NCW Libraries

Set in the 1950s: David Greene, a working-class Jewish quarterback from Scranton, Pennsylvania, is offered a football scholarship to a prestigious New England prep. school. It's David's ticket to an Ivy League education and a way out of his hometown, but there's one condition: the school's elders ask him to be discreet about his religion. At first willing to do so, David struggles with his silence as his popularity grows. David strikes up a friendship...

Examines the rise of antisemitism in Central and Western European Jewish history in the 19th century, European colonial imperialism from 1884 to World War I, and the institutions and operations of totalitarian movements and governments.

When 22-year-old Rae, a descendant of Holocaust survivors, is targeted by Neo-Nazis in Billings, Montana, her ancestors' trauma becomes real. After hitting a low, she returns home to her mother and uncovers the truth about a childhood accident. As antisemitism continues to rise in the community, we follow Rae on her journey to forgive herself, her mother, and the broken world. Inspired by true events, this coming-of-age story shows the inherited effects...

"A coming-of-age story set during the rising tide of World War II, How to Find Your Way in the Dark follows Sheldon Horowitz from his humble start in a cabin in rural Massachusetts, through the trauma of his father's murder and the murky experience of assimilation in Hartford, Connecticut, to the birth of stand-up comedy in the Catskills-all while he and his friends are beset by anti-Semitic neighbors, employers, and criminals"-- 1938. Twelve-year...

"When Danielle Marton's father is killed during the early days of the German Occupation, her mother sends her to live in a quiet farming town near Limoges in Vichy France. Now called Marie-Jeanne Chantier, Danielle struggles to balance the truth of what's happened to her family and her country with the lies she must tell to keep herself safe. At first, she's bitter about being left behind by her mother, and horrified at having to milk the cow and...

"A startling exploration of how Jewish history is exploited to comfort the living. Reflecting on subjects as far-flung as the international veneration of Anne Frank, the blockbuster travelling exhibition called "Auschwitz," the Jewish history of the Chinese city of Harbin, and the little known "righteous-gentile" Varian Fry, Dara Horn challenges us to confront the reasons why there might be so much fascination with Jewish deaths, as emblematic of...

A bold new exploration that answers the most commonly asked questions about the Holocaust. Despite the outpouring of books, movies, museums, memorials, and courses devoted to the Holocaust, a coherent explanation of why such ghastly carnage erupted from the heart of civilized Europe in the twentieth century still seems elusive even seventy years later. Numerous theories have sprouted in an attempt to console ourselves and to point the blame in emotionally...

"Rabbi Diana Fersko is used to having difficult conversations with members of her congregation about how the rise is antisemitism is affecting their lives, from the threat of violence to microaggressions and identity denial. In We Need to Talk About Antisemitism, she gives us the tools we need to understand the state of antisemitism today. Unpacking the origins of the most prominent conspiracy theories about the Jewish people, Rabbi Fersko shows how...

"Lilach has it all: a beautiful home in the heart of Silicon Valley, a successful husband and stable marriage, and a teenage son, Adam, with whom she has always felt a particular closeness. Israeli immigrants, the family has now lived in the U.S. long enough that they consider it home. But after a brutal attack on a local synagogue shakes their sense of safety, Adam enrolls in a self-defense class taught by a former Israeli Special Forces officer....

The Levins are a working-class Jewish family in Newark, New Jersey in an Alternate America during WWII, observing the political rise of aviation hero Charles Lindbergh, a xenophobic populist who captures the presidency in 1940 and turns the nation toward fascism.