Judaism – Page 4 – Cannonball Read 17

Anti-Semites Get Theirs

Gangsters vs. Nazis: How Jewish Mobsters Battled Nazis in Wartime America by Michael Benson

August 4, 2022 by Pooja 1 Comment

CBR 14 Bingo: Bodies Bodies hit the floor a whole lot of times, if not permanently. With Nazism on the rise in 1930s America, protected by free speech laws, a Jewish judge sets out to deal with them in the only way he knows how – by setting gangsters on them. I’m not big on WW2 stories, mostly because I feel like the market is rather oversaturated. But rather perversely I’m still always on the lookout for unique stories in this setting, because those stories […]

June 2022 Leftovers

The Cage by Bonnie Kistler

Gangsterland by Tod Goldberg

Gone 'Til November by Wallace Stroby

Cover Story by Susan Rigetti

Survivor's Guilt by Robyn Gigl

The Old Man by Thomas Perry

Iron Annie by Luke Cassidy

The Drop by Michael Connelly

The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy by David Nasaw

Barbed Wire Heart by Tess Sharpe

Amateur City by Katherine V. Forrest

Booth by Karen Joy Fowler

The Fury of Blacky Jaguar by Angel Luis Colón

He Kills Coppers by Jake Arnott

Lysistrata by Aristophanes

June 30, 2022 by Jake Leave a Comment

I was dealing with work turmoil and on vacation for most of June so I didn’t get the chance to write as many in depth reviews as I’d have liked to. Which is a shame because some of these deserved a longer look; I just didn’t have the time or energy… The Cage **** I went back-and-forth on my review. I’ve been giving out a lot of 4-star reviews lately and considered docking the book for that reason since it’s very borderline. But the more I […]

Incisive and Interesting Essays on Orthodox Jewish Childhood

Artifacts of Orthodox Jewish Childhood by Dainy Bernstein (editor)

June 17, 2022 by GentleRain Leave a Comment

Artifacts of Orthodox Childhoods is a book of personal and critical essays that cover a historically under-researched topic. The book is inclusive of a wide range of viewpoints and backgrounds, and it benefits from the thought that went into the editing of the essays and the impulse to widen instead of narrow the people who contributed. I appreciated that this book didn’t retread the same familiar ground we see in the media of the triumphant escape from the backwards evil of Ultra-Orthodoxy. Instead, the collection gave […]

A Lazy Book Not Recommended As An Overview of Hasidism

The Pious Ones by Joseph Berger

June 2, 2022 by GentleRain 4 Comments

After a long stretch of positive but distracting life events (a new job, a move), I find myself with enough mental room to rededicate myself to book reviews. Fortunately I have a backlog to review so I’ll jump on in with a book that deeply irritated me since I find a scathing review can be easier to write. The Pious Ones is an overview of the Hasidic community for the general reader. This is one of my main special interest areas, so I know a lot […]

Family

Why Is Everybody Yelling? Growing Up in My Immigrant Family? by Marisabina Russo

June 11, 2021 by BlackRaven Leave a Comment

I had a small roller coaster ride of thoughts and feelings about the graphic memoir, Why Is Everybody Yelling? Growing Up in My Immigrant Family? At first, I thought, “Sounds fun.” Then, “Huh, what’s going on?” And “This is slow reading.” With, “Oh, yeah digging this, getting meaty.” Along with several, “If this was fiction nobody would allow such a stereotype!” And finally, “Well that was a ride. And that afterwards was a good roundup.” Our narrator, Cookie is “the lucky one” of her […]

A surprisingly earnest (and not surprisingly literal) exploration of the Bible.

The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs

March 1, 2021 by narfna 2 Comments

Feels good to finally knock this off my TBR after 13 years, and it was a pretty good read, but I think I wanted more from it. This mindset is puzzling, because I was actually expecting less than what I got here. I was expecting this to be more of a satirical, humorous, critical exploration of the Bible. And it was not that! At all! Jacobs is extremely, beyond-call sincere in his exploration. He’s funny, but the humor is secondary. His quest comes first. (He […]

Zirza on A Gothic Classic for a ReasonIt's one of those wish-you-could-read-it-again-for-the-first-time books. I loved it.
Emmalita on “It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”I loved the ending! I don’t think it’s been out long enough to talk about why though.
Dixie on Track Her Down by Melinda LeighI am just starting Track Her Down and I have read them all in order till now and thought I...
Roland of Gilead on How can you give us the gift of a crazy character named Rando Thoughtful and then just as suddenly take that gift away? We need to talk, Uncle Stevie.I came across this randomly years after it was written because I was searching "Random Thoughtful. But I have the...
Emmalita on “Only you, Em, would refer to heartbreak as a distraction. I think I would have a more sympathetic response if I asked to marry a bookcase.”Oh my goodness, Gallifrey was beautiful. I’m sure her mittens were gloriously murdery.

Help Our Mission