The Sydney Taylor Shmooze

A Walk in the Woods by Chani Altein, illustrated by Miri Rooney and Marc Lumer Hachai Publishing, 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Marcia M. Rosenthal Buy at Hachai A Walk in the Woods is the latest picture book of the Benny and Tzvi Adventures. This time, the characters are joined by Benny’s bubby as they take a walk in the woods. The woods provide an ideal setting for Bubby to explain an important Jewish concept: every creation can teach us something and thereby inspire us to do a mitzvah. She says, “Because every creation that’s under the sun/Has something important to teach everyone.” This lesson is repeated each time the boys make a discovery: a school of fish; a forest of trees; a deer; and a stream. Each of these is an example of a creation and therefore presents an opportunity to do a mitzvah or a good deed. But how can the boys know where the mitzvah is within each discovery? With Bubbie’s guidance, Benny and Tzvi figure it out together. What is particularly impressive...

  This Is My Shabbat by Chris Barash, illustrated by Aviel Basil Green Bean Books, 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Shirley Vernick Buy at Bookshop.org This warmhearted picture book follows a boy and his family on a Saturday as they celebrate Shabbat together–synagogue services, a picnic with extended family, and an impromptu meetup with neighbors. The boy, who happens to be blind, experiences the Sabbath using his other senses, especially hearing. (The text never says that the child is blind, but the outdoor scenes show him using a white cane and wearing sunglasses.) The story ends with the family drifting off to sleep in anticipation of Havdalah, making it a great choice for bedtime reading. The repeated refrain, "This is my Shabbat" adds a lullaby-like quality to the tale. The story is written in both printed text and Braille. The illustrations' bright color palette and detailed panoramas will absorb readers and amplify the joyful atmosphere surrounding Shabb...

A Beautiful World by Yael Gover, illustrated by Paul Kor, translated by Gilah Kahn-Hoffman Green Bean Books (first published in Israel in 2003 by Kinneret, Zmora-Bitan), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Rachel J. Fremmer Buy at Bookshop.org With upbeat text perfectly complemented by a cheerful palette and childlike illustrations, A Beautiful World takes us through the creation story. A nameless narrator - apparently Hashem - begins with a black page and adds light and color, water and land, plants and animals, and so on, until the world is almost complete. What is missing? Why, you, the reader! Just as Hashem invites us to be partners in creation, the narrator invites the reader to be a partner in enjoying the world - and reading this book! The final page has a mirror on it so the child reader can see herself. Young children love seeing themselves in the mirror, so that would certainly add to the fun! I had to read A Beautiful World more than once to realize that it does not co...

Mrs. Maccabee's Miracle by Elka Weber, illustrated by Amélie Videlo Kar-Ben Publishing (imprint of Lerner Publishing Group), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Shanna Silva Buy at Bookshop.org Welcome to the Maccabee house. Five brothers are always misplacing their things, and look to their mom to locate the objects. Mom gently reminds them that items remain where they are left. This repeating theme will strike a familiar chord with both parents and children. As the story progresses, the situation in Modi’in worsens for the Jews when the Greek ruler, Antiochus, demands that Jewish life and practice cease. The Maccabee boys, like many other Jews, continue to study Torah and practice Judaism in secret. When the great battle between the Jews and Greeks ensues, Mama Maccabee’s lessons about locating lost items is an integral part of the Hanukkah miracle. It’s wonderful to see a woman of importance play a part in a story that’s usually male centered. Illustrations by Videlo help mak...

An Extraordinary Dreidel: A Hanukkah Story from Israel by Devorah Omer, illustrated by Aviel Basil, translated by Shira Atik Green Bean Books, 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Rinat Hadad Siegel Buy at Bookshop.org The Extraordinary Dreidel is a fun and engaging picture book about Hanukkah for young readers.  Devorah Omer is one of the legends in the Israeli kidlit book world. I grew up reading many of her exquisite stories, and The Extraordinary Dreidel is no different. What seems to be, at first glance, straightforward language and plot turns out to be a story that provides a level of sophistication that gets children’s attention from the start and engages their curiosity and independent thinking while igniting their imagination. When Uncle Haim makes a soccer ball-sized wooden dreidel for Gil and Nurit, the excitement level rises, but when they find out that there is a secret compartment under the letter nun, the children are beyond themselves. The reader follows along a...

