The Weight of Ink in Retro Chapter Chicks

May 13, 2018 Stacey B rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Kudo's!
This book won an award, which is very hard to come by with all the competition out there.
I was asked a few months ago to read this book (not by the author) for an upcoming conference.
and can understand why this book an award.
As a lover of jewish history, historical and contemporary fiction, it was
a wonderful surprise recognizing I would be reading both as one.
The writing is superb, as is the subject matter.
I loved this book.
Evidently so did many others.
Keep it up Rachel!!!!! ...more

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Oct 20, 2018 Theresa rated it really liked it

Shelves: immigrant-experience, highly-recommended-by-me, history, buddy-reads, historical-fiction

An engrossing read, requiring attention, and quite enjoyable. A cache of late 17th Century documents, a genizah or archive of Jewish documents, is found in 2000 hidden in a stairwell in a home in Richmond-on-the-Thames. Two scholars, Helen at the very end of her career and Aaron at the beginning of his, begin examining them only to discover they relate to the Restoration when the Portuguese Sephardic Community was being openly re-established in London after centuries of banishment. This story is An engrossing read, requiring attention, and quite enjoyable. A cache of late 17th Century documents, a genizah or archive of Jewish documents, is found in 2000 hidden in a stairwell in a home in Richmond-on-the-Thames. Two scholars, Helen at the very end of her career and Aaron at the beginning of his, begin examining them only to discover they relate to the Restoration when the Portuguese Sephardic Community was being openly re-established in London after centuries of banishment. This story is told in alternating chapters with that of Ester, an orphan in the home of a blind rabbi tasked with guiding and educating this congregation and its sons in 17th Century London. Ester becomes the rabbi's scribe, having been educated against custom and acceptable practice for women. Ester hungers for knowledge, being possessed of a brilliant mind capable of deep philosophical analyses, and a person of great strength. Both stories gradually reveal a compelling historical portrait of a community during the Restoration, including the devastating plague of 1665-1666, while also showing us the personal journeys and epiphanies of our 21st Century scholars. And quite a bit is revealed of the politics of academia along the way.

While this is definitely historical fiction about Restoration London, I hazard to suggest that it is also about women as intellects and philosophers, women academics suppression both overtly historically (denied education) and more subtley in contemporary academia (Helen being supplanted by the (male) former student of the (male) department chair as first scholar studying the genizah). Yet the story also reveals how gifted intellectual women persisted and continue to do so.

I did find sections slow, and the philosophical arguments set out by Ester in the letters she is scribing were a bit much, but there are also many ironies and even inventive leaps that balance out those passages. And I found the historical story revealed to be fascinating.

If you loved Possession by A.S. Byatt, this book is for you. I would also suggest The Last Watchman of Old Cairo by Michael Lukas for the story of another ancient geniza, and Hunger's Brides by Paul Anderson for a similar dual story about a 20th Century Canadian scholar and her subject, Sor Juana Inez de la Cruz, a late 17th Century nun in Mexico, who was one of the great poets and intellects of the time. ...more

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May 03, 2023 Tasha rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction

Rating: 3.5 rounded up to 4 for GRs.

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Apr 27, 2023 Kristin rated it really liked it

Shelves: european, early-modern-1500to1850, late-modern-1850topresent

3.5 Honestly, I think I would have liked it better if it were entirely set in the past. I was pretty bored reading Helen's and Aaron's POVs. The writing is nice, but maybe there was too much philosophizing and ruminating for me. I figured this out when Aaron was obsessing over his rebel Jew "maybe-girlfriend" and Helen was flashbacking on her militaristic Jew secret boyfriend; I realized I was not invested in these relationships, at all. Perhaps because I am not acquainted with Jewish history en ...more

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