Graham Bishop Bishop itibaren Bonaire, GA 31005, Amerika Serikat itibaren Bonaire, GA 31005, Amerika Serikat

Despite its length, it didn't take me all that long to read it. I enjoyed the prose and the style, though I did think it was too much of a good thing. Two hundred pages probably could have been cut and the story and atmosphere would have remained intact. A much more digestable "On the Road" set in Latin America and Europe. Oh, and Africa. Did I get much deep meaning out of it? No. But I still liked it.

This is an excellent book about two observant Jewish families whose lives are woven together. One is very frum, living in Brooklyn, while the other is very modern and lives in New Jersey. The daughter from the frummie family wants to become more worldly and modern, while the son from the modern family goes to Israel and becomes very frum. And then of course the two meet, fall in love, and get married. I love this book because it describes worlds I know so well, and describes them beautifully. It is funny and touching. It explores the many facets of religion, and of personal motivation and religious differences. The end is a bit too perfect and unrealistic, but I can forgive that because it’s also wonderful. I think I’ll probably want to read this book again someday soon. It’s so nice to read a book about my own world that actually displays an understanding of that world rather than befuddlement. The one weird thing is the way Mirvis kept writing “kosher” when she should have said “kashrus”; I assume it was to make the book more accessible to non-Jewish readers, but then so many other Hebrew and Yiddish terms were used that were never explained, so I really don’t know.