Scribblers on the Roof

Monday evenings in the summer, from 8 to 10pm. $5 suggested contribution.
Join us on the Ansche Chesed roof to hear emerging and established Jewish writers read from their recent work. Beverages and books are available for purchase. If it rains, come anyway. We have a perfect indoor space.

SALLY KOSLOW, Another Side of Paradise
(https://amzn.to/2rwKaS5)

In 1937 Hollywood, gossip columnist Sheilah Graham’s star is on the rise, while literary wonder boy F. Scott Fitzgerald’s career is slowly drowning in booze. But the once-famous author, desperate to make money penning scripts for the silver screen, is charismatic enough to attract the gorgeous Miss Graham, a woman who exposes the secrets of others while carefully guarding her own. Like Fitzgerald’s hero Jay Gatsby, Graham has meticulously constructed a life far removed from the poverty of her childhood in London’s slums. And like Gatsby, the onetime guttersnipe learned early how to use her charms to become a hardworking success; she is feted and feared by both the movie studios and their luminaries.

A notorious drunk famously married to the doomed Zelda, Fitzgerald fell hard for his “Shielah” (he never learned to spell her name), a shrewd yet softhearted woman—both a fool for love and nobody’s fool—who would stay with him and help revive his career until his tragic death three years later. Working from Sheilah’s memoirs, interviews, and letters, Sally Koslow revisits their scandalous love affair and Graham’s dramatic transformation in London, bringing Graham and Fitzgerald gloriously to life with the color, glitter, magic, and passion of 1930s Hollywood.

ALLAN APPEL, The Book of Norman
(https://amzn.to/2IsGWZv)

“I can’t think of many novels that . . . manage to be intelligent and sympathetic to not one but two oft-misunderstood American religions . . . Quite a feat.” ―Mark Oppenheimer, The New York Times

The Book of Norman probes Mormon-Jewish relationships and traditions with humor and thoughtfulness. A sibling rivalry erupts between brothers Norman and Jon Gould, who compete for their dead father’s soul in this wild theological ride set in southern California during the Summer of Love. Norman, a recent drop-out from the New York Jewish Seminary, wants to catch up on his generation’s sex, love, and rock ‘n’ roll. Yet when his doper brother Jon gets a buzz cut, sells his stash, and becomes a Mormon-in- training, the battle is engaged. As the religious tug-of- war ensues, Norman tries to pull his brother back to Judaism while Jon tries to prove to Norman that Mormonism is the truer path. The struggle culminates in a monumental and hilarious game of basketball pitting Norman and two gorgeous Jewish angels, Tali and Aviva, against a Mormon team headed by Wes, the Elder, and his compatriots.

Save the Dates for the rest of this year’s lineup:
June 25 with Joshua Max Feldman and Sam Graham-Felsen

July 2 with Rebekah Frumkin and Jenna Blum

July 9 with Eileen Pollack and Dara Horn

July 16 with Jeremy Dauber and Paul Goldberg

July 23 with Robert Anthony Siegel and Kenneth Bonert

July 30 with Laura Esther Wolfson and Hilary Zaid

August 6 with Cherise Wolas and Dawn Raffel