sort through the messiness of new love.

Fleeing NY is on the mind of one Shani Levine, main character of Jake Maia Arlow’s YA romance How To Excavate a Heart. She’s coming off a break up that is much more than it seems (please read the trigger warnings) and some time in D.C. as part of an internship at the Smithsonian seems like the best way to get past it. Too bad she runs into a very cute romantic prospect, May, on her way into town. And by runs into, I mean literally, with a Subaru. Woops.

Shani and May tackle some pretty deep issues while gallivanting through the city, including coming out to their parents, the aforementioned prior break up, and May’s parents divorce. Still, there is a very cute dog and a whole lot of national landmarks to help the reader along. (Plus a surprising amount of fun information about fossil fish). I had a great time visiting the National portrait gallery and seeing some of the exhibits mentioned in the book during crucial moments.

Museums aside, the book that I took on a full city tour was Aden Polydoros’s YA dark fantasy romance The City Beautiful. No, I am not rich enough to randomly fly books around the country. This blog in fact makes negative monies, since I have to pay for the hosting. But I just so happen to be in Chicago for work and I couldn’t help but take The City Beautiful with. It’s a lush historical fantasy about a young man named Alter who is possessed by the Dybbuk of his murdered roommate during the Chicago World’s Fair. Alter must team up with his former flame – pickpocket and overall dapper criminal, Frankie – to solve the murder or risk being consumed by the dybbuk.

Obviously the landmarks Alter and Frankie see have mostly not survived to the present day, but Chicago has a lot of historical and architectural tours and I most definitely enjoyed the way they provided context to the story. Alter and Frankie’s journey is so tied to the time and place – large immigrant community in a big city just waiting to take advantage – and the World’s Fair provides the perfect veneer of genteel respectability to a city that survives on exploitative labor, so it seemed right to show them what became of their city.

The Ghosts of Rose Hill by R.M. R0mero also features a city of the past, but in this case it is a past that is intruding on the present. Violin player Ilana Lopez is sent by her parents to spend the summer with her Aunt in Prague when they become concerned that she is neglecting academic work for her art. What nobody counted on was that behind her Aunt’s cottage is a small Jewish cemetery that Ilana takes it upon herself to restore. While there she meets the ghost of a Jewish teen boy and discovers that he is in fact not dead, but rather stuck in between, as a man with no shadow feeds off his soul and that of several other Jewish children. To set him free, Ilana must risk herself and choose between saving the children and the depth that the man with no shadow gives to her music. The choice to tell this bittersweet love story in verse adds a poignancy that grabs straight for the heart, but also perfectly evokes the vibes of a city built on years of struggle and discrimination, especially for its Jews.

A hop skip and a jump away on the map is Budapest, setting of Katherine Locke’s brilliant YA historical fantasy This Rebel Heart. Set during the doomed Hungarian revolution of 1956, the book shows what it means to love a place so much, despite it failing you personally so hard, that you choose to stay and fight for its soul even knowing that you will lose. It is not a spoiler alert to say the revolution is not a success. Aside from this being a known historical fact, one of the books main characters is the angel of death who is there for reasons. Yet somehow Locke manages not only to push and pull the reader into hoping against hope that somehow history will rewrite itself in these pages, they also manage to have us fall in love with this place. Budapest’s people have betrayed Csila and her family and all their Jews, yet it’s river has saved her many times. We know it would be the smart thing to leave, but we cannot bring ourselves to wish her to go. We stand with her and bear witness to the fight.

Travel is expensive, no doubt about it, but these books will take you there and back for the price of a library card. They show you what it is to love a place even as you leave it, how to let a place change you on a brief visit, and what it means to fight for justice in the streets you call home. Setting is so much more than a backdrop. In the hands of these talented authors, it is the star of the book itself.

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Find The Books Mentioned In This Post:

Ellen Outside the Lines: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon | BookishlyJewish review

Finally Fitz: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon | BookishlyJewish review

How to Excavate a Heart: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon | BookishlyJewish review

The City Beautiful: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon| BookishlyJewish review

The Ghosts of Rose Hill: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon | BookishlyJewish review

This Rebel Heart: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon | BookishlyJewish review

Today, Tonight, Tomorrow: Goodreads | Bookshop | Amazon | BookishlyJewish review

Our first Picture Book cover reveal! Written by author Dara Henry and illustrated by Olga and Aleksey Ivanov, here’s the cover copy for Hanukkah Pajamakkahs.

