Jewish and anti-Nazi women scientists who escaped. Science journalist Olivia Campbell fills these gaps in Sisters in Science . She focuses on four physicists who fled Euro- pe, each of whom greatly contributed to the field: one, Lise Meitner, discovered nuclear fission, the basis of nuclear power. Their accomplishments paved the way for many other women to enter the field, despite the great sexism they encountered in univer- sities across Europe and the U.S. Fans of Hidden Figures or Broad Band , this is your next read.
Jewish-Palestinian love. When Salim Abadi, a Jewish Arab mourning his sister’s sudden death, decides to relocate his family to New York, his wife grapples with her own questi- ons of identity as she tries to prevent their daughter from embarking on a relationship with a Palestinian neighbour and, she fears, following in her dead aunt’s footsteps.
cause he spent much of his youth in the women’s tents with his mother, Rachel. His older, jealous brothers refused to spend time with him, and that is where he went for companionship. Seventeen Spoons fol- lows Joseph’s growth, showing how a young man raised around women can become the benevolent second-in-command of Egypt.
BOOKS: NON FICTION
A Fool’s Kabbalah Steve Stern (Melville House) February 18
In 1946, the Hebrew University sent philo- sopher and Kabbalah scholar Gershom Scholem on a mission: go to Germany and central Europe to find and rescue Jewish books stolen by Nazis. In a biography of Scholem, its authors note that he went into a deep depression after the search. But what happened while he was on this great, yet upsetting, quest? This is the pre- mise for a perhaps unexpected tragicome- dy by Pushcart Prize–winning writer Steve Stern, who draws on real historical events to create a fictional account of this trip in A Fool’s Kabbalah .
Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning Peter Beinart (Knopf) January 28 Peter Beinart has long been discussing the ramifications of Israel’s political and military actions for diaspora Jews and for Jewish thought. In his new book, the essayist argues that Jewish self-concep- tions have focused too much on victim- hood and that, in the wake of the current war, this must change. Beinart implores Jews to see their fates intertwined with those of the Palestinians, rather than pit- ting them against our own survival, and maintains that it is time to reimagine ans- wers to age-old questions about what it means to be Jewish. Lorne: The Man Who Invented Saturday Night Live Susan Morrison (Random House) February 18 The most famous graduate of Toronto’s Forest Hill Collegiate is the subject of an authorized biography being published the same week the comedy institution
Seventeen Spoons Esther Goldenberg (100 Block by Row House) February 18
Sisters in Science: How Four Women Physicists Escaped Nazi Germany and Made Scientific History Olivia Campbell (Park Row) December 31 Many of the male Jewish scientists who fled Nazi Germany are household names: Albert Einstein, Max Born, and many of the scien- tists in Oppenheimer . Less known are the
Esther Goldenberg has committed her- self to giving the women of the Torah an in-depth look through The Desert Songs Trilogy. Her first installment, The Scrolls of Deborah , re-examined the life of the ti- tular prophetess. The second, Seventeen Spoons , focuses on Joseph of the techni- colour dreamcoat fame. Though Joseph is a boy, his story fits into the trilogy be-
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