Rabbi Deborah Wechsler
Bring on the Books
Someone asked me recently how, as a rabbi, I “celebrate” the end of Yom Kippur. Here’s my deep, dark secret --- I read for pleasure. Yes, I build my sukkah; yes, I have a bagel and lox. But the real way I know that Yom Kippur is behind me is by the books on my nightstand.
During the weeks leading up to Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur I read almost exclusively (save for the occasional Sports Illustrated, Bon Appétit, or Business Week) in preparation for the holidays. Like my old friend who gives up Sour Cream and Cheddar potato chips for Lent, I give up reading popular fiction during the Yamim Noraim.
Late Saturday night after break fast, I come home and note with a smile the stack of new books next to my bed. If I’m not too tired, I choose the best looking one and read the first few pages before falling happily to sleep.
Please help and recommend a book for me to dive into this week. What's the best fiction you’ve read recently?
Posted in: Holidays, Day to Day Life
6 Comments
Laurel
I think my favorite of the the summer was The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls. I am pretty much all fiction all the time, but this is the memoir of the author's wandering life with her dysfunctional family.
Rabbi Deborah Wechsler
These two books sound interesting. Judy Meltzer just dropped off Anna Quindlen's new book "Every Last One" so I'm looking forward to that as well.
Sarah
Laurel lent me The Help - it was one of the best books I have read in a while. Also an easy, fast read.
Miriam
A recent favorite is The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar. It take place in Bombay, India and is well written and moving. I'll drop it by next week.
Judy Meltzer
I am loving To The End of the Land by David Grossman. Like the wonderful novel, Freedom by Jonathan Franzen, that I just finished, it is 600 pages long, but well worth the investment.
Mark
Like a lot of other people, I read The Imperfectionists over the summer. It's a great first novel built on a series of vignettes of people who all work at a small English-language newspaper in Rome. There's nothing particularly Jewish about it, but it's a hard book not to love.