A lively picture book celebrating holiday traditions, the patience of parenting, sibling relationships, and children’s fondness for pajamas, along with a fun, read-aloud, new book to help everyone celebrate the holiday together – in, or out, of pajamakkahs.

When Ruthie receives pajamakkahs for Hanukkah, she loves them so much she refuses to take them off―for all eight nights. But as they get smeared and stained, splattered and smudged, Ruthie’s determined to show her parents she can stay spotless.

With globs of humor, a big splatter of love, and out of the gift-box creativity, Hanukkah Pajamakkahs is a fresh, new celebration of a special holiday.

Here is the beautiful cover, from the illustrators Olga & Aleksey Ivanov

Find It: Goodreads | Bookshop | Sourcebooks

Judaism has always been part of my life. I was fortunate to grow up in a vibrant Jewish community and received a fairly thorough Jewish education (sans Talmud), but figuring out how to create a practice that was wholly mine and reflected my own views, took some time. The process included fixing the omission of Talmud from my repertoire and reading works by feminist Jewish scholars. Writing was a significant part of that journey, it still is, and each new facet of Judaism that I engage with adds layers to both my existence and my stories. Reading about others going through similar journeys, even if they start from different places, is always interesting. When those people happen to have been Michelle Obama’s head speech writer? I’m all in.

It was obvious from the start that I am not the target audience for Sarah Hurwitz’s Here All Along. The book is part memoir, describing Hurwitz’s journey towards incorporating more spirituality and Jewish tradition into her life as an adult, and part explanatory text for those unfamiliar with Judaism. Hurwitz goes back to the basics, giving a brief summary of the Torah and describing the basics of such fundamentals as Shabbat and holidays that I have always taken for granted. I have some very differing thoughts than she did about prayer in particular, our disparate Hebrew and Yiddish language proficiency probably has something to do with that, but this doesn’t mean I couldn’t find something meaningful and interesting in these pages.

Back when I first read Here All Along, I was wearing Jewish themed jewelry as a means to express my identity and celebrate my newfound ability to engage with my Judaism. Right now, as I type this review, I hesitate to wear such items publicly because of rampant antisemitism and misunderstanding about Jews (we are not a monolith for goodness sake). It breaks my heart on a daily basis and adds a whole new meaning to Here All Along for me. Now, more than ever, we need books that are geared towards demystifying Judaism and showcasing our diversity of practice and thought. This book is not just for Jews like Hurwitz who are seeking greater connection, or for individuals pondering conversion. Any person who would like to look past click bait social media hate posts and actually learn about a group of people that have been demonized and misrepresented for hundreds of years can pick up Here All Along and get a taste for who and what Jews are, from one of our most articulate voices.

The writing was fluid, the journey full of thought and consideration for others. There are many different ways to practice Judaism, and if you read closely you will see that this is a celebrated thing. Jews are questioning, we grapple with our God and spiritual practice, and we actively encourage dissent and self reflection. Hurwitz does all of these things in the book, and includes a beautiful explanation for why it is important to add ones voice to the discussion even when it might feel futile. I was moved by many of her stories.

I was surprised to read how supportive Hurwitz’s colleagues were when she tried to experience a more traditional observance of Shabbat by going offline for a period of time each week. Even with her high pressured job, people of various backgrounds reached out and expressed their hopes that she found relaxation and meaning in her spiritual life. Similarly, her conversation with an orthodox Rabbi about death and the afterlife really resonated. It was clear to me they had different views, that these views were never going to meet in the middle, and that both parties would be disappointed. Yet the Rabbi ended with the thought process behind his words, and it was one of deep empathy. Suddenly, the entire story shifted and the compromise I previously thought impossible was manifest on the page. Because it was a meeting of hearts both striving to understand.

It’s hard right now to be a person who actively celebrates her Judaism in her work. It’s not clear how it will be received by the publishing landscape, or by people whose experience of Jews and Judaism comes from a few social media posts that are designed for maximum engagement and not much else. That does not accurately reflect me, or really anyone I know. It’s scary to continue to put my work out there, but I don’t know how to write any other way and I will not retreat into a corner and let hate and misinformation win. So instead, I strive to write with empathy and hope for a greater understanding to be born from my work, to spread compassion with my stories. I can’t think of a better example to follow than Here All Along.