The Mexican Dreidel by Linda Elovitz Marshall and Ilan Stavans, illustrated by Maria Mola Kar-Ben Publishing (imprint of Lerner Publishing Group), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Suzanne Grossman Buy at Bookshop.org Celebrate Janucá (Hanukkah) in Mexico with Danielito as he visits his grandmother for the holiday. When he adds his dreidel to the neighborhood game of spinning tops, friendships grow, bridging the cultural divide between Danielito and the children who are celebrating Christmas. His dreidel rallies all the tops and leads them on a wild race allowing the reader to see daily life in the village. With Spanish words and phrases sprinkled naturally throughout and needing no translation, young readers will feel as if they are walking in the town. After Danielito invites his new friends to his grandmother's home to celebrate with menorah lighting, latkes, and donuts, plans are made to play again the next day. It's refreshing to see the children being naturally curio...

Wishing on Matzo Ball Soup! (Ellie's Deli series) by Lisa Greenwald, illustrated by Galia Bernstein Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2023 Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Laurie Adler Buy at Bookshop.org Veteran tween author Lisa Greenwald’s newest book is about a sympathetic eleven-year-old who is determined to save her family’s failing Jewish deli. Ellie comes from a close knit Jewish family and has supportive friends at home and at school. Her small town's dwindling Jewish community, however, and her bubby’s declining health means that her family will likely have to sell their beloved fourth-generation kosher deli. Ellie’s ambitious plans to save the deli form the backbone to this gentle and upbeat book, and though there are some heavier subplots, such as anxiety, loss, and gentrification, all topics are addressed with a light hand. With the help of her community, Ellie’s plans to save the deli are successful and all problems, big and small, are neatly resolved by the last page. E...

Come and Join Us! 18 Holidays Celebrated All Year Long by Liz Kleinrock, illustrated by Chaaya Prabhat Harper (imprint of Harper Collins Publishers), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Lila Spitz Buy at Bookshop.org   Come and Join Us by ant-bias and ant-racist educator Liz Kleinrock invites readers to listen and learn from a diverse group of students about eighteen holidays celebrated throughout the year. Each holiday is introduced by a student whose family participates in its traditions. Important clothes, foods, and activities integral to the holiday are described and their importance is explained. The book concludes with the message that celebrating holidays with loved ones is the best part of all. Vibrant digital illustrations appropriately complement the themes of celebration. Word color alternates between black and white to provide contrast with the colorful background. The glossary provides helpful and accurate definitions of terms related to specific holidays for ref...

Where Do Diggers Celebrate Hanukkah? by Brianna Caplan Sayres, illustrated by Christian Slade Random House Books for Young Readers, 2023 Category: Pictures Books Reviewer: Kathryn Hall Buy at Bookshop.org The rhyming verses of this board book are fun to read aloud. There is no plot, and the title question is not answered, but that does not matter when you see cherry pickers in a line holding up lighted candles to form a menorah. Christian Slade's illustrations of heavy equipment in different locations are cheerful and colorful, very appropriate for preschoolers. This book is suitable for young children up to age 6, especially those who like trucks. There is Hanukkah content on every page, so it is integral to the story. The Diggers are a series of board books featuring friendly construction vehicles that--in other books--sleep at night, go on vacation, say I love you, and celebrate Christmas and Easter. Are you interested in reviewing books for The Sydney Taylor Shmooze?  Click ...

Phoebe's Diary by Phoebe Wahl Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2023 Category: Young Adult Reviewer: Sylvie Shaffer Buy at Bookshop.org Drawn (literally, on many pages) from her actual teen diaries, Phoebe’s Diary depicts in illustrated journal-entries — equal parts cottagecore-cozy and cringe-inducingly honest — a year or so in the life of white, Jewish, teenage Phoebe in 2006 Bellingham, Washington. Phoebe navigates school (she’s mostly homeschooled and only takes electives at the local high school), crushes, and friendships with her tight-knit crew of drama-kid friends, and falls into horny, teenage love. Eventually, after some character-establishing family vacationing and unrequited crushes, much of the book is devoted to documenting her first relationship with fellow drama-kid (and fellow Jew!), hunky Sam Goldman. In addition to exploring her budding sexuality and her identity as both an artist and a patron of the arts, the journal chronicles teen Phoebe’s vulnerable and...

