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It’s the Saturday ritual of Vladimir Kozlov and his granddaughter, Nomi, to snuggle up with a book, but only after Kozlov has gone through it with a dictionary close at hand. That’s because while the two love to read together, they are also study partners.

He is a Russian émigré, and 4-year-old Nomi speaks Russian at home. With picture books, they are helping each other learn English.

About 10 months ago, their Jewish literacy got an extra boost when they were among the first Russian-speaking families to become subscribers to the PJ Library, a program that gives free Jewish books and music to children up to age 8, like “Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins” and “Dear Tree.”

“In the Soviet Union, we didn’t have access to Judaism or traditions. We’re secular, but the books give us a push,” Kozlov said through an interpreter, adding that when the family celebrated Chanukah this year, they chanted both the blessings and the holiday poems — one for each candle — from a PJ Library book.

Source: The Jewish Week

by CindyMindell

During its first fifteen years, the annual date of the program coincided with the holiday of Lag B’Omer, traditionally regarded as a scholars’ festival. In 1940, the event was moved to the days and weeks preceding Chanukah in order to promote the purchase of books of Jewish content as holiday gifts. Over the years, Jewish Book Week became so popular and so filled with activities that it was extended to a one-month period in 1943. Today, Jewish Book Month remains an annual event coordinated by the Jewish Book Council, dedicated to the celebration of Jewish books. Because it is observed during the month preceding Chanukah, the exact date changes each year. To find out more about the Jewish Book Council and the programs and items it offers to help in the celebration of Jewish Book Month visit www.jewishbookcouncil.org . The Ledger begins its month-long celebration of Jewish Book Month with a look by Ledger staff writer Cindy Mindell at several exciting new books on Jewish topics and by Jewish authors. This issue features books by Daniel Asa Rose, Lorrie Greenhouse Gardella, Robert Gillette and Andi Rosenthal....

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by Beth Kissileff

This novel, set at an indeterminate time in pre-World War II Europe, features a Jewish woman, Blanca, who converts to Christianity to marry a non-Jewish man, Adolf, who abuses her. Blanca does not take care of her father once her mother has passed away, allowing her father to return alone at night to an old age home (Adolf will not let him in their home), and the father goes missing. Blanca gives birth to a child and can’t tell the news to her blind grandmother, who stands outside the now-closed synagogue, cursing the converts. She is afraid to speak to her grandmother because of her disapproval of Blanca’s conversion and marriage to a non-Jew.  The irony in their world is that when the man from the burial society says “We Jews stand by one another” at the funeral of Blanca’s mother, the crowd realizes “most of them were converts.” Yet, there is still a core of faith in them—Blanca remembers her mother saying “There is a God in heaven and he watches...

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