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The one time I tried to watch Saturday Night Live as a kid was during a sleep over in which we kids were in the basement and there happened to be a TV in our room. I didn’t understand a word of it, but I was with friends and being sneaky, so it was still a good time. Thankfully, I have matured since that incident, and was therefore able to dive into Chayla Wolfberg’s adult m/f romance Late Night Love.

Heroine and comedy writer Emily Beckerman clearly was a very different child than I was. She has been watching the sketch comedy show Live From New York, since she was a child. She finally has her dream job writing for the show, but it has both worsened her anxiety and exposed her to some of the more toxic sides of working in media. However, when a small prank gets her truly heinous boss fired, she finds herself paired up with Chris Galloway as co-head writer for the show as well as co-anchor for the fake news segment that appears every week on Live.

While this might seem like a win, there are some unfortunate strings attached to this promotion. The show is close to cancellation and Emily’s first season as head writer could be her last if she and Chris cannot work together. Chris, for his part, has no interest in working with Emily since he blames her for the prank that got his friend fired. The feeling is mutual because Emily blames Chris for enabling his friends misogynistic, racist, and frankly just every kind of obnoxious, behavior over the years which in all likelihood is what drove the show’s ratings into the ground in the first place. A massive office war ensues.

Since Late Night Love features literal comedy writers, I feel compelled to comment on the jokes. I found half to be hilarious and half to not be my type of humor. Which is about par for the course for any comedy show. But Emily herself? She’s got a wicked sense of humor and I truly loved being in her head, especially the way she ended the first chapter. It really hooked me and convinced me to continue reading. This is good, because the story is told solely from Emily’s POV. It’s a voice that we could use more of in media – she’s a plus size woman that has to think about her romantic partner seeing her shapewear, and also a person living with anxiety.

The romance is steamy, with two very explicit sex scenes that I found to be well done. The third act break up scene went on a little long, especially since the trigger came out of nowhere, but we were already suspicious about some of Chris’s behaviors. The resolution takes place in a way that also involves Emily’s faith and features some of the best jokes in the book (for my taste) since they are delivered deadpan by a reform Rabbi. Truly delightful.

Mostly, I think Late Night Love was really relatable, even for people who are not involved in comedy or the entertainment industry, because Emily is a character that a lot of people can see themselves in. I liked the choice of having the book come entirely through her POV because I don’t think I could bond with Chris quite the same way. Emily had me laughing, crying, feeling all the feelings. I rooted for her completely and was overjoyed to watch her achieve her happy ending.

Note: BookishlyJewish received a free copy of this book from the author.

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A good piece of reference material is more than just a way for writers to fact check. For me, reading source texts can in and of itself stimulate new plot developments or inspire entirely new stories. For some authors, those beloved reference books will be histories, memoirs, or science texts. For me, they are works of Jewish folklore, Talmud and other bible study, and works dealing with Jewish mysticism and magic. The epitome of such a book, that has so far sparked my creativity more than any other, is Rabbi Natan Slifkin’s Sacred Monsters.

The book features a discussion of various mythical creature such as unicorns, fire breathers like salamander/dragons, mermaids, and my personal favorite the Shamir. However, do not be fooled by my statement about creativity. This is not a work of fiction or written with any sort of creative license. In fact, the style is rather like a Talmud study – breaking down each possible explanation for references to these creatures in biblical and other Jewish texts, and attempting to find rational explanations for them. For some, the intro explaining the methodology used might be too much information, for others the scientific rational given might dull the magic, but for me, the descriptions have always inspired me to find new ways to incorporate these creatures into my work and to do so from a uniquely Jewish perspective. Many of the featured “monsters” are part of the cultural hive mind with characteristics from other cultures and sources. It is a unique joy to find the Jewish versions and represent them as accurately as I can.

The reading is interesting, but it also makes for good writing. To date I’ve sold at least 3 short stories inspired by creatures I read about in Sacred Monsters and there is one novel in development too. Not a bad haul for a single reference text, and I am sure there are many more stories to come.

This is why I am slightly heartbroken to report that Sacred Monsters is currently out of print (Unless you peak French. It appears to still be available in that language). I have my hardback, one of the most expensive books I purchased and well worth the price, in pride of place on my reference shelf. I refer to it often, and am so relieved I convinced myself to shell out the cash to purchase it a few years ago. For those who don’t yet have a copy – you can join me in hoping it gets reissued soon.

