Doubles
By Nora Gold (Guernica Editions)

Nora Gold, the founder and editor-in-chief of the online literary journal JewishFiction.net, creates a remarkable character in her new novella, set in Canada in 1968. The smart, perceptive and spunky 12-year-old girl, who loves math and often sees the world through numbers, has been sent to a residential institution for troubled youth called Valleyview—itself a troubled institution. Gold draws on her experience as a social worker and professor, where she got to know many compassionate professionals trying to better the lives of troubled kids.

The Last Time We Saw Her
By Jaclyn Goldis (Atria/Emily Bestler Books)

A lively thriller with many twists set in Portugal’s alluring Azores, the story is propelled into motion when kids from the Jewish Camp Zahav descend on the island of São Miguel for a rugged adventure trip. A female camper disappears, thought to have been murdered, and 10 years later the group of friends and the missing camper’s family return for a memorial at an historic island synagogue and the filming of a documentary. There are threads of crypto-Jewish history and a lost fortune woven into a
mystery that is both dark and joyful.

Crossing the Bronx
By David Hirshberg (Fig Tree Books)

In his tale of two battling brothers with shades of Jacob and Esau, David Hirshberg has written a story set in the Bronx of the 1950s. Alive with romance, crime and corruption, family tensions and the fires of antisemitism—all grounded in actual events that shaped New York City—Hirshberg’s book captures the atmosphere of the times, often with humor. The characters are portrayed with affection and nuance in a novel that grapples with American Jewish identity, as relevant now as it was then.

Sounds Like Trouble to Me
By Jean Trounstine (Running Wild)

Jean Trounstine is an author, journalist and activist for prison reform who launched a groundbreaking theater program for prisoners behind bars. Indeed, she may be the first person to produce Shakespeare in a prison. On the first page of this powerful debut novel, a corrections officer shoots and kills her abusive husband. Detailing prison life and the ensuing trial, Trounstine writes with empathy for incarcerated women wronged by the justice system, uplifting their humanity. The author has said that her Jewish identity inspired her novel and her advocacy.

The Very Unremarkable Life of Mrs. Etty Bloom
By Talya Jankovits (Running Wild)

Etty Bloom began life as the red-headed only child of Holocaust survivors in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn; she screamed incessantly for the first three years of her life and then stopped suddenly and began speaking in sentences. She grows up, marries, has children according to the norms of her Hasidic community, her red hair tucked under a covering and her dreams obscured. In this debut novel, Talya Jankovits portrays her unconventional character, flaws and all, with humor and love.

Sandee Brawarsky is a longtime columnist in the Jewish book world as well as an award-winning journalist, editor and author of several books, most recently of 212 Views of Central Park: Experiencing New York City’s Jewel From Every Angle.