Judaism


Israel Abrahams - 2003
    You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

Here and There: Leaving Hasidism, Keeping My Family


Chaya Deitsch - 2015
      Even as a child, Chaya Deitsch felt that she didn’t belong in the Hasidic world into which she’d been born. She spent her teenage years outwardly conforming to but secretly rebelling against the rules that tell you what and when to eat, how to dress, whom you can befriend, and what you must believe. Loving her parents, grandparents, and extended family, Chaya struggled to fit in but instead felt angry, stifled, and frustrated. Upon receiving permission from her bewildered but supportive parents to attend Barnard College, she discovered a wider world in which she could establish an independent identity and fulfill her dream of a life unconfined by the strictures imposed upon her by a belief system that she had never bought into, a life that would be filled with the secular knowledge and culture that were anathema to her friends and relatives in Crown Heights, Brooklyn. As she gradually shed the physical and spiritual trappings of Hasidic life—the long skirts and long-sleeved blouses, the rules of kashrus, the meticulous observance of the Sabbath and the Jewish holidays—Chaya found herself torn between her desire to be honest with her parents about who she now was and her need to maintain loving relationships with the family that she still very much wanted to be part of.   As she navigated the complexities of her new life, Chaya and her parents eventually came to an understanding that was based on unqualified love and a hard-won but fragile form of acceptance. With honesty, sensitivity, and intelligence, Chaya Deitsch movingly shows us that lives lived differently do not have to be lives lived apart.

If You Awaken Love


Emuna Elon - 2007
    Set in Israel between the Six Day War and the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, 'If You Awaken Love' is an intensely moving story of a stormy and spiritual young girl and her love-hate relationships with her childhood sweetheart, with her father, and with God.

His Beauty: The Cohan Billionaire Brothers Book Three (An Enemies To Lovers Office Romance)


Layla Holt - 2020
    

The Worst Detective Ever Mystery Series, Books 1-3


Christy Barritt - 2019
    I just play one on TV. Joey Darling, better known to the world as Raven Remington, detective extraordinaire, is trying to separate herself from her invincible alter ego. She played the spunky character for five years on the hit TV show Relentless, which catapulted her to fame and into the role of Hollywood’s sweetheart.When her marriage falls apart, her finances dwindle to nothing, and her father disappears, Joey finds herself on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, trying to piece her life back together away from the limelight. A woman finds Raven—er, Joey—and insists on hiring her fictional counterpart to find a missing boyfriend. When someone begins staging crime scenes to match an episode of Relentless, Joey has no choice but to get involved.Joey’s bumbling sleuthing abilities have her butting heads with Detective Jackson Sullivan and kindling sparks with thrill-seeking neighbor Zane Oakley. Can Joey channel her inner Raven and unearth whodunit before she ends up totally done in? And where is her father anyway? Can she handle fame, or is disappearing into obscurity the wiser option? Reign of Error Sometimes in life, you just want to yell “Take two!” When a Polar Plunge goes terribly wrong and someone dies in the icy water, former TV detective Joey Darling wants nothing to do with subsequent investigation. But when her picture is found in the dead man’s wallet and witnesses place her as the last person seen with the man, she realizes she’s been cast in a role she never wanted: suspect.Joey makes the dramatic mistake of challenging the killer on camera, and now it’s a race to find the bad guy before he finds her. Danger abounds and suspects are harder to find than the Lost Colony of Roanoke Island. But when Joey finds a connection with this case and the disappearance of her father, she knows there’s no backing out.As hard as Joey tries to be like her super detective alter ego, the more things go wrong. Will Joey figure this one out? Or will her reign of error continue? Safety in Blunders My name is Joey Darling, and I’m a disgrace to imaginary detectives everywhere. When actress Joey Darling discovers a mermaid tail with drops of fresh blood on it while hiking in a remote nature preserve, she knows something suspicious is going on. As details surface, Joey realizes she’s dealing with a problem she has encountered one too many times: someone desperate for fame who falls victim to a predator. With the help of her neighbor Zane Oakley and the opposition of local detective Jackson Sullivan, Joey hunts for answers, unaware of the deadly net in which she’s about to entangle herself.Joey knows she’s a fish out of water when it comes to cracking cases, but can she use her talent—acting—to help find the missing woman? Or will Joey end up swimming with sharks?