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It’s been a while since I truly whipped through a book without taking a moment to stop and think on the craft that went into creating it. That’s a consequence of doing this job plus being a writer. I see a lot of plot “surprises” coming from a mile away, and I’m often so distracted by examining the bones of a book I forget to enjoy how the writer has fleshed them out. So it’s saying something pretty significant when I tell you that I binged Marisa Kanter’s new YA romance Finally Fitz faster that a new Netflix drop. I would have finished it in a single sitting, but I do have other responsibilities, and they rudely interrupted me several times. 

The title character Of Finally Fitz is Ava Fitzgetald, a teen Instagram fashion influencer, who goes by the name of Fitz. Thanks to her trendy up cycling and large fan base, she is in NYC for the summer completing an intense program at FIT, learning how to sustainably scale up her brand. The main problem in this idyllic scenario is that her girlfriend, and also roommate for the summer, unceremoniously dumps her right before the program starts. In the most awkward living situation ever, the now ex-girlfriend also starts dating their mutual third roommate. A heartbroken Fitz can barely think, yet alone create, so when she fortuitously runs into her long lost best friend Levi Berkowitz on the 1 train he seems to be the solution to all her problems. Fitz quickly hatches a fake dating plot to make both their respective exes jealous and Levi, who is mostly in this for the help he will receive on rescuing plants, reluctantly agrees. 

The chance meet cute on the subway reminded me of how Finally Fitz came into my possession. I actually emailed the publisher, explaining the concept of BookishlyJewish, and asked for a different title. They very kindly provided that title (a review of it is forthcoming) and inquired if I might like to try Finally Fitz too. Indeed thoughtful publicist, I would. 

The thing is – not every book is on my radar. I’m small enough that most big five publishers are not exactly sending me their catalogues to peruse, and even if they did, I usually have no way to know which ones have Jewish content unless someone, ANYONE, tells me. This is why I rely so heavily on the suggest a book form and my fellow bloggers, writers, and readers who often share this information about their favorite reads with me. Still books can slip through the cracks- like this one almost did. 

Which is actually pretty ironic, because Fitz’s perfectionism and anxiety have her worrying on the page about whether she’s Jewish enough to attend a reform Shabbat service with Levi. I bet she’d be worried her book didn’t belong on the website. It’s a reflection of what I have often noted- Judaism can sometimes magnify our internal mental struggles to the point where some people stop engaging with it, rather than worry about if they are doing it right. Those people need a Levi in their lives. He shows Fitz such kind and caring compassion that she can’t help but find herself developing some more than friendly feelings towards him. 

The romance is low heat, nothing more than kissing, so it’s perfect for those YA readers that enjoy a good swoon but don’t want sex on the page. This adult reader enjoyed it quite a bit too. The focus was on Fitz reconciling with herself rather than someone else magically fixing her with their love. As someone intimately familiar with how mental health can block a person from creating, I really appreciated the message and thought it was relevant for all ages of reader. 

Teenagerhood clearly looks a lot different now than when I went through it. We had no phones to build “platforms” on, and my parents were nervous to let me ride the train into Manhattan let alone spend an entire summer there unsupervised, but Kanter gives a realistic picture of what growing up this way might do to a person. The realities of being a social media personality are universal and cross age borders – and I don’t even post photos or have a huge following. Finally Fitz is also quintessentially a NYC book, with many familiar locations and outings. Locals will enjoy the references. 

I sank into this book for so many reasons, and I didn’t pause to think over how I would frame it, or what angle I needed to take in the review. Much like Fitz, I learned to just enjoy the ride. I’m still struggling with waiting for the other part of my art and creativity to return, it’ll take as long as it takes I guess, but this post was easy to write. That is no small gift from a novel. 

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Felicia Grossman’s books are easy to recommend for a variety of reasons, but in keeping with the nature of this blog I’ll give you my personal favorite because it is a distinctly Jewish sentiment. Sometimes it feels like the world is looking for any excuse to label “good” and “bad” Jews, as a way to let gentiles vent their frustrations on their favorite punching bags. It’s a convenient way for those in power to divert frustrations from class, race, or economic policy issues and onto a man made villain that has been demonized for centuries. Grossman shines a light on this age old stalwart of antisemitism, gives it the middle finger, and provides a steamy romance for good measure. What’s not to love?

