Searching, soulful reading for exceedingly difficult times.
A distinguished New York City rabbi reflects on being Jewish during a time of renewed hostility between Palestinians and Jews.
The Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel turned Cosgrove’s life and the lives of his fellow clergy “upside-down.” Furthermore, “in the week that followed (and before any Israeli counterattacks), over 150 anti-Israel rallies were held across the United States.” Cosgrove was suddenly confronted with difficult questions about the nature of “diaspora Jewry’s obligations to Israel” in a post-Shoah world. Jews living outside of Israel often live in a state of cultural tension characterized by “the disorienting struggle to integrate…multiple selves” and multiple ways of expressing affiliation with Judaism. Complicating the situation is the conflicted political situation in Israel, which has manifested in assassinations—like that of Yitzhak Rabin, who championed a framework for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—and, in more contemporary times, a hard turn toward militant authoritarianism. The author notes that many among the younger generations of diaspora Jews feel that “the Israel they love does not love them back, or even care that [they] exist.” At the same time, anyone attempting to speak about Jewish issues in the U.S., even nonpolitical ones, may find themselves shut down—as Cosgrove was at a university lecture after the Hamas attack in 2023. Part of what makes this book so compelling is the author’s willingness to criticize Israel for being antidemocratic in its hardline Zionism while also expressing his deep and abiding love for it. In a world where diatribe trumps civil discourse, Cosgrove’s moderate, carefully reasoned approach, grounded in both history and biblical scholarship, is a welcome balm. “God knows, we are all in need of a place to start,” he writes. “Wholeness and brokenness, every step of the way, on our journey toward the Promised Land.”
Searching, soulful reading for exceedingly difficult times.Pub Date: Sept. 24, 2024
ISBN: 9780063417472
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Harvest/Morrow
Review Posted Online: June 21, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2024
However charily one should apply the word, a beautiful book, an unconditionally involving memoir for our time or any time.
Maya Angelou is a natural writer with an inordinate sense of life and she has written an exceptional autobiographical narrative which retrieves her first sixteen years from "the general darkness just beyond the great blinkers of childhood."
Her story is told in scenes, ineluctably moving scenes, from the time when she and her brother were sent by her fancy living parents to Stamps, Arkansas, and a grandmother who had the local Store. Displaced they were and "If growing up is painful for the Southern Black girl, being aware of her displacement is the rust on the razor that threatens the throat." But alternating with all the pain and terror (her rape at the age of eight when in St. Louis With her mother) and humiliation (a brief spell in the kitchen of a white woman who refused to remember her name) and fear (of a lynching—and the time they buried afflicted Uncle Willie under a blanket of vegetables) as well as all the unanswered and unanswerable questions, there are affirmative memories and moments: her charming brother Bailey; her own "unshakable God"; a revival meeting in a tent; her 8th grade graduation; and at the end, when she's sixteen, the birth of a baby. Times When as she says "It seemed that the peace of a day's ending was an assurance that the covenant God made with children, Negroes and the crippled was still in effect."
However charily one should apply the word, a beautiful book, an unconditionally involving memoir for our time or any time.Pub Date: Feb. 1, 1969
ISBN: 0375507892
Page Count: 235
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 14, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1969
SEEN & HEARD
IN THE NEWS
SEEN & HEARD
Everything about Sabathia is larger than life, yet he tells his story with honesty and humility.
One of the best pitchers of his generation—and often the only Black man on his team—shares an extraordinary life in baseball.
A high school star in several sports, Sabathia was being furiously recruited by both colleges and professional teams when the death of his grandmother, whose Social Security checks supported the family, meant that he couldn't go to college even with a full scholarship. He recounts how he learned he had been drafted by the Cleveland Indians in the first round over the PA system at his high school. In 2001, after three seasons in the minor leagues, Sabathia became the youngest player in MLB (age 20). His career took off from there, and in 2008, he signed with the New York Yankees for seven years and $161 million, at the time the largest contract ever for a pitcher. With the help of Vanity Fair contributor Smith, Sabathia tells the entertaining story of his 19 seasons on and off the field. The first 14 ran in tandem with a poorly hidden alcohol problem and a propensity for destructive bar brawls. His high school sweetheart, Amber, who became his wife and the mother of his children, did her best to help him manage his repressed fury and grief about the deaths of two beloved cousins and his father, but Sabathia pursued drinking with the same "till the end" mentality as everything else. Finally, a series of disasters led to a month of rehab in 2015. Leading a sober life was necessary, but it did not tame Sabathia's trademark feistiness. He continued to fiercely rile his opponents and foment the fighting spirit in his teammates until debilitating injuries to his knees and pitching arm led to his retirement in 2019. This book represents an excellent launching point for Jay-Z’s new imprint, Roc Lit 101.
Everything about Sabathia is larger than life, yet he tells his story with honesty and humility.Pub Date: July 6, 2021
ISBN: 978-0-593-13375-0
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Roc Lit 101
Review Posted Online: May 11, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2021
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
