Women's Fiction

Rose is a ninety-three-year-old former ballet dancer and the last of the Eastern European Jews who fled the Nazis and formed a community in Venice Beach, California.

Nina is a thirty-six-year-old yoga teacher living in Venice during the 2008 recession.

Their lives collide after a car accident kills Rose’s husband and Nina’s fiancé. Wracked by grief, shame, and guilt over her perceived role in the accident, Rose attends the funeral of Nina’s fiancé. Nina is also wrestling with shame and guilt because she had a terrible fight with her fiancé before his death.

After the funeral, Rose and Nina strike up an urgent, complicated friendship. Brought together by tragedy and secrets, they strive to maintain an authentic intergenerational bond while grappling with their respective demons.

 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.

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