In her latest historical romance, Wake Me Most Wickedly, the heroine/villainess is Hannah Moses, a Jewish pawn broker who does what she needs to do to survive. Hannah blames herself and her temper for getting her parents arrested after a gentile client provoked her as a teen. The trial in which they traded their lives for Hannah’s was widely publicized and the Moses’ family ostracized by both the gentiles who blamed them for all the ills of London and the Jewish community who are afraid to be tainted by association. Spoiler alert for anyone reading – that never works. If gentiles want to hate Jews, they will do regardless of who we associate with or how many of our own we offer up as sacrificial lambs. Hannah learns that the hard way.

Hannah deals with it all by throwing her resources into building a dowry for her sister Tamar. She is hoping that with enough funds, Tamar, who was too young to be included in the original trial, might might be able to secure a husband that allows her to rejoin the Jewish community that shuns Hannah. She has no such hopes for herself. Instead, she is resigned to taking miserable job after miserable job in the seedy part of town.

During one such night on the job, Hannah saves the life of Solomon Weiss, who readers may recall from the first book in this series, Marry Me By Midnight. Sol is immediately captivated by the mysterious stranger with a sharp tongue and mysterious smile even after learning about her past and how it might thwart his own desire to rejoin the Jewish community. Adding a further obstacle is Sol’s brother Frederick, who has distanced himself from Judaism and gone so far as to be baptized in an attempt to integrate himself with the gentile upper crust. Frederick is pursuing a marriage with a gentile widow from the gentry and he fears that Sol’s insistence on being so publicly Jewish and associating with characters like Hannah will ruin his chances. Still, Sol cannot help but follow the attraction.

The romance is indeed very steamy and there are multiple explicit sex scenes, but Wake Me Most Wickedly also full of wicked wit and teasing. Unlike Isabelle, the heroine of Marry me by Midnight, Hannah is no innocent. She is also several years Sol’s senior. This combination allows Grossman to show off more of her skill set. Wake Me Most Wickedly has tongue in cheek humor and biting acerbic banter along with the passion, and I was definitely into it! The tone is also quite suitable to the original fairy tale it retells – Snow White – which has always struck me as a dark story even in the Disney version.

Wake Me also has an intricate social commentary and meditative take on what it means to be a Jew and why we are such convenient fall guys for ages and ages of other peoples problems. It takes time to build that kind of framework for storytelling, so if the book feels like it starts slow, keep going. Things started to really heat up for me around 30% and by 60% I found myself in some pretty action packed moments. There are perhaps a few inaccurate statements/descriptions about food allergy, but as the author states in the content warning, she is not a physician, much less an allergist, so we can just gloss over that and zoom in on what she is a specialist in – namely dark humor, fun sexy times, and historical accuracy.

Hannah learns that the gentile world is not worth even trying to please, that she is not to blame for the past, and the scene in which she does is deliciously fulfilling. Like biting into a juicy apple – crisp and full of things you feel like you’ve known forever but have simply been waiting for someone else to articulate. Lucky for us, Grossman is indeed very articulate and she perfectly encapsulates these thoughts for the rest of us. As a Jew, it is the reason I fell so hard for this book.

Note: Bookishlyjewish received an e arc of this book from the publisher.

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It will come as no surprise to readers of this blog that I enjoy clothes and fashion. By extension, I’m usually a fan of books featuring thread or cloth magic. Therefore, I was excited to learn that A Fragile Enchantment, a YA second world fantasy from Allison Saft, has a heroine named Niamh who possess the gift of sewing memories and emotion into fabrics. Much like Safts last book, A Far Wilder Magic, I was unable to obtain a review copy from the publisher. Luckily, this doesn’t tend to deter me. It simply means I’m a few months late on the review for having to rely on the library (shout out to the three wonderful library systems I belong to!).

Niamh technically lives in a secondary world, but her home country Machland, very much felt like a fantasized version of Ireland to me. She is hoping to make her fortune by sewing the wedding garments of a Prince of Avaland – a country that felt like a thinly veiled England and from which Machland has only recently gained independence after a bloody and costly war. The Machlish make up a large portion of the servants in the homes of Avlish gentry and they are starting to resent their bad treatment. Together with a member of parliament, they are organizing to push for not only better treatment, but also for reparations after the use of Avlish magic on Machlish soil caused a famine.

Niamh struggles deeply with whether or not her working for the royal family is a betrayal of Machland, but in the end she feels the need to provide for her family justifies the job. Furthermore, she is living with an unspecified medical condition that felt vaguely rheumatological to me, which sometimes results in early death. Since Niamh doesn’t know how much time she has left, she wants to earn as much as possible to set her family up to survive without her, even though using her magic appears to trigger the condition on occasion. 

