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THE PINCH

Name: THE PINCH
Author: Steve Stern
ISBN: 978-1-55597-715-3

by Steve Stern ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 2, 2015

Audacious, hilarious, unabashed fiction.

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The Pinch—for many years in the early 20th century a predominantly Jewish section of Memphis—has found its Whitman and its Faulkner in Stern, who's written a stylistically effusive, verbally extravagant novel.

In the late 1960s, Lenny Sklarew is living…well, not much of a life. He works in Avrom Slutsky’s bookstore, The Book Asylum, deals drugs on the side, and spends time listening to his favorite band, Velveeta and the Psychopimps. But then two things happen that change his life: he meets Rachel Ostrofsky in a bar and finds a book by Muni Pinsker called The Pinch: A History in Avrom’s bookstore. Rachel is a folklorist who came to Memphis "to research the roots of the Southern Jewish community," and she’s of course fascinated by the Pinch. And in a metafictional trope, Lenny finds out that he’s a character in Pinsker’s book. From here, Stern’s narrative gets really complex, as he bounces back and forth between the events in Lenny’s life, the early history of the Pinch, and supposed excerpts from Pinsker’s history. One of the main strands of Stern’s multilayered narrative involves Pinsker’s arrival in Memphis from Siberia in 1911, a journey financed by his uncle Pinchas Pin (nee Pinsker), a shopkeeper in the Pinch, and his wife, Katie. Shortly after his arrival, Pinsker meets and falls in love with Jenny Bashrig (aka “La Funambula,” a tightrope walker), and they consummate their relationship in the branches of an iconic oak tree. The action unfolds against visits by the Ku Klux Klan and, by the end of the novel, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr.

Audacious, hilarious, unabashed fiction.

Pub Date: June 2, 2015

ISBN: 978-1-55597-715-3

Page Count: 368

Publisher: Graywolf

Review Posted Online: March 20, 2015

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2015

Categories:

RELIGIOUS FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE VILLAGE IDIOT
by Steve Stern

- BOOK REVIEW
THE BOOK OF MISCHIEF
by Steve Stern

- BOOK REVIEW
THE FROZEN RABBI
by Steve Stern David Plante

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THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS

by C.S. Lewis ‧ RELEASE DATE: Jan. 1, 1942

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These letters from some important executive Down Below, to one of the junior devils here on earth, whose job is to corrupt mortals, are witty and written in a breezy style seldom found in religious literature. The author quotes Luther, who said: "The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn." This the author does most successfully, for by presenting some of our modern and not-so-modern beliefs as emanating from the devil's headquarters, he succeeds in making his reader feel like an ass for ever having believed in such ideas. This kind of presentation gives the author a tremendous advantage over the reader, however, for the more timid reader may feel a sense of guilt after putting down this book. It is a clever book, and for the clever reader, rather than the too-earnest soul.

Pub Date: Jan. 1, 1942

ISBN: 0060652934

Page Count: 53

Publisher: Macmillan

Review Posted Online: Oct. 17, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1943

Categories:

RELIGIOUS FICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
ALL MY ROAD BEFORE ME
by C.S. Lewis

- BOOK REVIEW
PRESENT CONCERNS
by C.S. Lewis

- BOOK REVIEW
BOXEN
by C.S. Lewis

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THE CHOSEN

by Chaim Potok ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 28, 1967

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This first novel, ostensibly about the friendship between two boys, Reuven and Danny, from the time when they are fourteen on opposing yeshiva ball clubs, is actually a gently didactic differentiation between two aspects of the Jewish faith, the Hasidic and the Orthodox. Primarily the Hasidic, the little known mystics with their beards, earlocks and stringently reclusive way of life. According to Reuven's father who is a Zionist, an activist, they are fanatics; according to Danny's, other Jews are apostates and Zionists "goyim." The schisms here are reflected through discussions, between fathers and sons, and through the separation imposed on the two boys for two years which still does not affect their lasting friendship or enduring hopes: Danny goes on to become a psychiatrist refusing his inherited position of "tzaddik"; Reuven a rabbi.... The explanation, in fact exegesis, of Jewish culture and learning, of the special dedication of the Hasidic with its emphasis on mind and soul, is done in sufficiently facile form to engage one's interest and sentiment. The publishers however see a much wider audience for The Chosen. If they "rub their tzitzis for good luck,"—perhaps—although we doubt it.