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The Disappearing Southern Jew
Every few years, national reporters rediscover the phenomenon of the “disappearing southern Jew.” This week, Seth Berkman of the Forward ...
The Torah of second chances
A couple of years ago, after several years of trying to get all the way through the counting of the ...
On Writing a Novel in Two Cultures
Yesterday I wrote that my novel, The Golem and the Jinni , is “pretty darn Jewish.” In truth, that’s only ...
Eating on the Road
Whenever I get ready to go on a long research trip, I put together a detailed itinerary, listing each library, ...
Almost Jewish
So why would a nice Jewish girl not write nice Jewish fiction? My last book, Stations West , was about ...
Privilege & Oppression, Part II
Recently, the Governor of Mississippi, Phil Bryant, signed the Mississippi Student Religious Liberties Act. On Governor Bryant’s website, the student ...
Independence Thinking
Rabbi Avi Katz Orlow is the Director of Jewish Education at the Foundation for Jewish Camp.Unlike many parents who send ...
Do We Prefer Yom Hazikaron or Memorial Day?
Is Yom Hazikaron a good thing? This unusual question recently popped into my head while we were teaching our religious ...
The Jewish Connection to Art
People ask me how much research I had to do on art forgery for my new book A Nearly Perfect ...
The Scottsboro Boys Revisted
Last week, the Alabama House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill setting up a procedure to pardon the Scottsboro Boys, ...
Privilege & Oppression
We recently finished celebrating Passover, a holiday where “oppression” is an ongoing theme (and freedom, of course, is our cause ...
Yom HaShoah: Oral Histories Help Us “Never Forget”
Today is Yom HaShoah, and while the atrocities committed by the Nazis and their collaborators may seem very distant from ...