To make matters worse, the Prince in question-Kit- is not interested in Niamh’s services. He is also not interested in his bride, Infanta Rosa, who hails from a thinly disguised Spain. Good news – the feeling is mutual. Rosa is not really interested in him either. They’re both going through with this marriage because they think it is their duty, as countless royals have done before them – but all is not right in Avaland, as a gossip columnist named Lovelace insinuates in their columns. 

In predictable fashion, the prince falls for the tailor and everything goes to hell in a hand basket, but somehow manages to be salvaged in an ending that is pleasantly optimistic even if it feels a little too easy. The Jewish rep comes in the form of Infanta Rosa’s chaperone and ladies maid Miriam who feels very much like a sephardic Jew being given a special dispensation to live in an inquisition happy country. We meet her briefly, but it is enough to get a handle on the situation. 

Much like Saft’s prior work, A Fragile Enchantment is full of fast paced action at the end and a bevy of queer characters. The pacing is solid. However, unlike A Far Wilder Magic, this book felt to me like it did not fully deliver on the cover copy promises, making me wonder if the person who wrote it had actually read the book. In addition, Infanta Rosa’s characterization seemed to shift wildly from the beginning to the end of the book and not because she experienced personal growth or change. Most of all, the red herrings regarding the identity of Lovelace were extremely thin and I was able to spot the gossip columnists true identity almost immediately.  On top of that, I kind of wished the secondary world was more than just this world but with a little magic and a new set of royals in it. That last one is just my taste as a reader – I favor heavy lifting when it comes to secondary world building.

So why am I writing this review and still recommending the book? The romance aspect is fantastic! It’s a really steamy slow burn, enemies to lovers and anyone looking to figure out how to make those tropes work could use this novel as a textbook. The relationship building was deftly handled and had an exquisite pay off. A Fragile Enchantment is a higher heat book for a YA, so readers should know themselves and make their own decision about whether they want spice in a YA. I enjoyed it, but I’m not a young adult, and I’m aware that there is a wide spectrum in what those readers are looking for. I don’t like to put my own expectations on them.

Much like Niamh’s magic, a novel should ideally make the reader feel something. For me, A Fragile Enchantment was all about longing. I felt that yearning from page one and again in a variety of areas of the plot. So if your heart is ready to pine, this is the book for you. 

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Here at BookishlyJewish we are preparing to start featuring books in translation. So we were thrilled to sit down with Jessica Kirzane and learn about her work as a translator, including how books are selected for translation and published. Read on to discover more!

BookishlyJewish: I am so excited to learn more about book translation and how it works! How did you get involved in the field?

Jessica Kirzane: When I was a graduate student working on a PhD in Yiddish literature – as a non-native Yiddish speaker who was still learning Yiddish as I was trying to analyze it in a critical way – I found myself turning to translation as a way to express to myself my comprehension, and my interpretation, of the texts I was reading. This was initially a personal practice to support my reading and force myself to slow down and spend time with the texts in close detail. I discovered quickly that I loved translation! I appended a translation of a short story to a term paper I had written on the story, and my instructor told me that the translation itself was excellent (he was less enthusiastic about the term paper, if I remember correctly) and I should consider pursuing translation. Maybe that was a veiled insult, or even an example of a certain kind of academic sexism in which translation work is considered supporting or supplemental to the “more seriou”s work of literary analysis, like women academics have sometimes been treated as supporting figures to “more serious” male academics. But I took it as a compliment anyway, and when I finished my PhD I applied to a translation fellowship at the Yiddish Book Center.

This was a life-changing opportunity to learn about the nuts and bolts of translation and to understand myself as a translator who could interpret and represent an entire book-length translation, something I probably never would have attempted without this extra vote of confidence. Through this program, I came to understand what it meant to see literary translation as an act of literary creation, and to develop my own voice as a translator. I could see how each word in the original bears with it a constellation of connotations and associations, possibilities that a translator has to either recreate or choose from in order to craft a new text that stands on its own terms.

BookishlyJewish: How many books have you translated and what languages do you work in?

Jessica Kirzane: I translate from Yiddish to English. I have translated three books, all by popular Yiddish writer Miriam Karpilove: Diary of a Lonely Girl, or the Battle Against Free Love (Syracuse UP 2020), Judith (Farlag Press 2022), and A Provincial Newspaper and Other Stories (Syracuse UP 2023). In addition I have translated many short stories and poems that have appeared in literary journals and anthologies – some of the writers I have translated include Yente Serdatsky, Pessie Hershfeld Pomerants, Joseph Opatoshu, and Dora Schulner.

