Fantasy

Venice, rich in history, sickness and debauchery, is the splendid background to The Cabalist. Closeted in a damp, sunless room in a poorer quarter of the city, Joseph Kestler, old and terminally ill, is struggling to record the secrets of a strange trade and safeguard his life's work for future generations. But it is not easy. He has strong adversaries – his own mortality, an unsympathetic century, and the Catcher, an irritating and malevolent child demon, who delights in taunting the dying man.

Kestler's discoveries are most precious; they are the hidden truth of the ancient power of numbers – the cabala. With this awesome craft, Kestler is transformed – no longer a frail, lonely man who aches for companionship, but a wizard, a magus, someone who can touch the opposite mysteries of virtue and evil, the quick and the dead, the past and what is still to come.

This collection of books featuring Jewish main characters is decidedly non-comprehensive. As we come across books that are described as having Jewish main characters, we add them to this database. The creators of the Jewish Genre Reading Challenge have not read all (or even most) of the books in this database. We have gathered information from many sources and not all may be accurate. Inclusion of a book in our database does not imply endorsement or approval. There is always the possibility that antisemitism may be present in a book, either written into a character's experience or through malicious or ignorant caricature or stereotypical portrayal of Jewish characters and culture. Please take care of yourselves as you read.

PLEASE let us know if you encounter a book in this database that does not have a Jewish main character, if you have corrections or additions for a book's genre categories, or if you have any other concerns about the inclusion of a particular book in this database.