A Wild, Wild Hanukkah by Jo Gershman & Bob Strauss, illustrated by Jo Gershman Kar-Ben Publishing (imprint of Lerner Publishing Group), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Arlene Schenker Buy at Bookshop.org This book is a lovable rhyming tale of different wild animals invading a home each night of Hanukkah. The rhymes roll off the tongue with wonderful alliteration, sure to delight children. The illustrations are mesmerizing, with large depictions of animals seemingly jumping off the page. They remind me of Maurice Sendak’s “wild things,” though Gershman uses brighter and more vibrant colors. Perhaps the authors are giving a nod to Where the Wild Things Are in their choice of book title? The illustrations also add a fun element to the narrative. Have you ever seen a tiger juggling eggs or punk-rock penguins spinning dreidels? There are pages with no text at all, perfectly appropriate where the illustrations pull the reader right into the story. The Jewish content is relate...

Hollowthorn (A Ravenfall Novel) by Kalyn Josephson Delacorte Press (imprint of Random House Children's Books), 2023 Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Kathryn Hall Buy at Bookshop.org Hollowthorn 's cover is exquisite and made me eager to read this sequel to the author's novel Ravenfall , which I have not read. I very much appreciated the excellent summary of Ravenfall provided before chapter one. Hollowthorn is told from three viewpoints: 13 year old Anna, 14 year old Colin, and Ravenfall, the magical inn that Anna and her family run as a bed & breakfast in Wick, Oregon. All of the major characters, and most of the minor ones have some sort of supernatural abilities. Anna and Colin used their magic after the murder of Colin's parents to rescue Colin's brother Liam in the previous book. Now, a little more than a month later, in Hollowthorn Anna and Colin join Henry (Anna's father) and Salem (a Raven, but human) on a quest to prevent Ashmedai, the Jewish Lord o...

Straw Bag, Tin Box, Cloth Suitcase: Three Immigrant Voices by Jane Yolen, Marjorie Lotfi and Raquel Elizabeth Artiga de Paz, illustrated by Fotini Tikkou Reycraft Books, 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Jeanette Brod Buy at Bookshop.org As a nation of immigrants, our family histories have roots in other countries. The countries we leave are often fraught with peril for those who live there. At great personal risk, some people choose to emigrate and eventually arrive in America. Straw Bag, Tin Box, Cloth Suitcase: Three Immigrant Voices is the story of three generations that undertake the immigrant journey from different continents. The stories are fictionalized accounts of the families of the storytellers. Each story is told by a woman who passes generational memory to a young girl who is the appointed keeper of the family legacy. An artifact from each place (a straw bag, a tin box, a cloth suitcase) sparks the storytelling and creates some of the parallelism that connects the s...

Eight Nights of Lights: A Celebration of Hanukkah by Leslie Kimmelman, illustrated by Hilli Kushnir Harper (imprint of HarperCollins Publishers), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Heidi Rabinowitz Buy at Bookshop.org Nine small candle-shaped paper booklets are nestled into a menorah-shaped holder in a large folder, in this Hanukkah toy/story. The Shammash booklet contains the lyrics to the traditional song "Hanukkah, Oh Hanukkah" and shows a diverse group of celebrating children. Other candle booklets are labeled "Night 1" and so on, meant to be read in order. The front of each booklet shows an unlit wick; the back shows a candle aflame; if one story is read each night of Hanukkah, it can then be flipped over to light the menorah. The cover includes directions and a brief history of the holiday. Each booklet contains a short story about Lena, a biracial Jewish girl who has a white father and a brown Latine mother. She celebrates various aspects of the holiday w...

