Post­ed by Nao­mi Firestone-Teeter

Today, I diverge from my usu­al list­ing of new­bies on my desk and bring you a list of out­stand­ing Jew­ish books that con­tem­plate love in all of its forms (albeit a few days ear­ly). And, in hon­or of the JBC’s upcom­ing trip to Israel for Jerusalem Inter­na­tion­al Book Fair, you’ll find a healthy dose of Hebrew lit­er­a­ture in the mix. Any­thing to add? Com­ment and let me know:

The His­to­ry of Love, Nicole Krauss (2005, W. W. Norton)

A Tale of Love and Dark­ness, Amos Oz; Nicholas de Lange, trans. (2004, Houghton Mif­flin Harcourt)

Super Sad True Love Sto­ry, Gary Shteyn­gart (2010, Ran­dom House)

See Under: LOVE, David Gross­man; Bet­sy Rosen­berg, trans. (1989, Far­rar, Straus and Giroux)

The Love of Elspeth Bak­er, Myron S. Kauf­mann (1982, Arbor House)

Poems of Jerusalem and Love Poems , Yehu­da Amichai; Harold Schim­mel and Assia Gut­mann, trans. (1992, Sheep Meadow)


Orig­i­nal­ly from Lan­cast­er, Penn­syl­va­nia, Nao­mi is the CEO of Jew­ish Book Coun­cil. She grad­u­at­ed from Emory Uni­ver­si­ty with degrees in Eng­lish and Art His­to­ry and, in addi­tion, stud­ied at Uni­ver­si­ty Col­lege Lon­don. Pri­or to her role as exec­u­tive direc­tor, Nao­mi served as the found­ing edi­tor of the JBC web­site and blog and man­ag­ing edi­tor of Jew­ish Book World. In addi­tion, she has over­seen JBC’s dig­i­tal ini­tia­tives, and also devel­oped the JBC’s Vis­it­ing Scribe series and Unpack­ing the Book: Jew­ish Writ­ers in Conversation.