Notes from the Levy Library

Jewish Book Month

– column updated 12/5/25

Jewish Book Month celebrates 100 years!

It’s the centenary year of Jewish Book Month (November 13-December 13), so what better way to celebrate than to read a Jewish book? And that’s what we’re all about! The theme this year is “Share your shelf. Share your story.” For details, see https://www.jewishbookcouncil.org/events/jewish-book-month
The program began as Jewish Book Week in 1925, the brainchild of librarian Fanny Goldstein. There is now a children’s book about this: Rich Michelson’s Fanny’s Big Idea: How Jewish Book Week Was Born, illustrated by Alyssa Russell. Our copy is on order – ask me for it!

Tehillim speaker’s book available in the library

Please note that we have a copy of Operating with God: Spiritual Stories of a Surgeon, a memoir by Dr. James Elist, who will be the Tehillim speaker at the Temple on Friday, 12/19. Copies of his book will be available for sale for $26.00 that day as a fundraiser for IDF families in need, so do attend and buy the book! But since Dr. Elist generously donated our copy I’m sure he would love to have even more people read it, so keep in mind that you can also borrow it from the library.

Hidden Lives: Stories from Child Survivors of the Holocaust

We are quickly losing the last of the survivors of the Shoah, so the opportunity to hear from them is precious. Reading their stories will soon be the only way to keep this connection. On Wednesday, 12/10 at 1:00 p.m. Echoes and Reflections, a professional development organization for Holocaust educators, hosts a free webinar with reflections from the following survivors: Rachelle Goldstein, Cordula Hahn, Dr. Robert Krell, and Abe Foxman. Though geared to educators, others are welcome too. Apparently U.S.-based webinar attendees will receive a free copy of Hidden Lives: Stories from Child Survivors of the Holocaust, the new book that recounts their stories. To register, go to: https://tinyurl.com/hiddenchildrenwebinar

Latest Recommendations from the Second Sunday Book Club

We met on November 16 and came up with quite an eclectic list. We also decided to each read a banned book in the new year. Here are a few of the books that we discussed….

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop by Satoshi Yagisawa is an international bestseller from Japan. This short novel has romance, soul-searching, interesting characters, and lots of books! Fugitive Pieces is the first of many fine novels by Canadian poet Anne Michaels. It’s a very moving story of the relationship between a Greek geologist and the Jewish boy he saves. You may know Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America from the HBO series – a timely look at an alternative history of the US.

Jella Lepman and Her Library of Dreams is a very personal pick for me. It’s a children’s biography of the woman who founded the International Youth Library in Munich, where I spent several months on a fellowship. This extraordinary woman – a Jew who had fled Germany with her two young children to work as a journalist in the UK – went back after the war as a major in the US Army to help German children repair their lives by giving them access to books. This proved to be an effective antidote to Nazi propaganda, which was all that they knew. A new release, the book is just waiting for you to borrow it from our library!

Our next book club meeting is Sunday, December 7, at 1:00 pm – the FIRST Sunday so as not to conflict with Hanukkah. Email me for the Zoom link if you’d like to join us to talk about your reading.

Shabbat Shalom, and happy reading and viewing!

Your Librarian, Annette

Do visit our online catalog http://stti.hl.scoolaid.net/bin/home. You can also get there via the Temple web site https://sephardictemple.org/ — click on the “Learning” tab and choose “Temple Library.” Get to know your Levy Library – there’s lots to discover!

Librarian: Annette Goldsmith. Email: library@sephardictemple.org