"One Hundred Philistine Foreskins centers on the life of Temima Ba'alatOv, known also as Ima Temima, or Mother Temima, a charismatic woman rabbi of extraordinary spiritual power and learning, and an utterly original interpreter of the Hebrew Bible. Temima is revered as a guru with prophetic, even messianic powers-- one who dares to raise her woman's 'naked' voice even in the face of extreme hostility by the traditional establishment. Moving between two worlds-- Temima as a child in Brooklyn and Temima as an adult in Jerusalem-- the story reveals the forces that shaped her, including the early loss of her mother; her spiritual and intellectual awakening; her complex relationship with her father, a ritual slaughterer; her forced marriage; her 'ascent' to Israel; and her intense romantic involvements with charismatic men who launch her toward her destiny as a renowned woman leader in Israel"--

When her parents separate, twelve-year-old Sarah Stein feels split into her mother's daughter and daddy's girl, but a disgraced firefighter who lives in a hidden room in the Brooklyn Bridge, and her grandmother's story of her own childhood, help Sarah find her true self.

Oskar, a survivor of the Holocaust, is a man of little faith. Despite his inability to find answers, he persists in asking questions that all human beings have a right to ask. He encounters diverse characters, such as Bella, a New York prostitute, mystic Martin Buber, and an anti-Semitic high school teacher on the Canadian prairies. Strong language.

A series of sketches on French salon life. One chronicles a room's reaction to a man with the nobiliary particle de in his name--from fawning to hate.

"A community college professor whose career has stagnated, and a wife and mother whose marriage has tumbled into a spiral of apathy and distrust, Lena is frustrated at the seeming "impossibility of happiness." As Lena makes her way to present a paper at a remote New England conference, a chance encounter with an old schoolmate a once average-seeming teenager who has since achieved international fame as a human rights advocate-catapults Lena into memories of their life changing summer together, as counselors at a summer camp in the backwoods of rural Russia during the massive cultural changes of perestroika in the 1980s"--

Noah’s Turn is the darkly humorous story of Noah Douglas,a failed television writer who is intensely jealous ofa more successful friend. Jobless, wifeless, Noah drifts throughthe cold winter, alternately drinking, visiting an elderly auntwhom he hopes will die and leave him money, and sleepingwith whomever will have him. But it isn’t until Noah findshimself at a pivotal moment of envy that he crosses the linebetween humanity and depravity and murders his successfulfriend with a machete. Noah must deal with the mental anguishand moral dilemmas -- and surprising lack of remorse -- overthe murder, for which he seems not to be a suspect. Well-paced, funny, with Finkleman’s trademark sharp observationson vanity and hubris, Noah’s Turn is a short masterpiece.

"She's beautiful," writes Irish-American art historian Patricia Dolan in the first of the journal entries that form The Music Lesson. "I look at my face in the mirror and it seems far away, less real than hers." The woman she describes is the subject of the stolen Vermeer of the novel's title. Patricia is alone with this exquisite painting in a remote Irish cottage by the sea. How she arrived in such an unlikely circumstance is one part of the story Patricia tells us: about her father, a policeman who raised her to believe deeply in the cause of a united Ireland; the art history career that has sustained her since the numbing loss of her daughter; and the arrival of Mickey O'Driscoll, her dangerously charming, young Irish cousin, which has led to her involvement in this high-stakes crime. How her sublime vigil becomes a tale of loss, regret, and transformation is the rest of her story. The silent woman in the priceless painting becomes, for Patricia, a tabula rasa, a presence that at different moments seems to judge, to approve, or to offer wisdom. As Patricia immerses herself in the turbulent passions of her Irish heritage and ponders her aesthetic fidelity to the serene and understated pleasures of Dutch art, she discovers, in her silent communion, a growing awareness of all that has been hidden beneath the surface of her own life. And she discovers that she possesses the knowledge of what she must do to preserve the things she values most.

All the King's Men, Catcher in the Rye and The Pawnbroker are among the novels discussed as true works of the imagination

Book by Charyn, Jerome

""The Fox sisters grew up just outside of Rochester, NY, in a house that had a reputation for being haunted, due in large part to a series of strange "rappings" or "knockings" that plagued its inhabitants. Fed up by whatever was responsible for the knockings, the youngest of the sisters (who was twelve at the time) challenged the ghost and ended up communicating with the spirit of Charles Haynes, who had been murdered in the house and buried in the cellar.Thanks to the enthusiasm of one Isaac Post, the Fox sisters became instantly famous for talking to the dead, launching the Spiritualist Movement in the US. After taking Rochester by storm, the sisters moved to New York where they were the most famous mediums of the time, giving seances for hundreds of people.Then, it all fell apart, and the sisters were exposed as frauds. Nevertheless, even today the Fox sisters are considered to be the founders of Spiritualism, one of the most popular religious movements of the past couple centuries (consider the success of Long Island Medium and the hundreds of thousands who visit Lily Dale every year). Rich in historical detail, Rochester Knockings novelizes the rise and fall of these most infamous of mediums. Hubert Haddad was born in Tunisia, and is the author of dozens of works, including the novels Palestine (winner of the Prix des Cinq Continents de la Francophonie), Tango chinois, and La Condition magique (winner of the Grand Prix du Roman de la Socie;te; des Gens de Lettres)"--

A biography that doesn’t quite exist, about a violinist who can’t be found, as told by people who don’t agree on much. Novelist Geoff Berner has been tasked with writing a biography of DD, a mysterious, charismatic, chimerical musician who has, it seems, dropped off the face of the earth. In the course of his search for DD, Berner interviews her friends, ex-bandmates, ex-lovers, and others. They paint such variable portraits of her that each successive attempt to describe her casts doubt on the previous testimony. As his project is taken over by the lively, infuriating, entertaining tales, a wounded, gifted, and complex DD starts to emerge from all the eyewitness accounts and swear-to-God true stories. Who is DD? Where did she go? And why didn’t that book get written? Travel through a world of knockabout musicians and chancers, on the trail of an inimitable artist who truly lives in the moment, for better or worse.

Jesus and Judas - media show pony and backroom organiser . . . When Mordecai Ben Ruben first meets them, he thinks he has them pegged. But when the hubris of one and the loyalty of the other lead to tragedy and betrayal, Mordy tries to salvage what he can from the wreckage to protect those he's closest to. Our sceptical, and at times scatological, narrator is Mordecai Ben Ruben, a loudmouth Temple priest and dove seller. When the Jesus roadshow arrives in Jerusalem, Mordy has to deal with a big problem: what do you do when your wife and best friend get mixed up in a weird, suicidal religious cult?

KT, sixteen, learns that her father was Donor 806, discovers two half-brothers, and travels with them from Missouri to California to meet their biological father, redefining their notions of "family" along the way.

America is under attack. Islamist revolutionary terrorists have taken over and are hell bent on obliterating the country's way of life, and-worst of all-the President is nowhere to be found. Eli Jared is the President's most trusted advisor, but there's little he can do when he's holed up in a secret government command center without any weapons or communication with the outside world. Still, Jared must find a way to wrest the fate of the nation away from the terrorists before it's too late.