Dino-Hanukkah by Lisa Wheeler, illustrated by Barry Gott Carolrhoda Publishing (imprint of Lerner Publishing Group), 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Laurie Adler Buy at Bookshop.org Come celebrate with the dinosaurs, as they cheerfully prepare for the holiday and join in familiar Hanukkah fun. This book is the latest addition and the first Jewish holiday featured in the Dino-Holiday series by author/ illustrator team Lisa Wheeler and Barry Gott. In Dino-Hanukkah , the dinosaurs decorate, play dreidel, open presents, and engage in other highly recognizable Hanukkah activities. Wheeler’s rhymes are never forced, and there is a small plot of Allo the Allosaurus waiting patiently for all eight nights till it’s his turn to light the menorah. Gott’s bold and colorful computer-generated illustrations are toddler-friendly and add to the fun; even the T-Rex is affable and unthreatening. Each page conveys action and activity and is full of enough detail for children to find new elements i...

Shira & Esther's Double Dream Debut by Anna E. Jordan Chronicle Books, 2023 Category: Middle Grade Reviewer: Stacey Rattner Buy at Bookshop.org Are you looking for a book filled with wholesome fun, mystery, vaudeville and a side of Yiddish? Then this Freaky Friday meets G-rated Mrs. Maisel is the one! Many years ago, before cell phones and the Internet, in the town of Idylldale, New York, there was a synagogue led by Rabbi Epstein, Scheinfeld’s Resort and Cottages (not unlike Grossingers), a deli man, a trolley, the Heights theater (on the verge of becoming a parking lot) and more of what you would imagine in an idyllic Catskills town. Esther Epstein is about to become Bat Mitzvah in two weeks, yet performing is more her passion than Torah. Shira lives with her performer mother, Red Hot Fanny, in the Heights. At odds with her mother, Shira wishes she could spend time studying with the rabbi. As different as these girls are on the inside, they are pretty much physically identica...

Eight Dates and Nights by Betsy Aldredge Underlined (imprint of Random House Children's Books), 2023 Category: Young Adult Reviewer: Kathryn Hall Buy at Bookshop.org High school senior Hannah Levin doesn't want to spend Hanukkah with her grandmother in Texas instead of with her family and friends in New York, but consoles herself that it is a mitzvah to honor the elderly. The story is told from Hannah's point of view, and she tells us perhaps too much about her feelings, which change over the eight dates and nights. In this rom-com, she falls for Noah, the cute boy working in his grandfather's struggling Jewish deli in Rosenblum, Texas. He promises to make her Hanukkah magical, and each date is unique and memorable. Both Hannah and Noah show personal growth, and socioeconomic and family issues are discussed and dealt with realistically. This is a fun feel-good read, which requires only a little suspension of disbelief, suitable for a winter holiday read. It meets the cr...

Hanukkah Upside Down by Elissa Brent Weissman, illustrated by Omer Hoffmann Abrams Books for Young Readers, 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Ann D. Koffsky   Buy at Bookshop.org From their homes in New York and New Zealand, cousins Noah and Nora celebrate Hanukkah. But which one's got it right side up, and which upside down? They have an eight-night competition to decide which side of the world celebrates it best. Is Hanukkah better in New York’s winter or New Zealand’s summer? Does it go best with snowballs or surfboards? As the competition goes on, readers get to see how each cousin celebrates the holiday differently, and also what they have in common. While they each do things differently from different sides of the world, they BOTH light the chanukiah, spin a sivivon, and enjoy latkes and sufganiot. The story is upbeat and cheerful throughout, with the competition never getting anything beyond friendly. The arc of the story—one new activity of difference, and one in comm...

Barefoot in the Sand by Hava Deevon, translated by Gilan Kahn-Hoffman, illustrated by Rotem Teplow Green Bean Books, 2023 Category: Picture Books Reviewer: Ronda Einbinder Buy at Bookshop.org This heartwarming story is about the bond between two men, who appear different on the outside but have both dreamed of moving to the Land of Israel.  Young Saul is bundled in his orange coat and brown shoes standing on the snow-capped mountain imagining himself climbing rocky hills. Dressed in the coat, his feet are bare in his dreams. Saul grows older learning about the land of Israel in his Romanian Jewish school. Luscious green trees with orange figs are drawn with Saul standing barefoot with a shovel. Now old enough, he devises a plan to travel by boat. Years pass and he crosses the sea, kicking off his boots to feel the soft sand between his toes. Illustrations of succulents and purple grapes are drawn. He says the Hallel prayer, a Jewish psalm of praise and thanks. Tel Aviv was a small ...