Book Review - The Chosen, Chaim Potok

This last month's book club selection was "The Chosen" by Chaim Potok, a book about Hasidic Jews in NYC during the early 1940's. It is one of those High School books that is given the students in the US, I had never heard of it before it was picked so I had no prior knowledge of the story or it's contents. The story starts at a baseball game, where two boys meet and the story follows them from their mid teens until they graduate from college. Our protagonists are Reuven Malther and Danny Saunders, they are both eldest children, they are both Jews, they are neighbors and they have very particular relationships with their fathers. Danny's father, Rev Saunders is a Hasidic rabbi that has inherited his position from his father and has led his flock from Russia to the United States. Danny's father is an intellectual who teaches and writes, he is an orthodox Jew and the story never really goes very deeply into why he came to the U.S. or when. Since each family is of a different type of Jewish faith, their lives do not intersect even if they are neighbors until Danny and Reuven meet at a baseball game. It is hard to do a summary of the plot without giving the story away, but here are some if the great insights this book provides:

• Explains how the Talmud is studied
• Explains where and why the Hasidic movement was born
• Illuminates the different Jewish positions and feelings regarding the founding of the State of Israel

I would definitely recommend the book it is an easy read, and if you do not know about any of the subjects mentioned above, then you get to know a little more so it is definitely something interesting one can use years later at dinner conversations and intellectual parties, but I do have to warn you that the book is book of ideas. What do I mean you ask ? Well the book uses its main 4 characters to explore different positions, the very orthodox, very traditional Hasidic point view, a more modern orthodox point of view, and through the two boys, they author covers the Americanization of the children of this very tight communities.

Happy reading !

The Return of the Knitter

Well, hello !! Any one there ??? Yes it is me, I am back kind-a-sorta. After 2 years of traveling to California and now 6 months of working from home, I am going a little crazy. Yes the kind of crazy that happens when you wake up at 6:15 for a meeting at 6:30 and then you stay all day at home working remotely and talking to people over the phone , but lacking total human contact for hours on end. So in this 2.5 years i have read a lot of books - thank you air travel for allowing me to read a book a week - but I stopped doing anything crafty, like at all. About two months ago I started knitting again, and I feel like i want to share the results with you.

I was working on this two sided cable scarf, but I was making a lot of mistakes and after some frustrating time I ripped it out and started a new with a simpler pattern, this is all a result of two very good friends who have started a knitting circle with yours truly and that was the kick in the pants I needed to get back on to the fiber arts, and I have made tons of progress.

Here is a look:

This is more detailed look:

The scarf is getting there, I need to do another feet or so, for it to be long enough for me to like and feel comfortable giving as a present. Who will it be presented to you ask, well my mother of course, since she has not received any scarfs as of yet. Next on my list, my mother in law !