BookishlyJewish: How does the selection process work? Do you approach an author, does a publisher approach you, or is there some other permutation I haven’t thought of?

Jessica Kirzane: Generally, I choose what to translate by reading as much as I can. Whenever I read in Yiddish, I always have in the back of my mind the question, “Will I translate this?” Often if I think something would be fun, interesting, or meaningful to translate, I’ll try my hand at a few paragraphs and see how it feels in my language. Sometimes that’s as far as I’ll go – even if I like it, I feel satisfied in having engaged with it just as a personal experiment.

Sometimes I decide to move forward. Often that’s because I feel that the text needs a champion, that English language readers should have access to it and I’m a good person to help them reach the text. In my case (with a few rare exceptions) the author is often no longer living. I have to look for existing relatives because they often hold the rights for the original, and ask them for permission to publish a translation. I then pitch the translation to a journal or to a press, usually when it’s already finished, or in the case of the books when I at least have quite a bit of the text already translated and in good shape. I have never been approached by a publisher – but if anyone out there is reading this and wants to approach me, I’m all ears!

BookishlyJewish: I imagine there are many moments when translation also requires interpretation of the authors meaning. How do you resolve these ambiguities in writing?

Jessica Kirzane: I can’t remember who told me this, so I can’t give credit specifically, but in one of the workshops at the Yiddish Book Center translation fellowship I remember being taught that a good translator has to make decisions and interpretations. If the original is ambiguous, you have to decide on what you think it means, and try to convey that (even if you want to convey it in a way that is also ambiguous, to match the original). You have to know why you are writing it the way you are. If you are unsure, your readers will be unsure, and even confused. Your original author wasn’t unsure – they made a choice. You have to be an author too, and make your own choices, because that’s what makes a good piece of writing.

BookishlyJewish: How much involvement does the original author have (if they are still alive obviously)? Do you consult them during the work?

Jessica Kirzane: I very rarely work with an original author (as I mentioned above). Recently, however, I have translated a few poems by contemporary Yiddish poets. In that case, I have sent my translations to the poet, who has sometimes given me feedback. Sometimes there’s a back-and-forth: the poet is the expert on the poem in its original, but I am the expert on the English version, and on what I’m trying to do with it. I am thinking about the connotations of the words in English and how I imagine they might land with my readers. Maybe I made a change to create a particular rhythm or sound that I feel works for the English version. I don’t simply take the author’s suggestions as corrections. I see them as an opportunity to have a clarifying conversation about how the poet and I both understand the words and their weight.

I did have one very fun interaction, as it were, with the author I have translated most – Miriam Karpilove. She died in the 1950s, so of course it wasn’t a conventional back-and-forth with an author, but it was sort of like that! I had already translated Karpilove’s novella Judith when I realized that in her archive at the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research there was an unpublished manuscript of Karpilove’s self-translation of the novella into English! I did a side-by-side comparison of my translation and hers, and sometimes I took her “suggestions” because they clarified something I hadn’t fully understood or I simply preferred her turn of phrase. But her writing in English felt much more formal than mine, and I was confident in my version as one that would be more readable for today’s readers. It felt like having a conversation about translation with the author, albeit a delayed one.

BookishlyJewish: What credentials does a translator need?

Jessica Kirzane: The bottom line is that a translator needs to translate well. There are MA programs for translation, there are courses in translation, there are conferences and workshops and collectives, and I heartily recommend participating in all these things – having a community you can bounce your ideas off of is not only helpful but absolutely life-giving. There’s nothing as satisfying as being in a room full of translators who can talk together about shades of meaning around a particular phrase. But there isn’t a specific qualification or requirement.

BookishlyJewish: Yiddish is a language full of idioms that carry meaning only from the years of tradition that created them. How do you adequately convey those meanings in another language?

Jessica Kirzane: I think any language has its own idioms and its own cultural and historical context and specificity. The crux of translation is to try to remain true to that cultural specificity while also making the text understood for a new audience. You can do that in a variety of ways: sometimes with footnotes or glossaries to support your including information (such as words from the original, or cultural references) that might not be readily comprehensible to your readers, sometimes by expanding the sentences to include explanations where the original doesn’t have to. For me, a question is always whether I am correctly conveying the tone of the original – is it chatty and lighthearted in the original? Is it formal? Is a particular word that comes from Hebrew there because the author is trying to convey something about tradition or religion, or was it simply a commonplace word and the most apt word the author could think of? Knowing, or deciding, when something is so specific and its specificity is so central to the idea of the original text that it needs to be preserved in the translation is a tricky thing – but I don’t think that’s unique to Yiddish.

BookishlyJewish: I always end by asking if you have a favorite Jewish book

Jessica Kirzane: I have so many favorite books! My favorite book for today, though – just for this very minute – is Yerra Sugarman’s Aunt Bird. It’s a recent book of poetry in which the poet tries to connect to an aunt she never met, who died in the Holocaust, through imagining the texture of her aunt’s emotional life. There’s something sort of translation-like in the poet’s attempts to reach across an enormous gulf and think, or feel, herself into her aunt’s mind. It’s a beautiful book – I hope your audience will give it a read.

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Find It:

Diary of A Lonely Girl: Bookshop |Amazon

A Provincial newspaper and Other Stories: Bookshop| Amazon

A little while ago I was presented with some feedback on a manuscript – the two points of view were too similar. It was suggested that I sit down and and work through how each character thinks and ensure that was reflected in the pages. Not so much their turns of phrase or character traits, but what actually makes their brains tick. I wasn’t entirely certain how to go about that so I took a break to refill the creative well. As is often the case, the break turned out to be the solution. Because I picked up my copy of Finn and Ezra’s Bar Mitzvah Time Loop by Joshua S. Levy and in this MG sci fi about two bar mitzvah boys, I found exactly the lesson I needed to fix my female only, adult, romcom. Because good writing is good writing, no matter the genre.

The book features two boys – Finn and Ezra – who are stuck in a time loop, doomed to repeat their bar mitzvah weekends forever. These two boys live in completely different worlds. Finn is an only child with doting parents, attends public school, and appears to practice reform Judaism. Ezra, on the other hand, has a house full of siblings competing for his parents attention, attends an all boys yeshiva, and is ultra orthodox. These differences, however, are NOT what most sets them apart. When I opened a chapter I could immediately tell whose head I was in, even without a label, because of the different way these boys move through the world. Finn is scientific, his mind whirring a million miles a minute, even if it leaves him a little callous to the feelings of those around him. He has tried every angle and every experience possible to try and break out of the loop. Ezra is more laid back, worried about his family but not so much his mishna, and just goes with the flow. He wants out of the loop, but it never occurs to him to try and break out. He doesn’t even try and use his knowledge of the weekend to get a better grade on the mishna test he has taken five hundred times. He just keeps circling “C”. Yet he still cares about what happens to the people in his lopp – even if they will forget it all the next day.

The combination of these two personalities is hilarity in itself. Obviously, they each have something to learn from the other, and things to learn about their own lives that only become apparent as they provide fresh eyes towards each others loops, but the ways in which they try to break out of the loop are so creative I had to laugh. The side characters are well utilized and the bank robbing sequence – yes you read that correctly, bank robbing is a thing here – is genius. Even the small throw away lines were guaranteed to make the reader smile. I got some pretty serious side eye for the way I laughed out loud when the boys approach Ezra’s Rabbi for help with a scheme and he suggested the boys seek the greatest reward – learning Torah! It was just so exactly what many youth Rabbi’s would say, really spot-on.

Like any time loop book, the trickiest part is the introduction of the loop itself. I was a bit disoriented at first but eventually caught on. So the reader should just plow through the first few pages and settle in. I had no issue fully integrating into both characters worlds but I will say I’m better equipped than the average reader to understand the goings on in Ezra’s synagogue and family so I can’t comment on how a complete stranger to many Jewish rituals and customs would find those aspects of the story. I enjoy when a story is not written for an outside gaze and this one trusted the reader enough to provide a fully immersive experience without overdoing the explanations.

I’m a huge fan of Jews from different religious backgrounds working together. I loved seeing this partnership in the book and how both of the boys observance is reflected on the page, but most of all I enjoyed seeing the world through Finn and Ezra’s eyes. Because even though they are both thirteen year old boys trapped in the exact same weekend, their takes on the situation were so vastly different. It is that fullness of character development through viewpoint details and actions that I hope to achieve when I turn back to my own work.

I received an e-arc of this book from the author

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