Paradise Lost Epic Boxed Set


R.E. Vance - 2019
    All of them. Grab all four books in the thrilling Urban Fantasy series, Paradise Lost, for one low price, in this great value 1800+ pages box set! First the gods left. Then the Others came. Jean Matthias, ex-monster-killer, is now trying to help them adjust to this new godless world. Everyone from his past thinks he’s dead. In order to keep helping the displaced mythical creatures that now roam the world, he’s going to need it to stay that way. Except-something is terrorizing the night. A murderous creature is unearthing parts of his past best left dead and buried. If the wrong people find out he’s still breathing, he'll be forced back into a life he died to escape. And to make matters worse, if the creature isn't stopped, it might just trigger the apocalypse. Again. Jean didn’t start this fight, but he’s damn sure going to end it. If you like the Dresden Files, Mercy Thompson or want to read a throwback to Angel and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, then you’ll love the Paradise Lost Boxed Set. "Mythology, satire, and brutal honesty. Vance delivers a knockout punch of fun and fearlessness in every last one of his books. Not only does he make you laugh, he makes you think. That's a rare combination that few authors ever achieve, and Vance does it splendidly." — John P. Logsdon, author of the Paranormal Police Department series. The Paradise Lost Boxed Set includes the following novel: • GoneGod World (Keep Evolving - Book 1) • Keep Evolving (Keep Evolving - Book 2) • CrystalDreams (Keep Evolving - Book 3) • Penemue's Inferno (Keep Evolving - Book 4) NEW RELEASE

A Passion for Truth


Abraham Joshua Heschel - 1973
    In this work Heschel explores despair and hope in Hasidism as he experienced it himself through study of the Baal Shem Tov and the Kotzker.

The World to Come


Dara Horn - 2006
    The unlikely thief, former child prodigy Benjamin Ziskind, is convinced that the painting once hung in his parents' living room. This work of art opens a door through which we discover his family's startling history--from an orphanage in Soviet Russia where Chagall taught to suburban New Jersey and the jungles of Vietnam.

Simplifying Street Fighter: A New Player's Guide to Preparing for Street Fighter 5


gootecks - 2015
    If you're like most players, you struggle with nearly every aspect of the game: offense, defense, execution and combos, and generally having a game plan that is more complex than just mashing buttons at every opportunity. A Road Map Toward Improvement Street Fighter is a game that requires practice, finesse, and knowledge. Unfortunately, most players don't have any guidance on where to begin when learning the game which leads to lots of frustration and losses. This guide is designed to give you a road map for improving your skills so that when SF5 drops you can hit the ground running!Lots of players are under the misconception that since SF5 is a brand new game, there's no point in playing SF4 and improving. While it is true that there will be lots to learn in SF5 such as new engines and characters, this is not a reason not to improve on your Street Fighter fundamentals in the meantime. The Importance of a Solid Foundation Like anything else worth doing in life, developing a foundation of solid fundamentals is the key to improving. Even though SF5 will have brand new characters and mechanics, the core elements of Street Fighter remain the same throughout the franchise. Execution, footsies and space control, combos, punishing, and resource management are important in all Street Fighter games and this guide will show you how to use SF4 to improve on these aspects of your game. Who is gootecks and why should I bother? I've played Street Fighter competitively since 2003, starting with Street Fighter III: 3rd Strike and continuing with Street Fighter 4. I've traveled to compete in tournaments around the world, including places like Japan, Singapore, Australia, Canada, and Europe.A lot of people may know me as the co-host of Excellent Adventures of gootecks & Mike Ross, or perhaps from my work on Cross Counter TV, the entertainment network for fighting game fans.Recently, I've begun training players just like yourself through Cross Counter Training, where players like EG.Justin Wong, EG.K-Brad, Alex Myers are available for helping players of all skill levels improve. Through working with my students, I've developed what I believe to be an extremely effective method of learning how to play Street Fighter. This method is based on the idea of learning one tiny aspect of the game at a time through the eyes of the poster boy of Street Fighter, Ryu. "But Ryu is boring, gootecks!" I know, I know, you think Ryu is boring and everybody plays him and you want to play a cool, flashy character so you can style on people on stage at Evo someday. Unfortunately, you'll need to learn how to walk before you can run and there is no better investment of time as a new player than to learn Ryu in order to build a strong foundation.Taking this time now to develop your fundamentals will serve you well as you transition to Street Fighter 5. Ryu is definitely different in SF5, but the tools and concepts you'll learn in this guide will give you a leg up on the competition when SF5 drops.

Sacred Treasure - The Cairo Genizah: The Amazing Discoveries of Forgotten Jewish History in an Egyptian Synagogue Attic


Mark Glickman - 2010
    He had entered the synagogue's genizah--its repository for damaged and destroyed Jewish texts--which held nearly 300,000 individual documents, many of which were over 1,000 years old.Considered among the most important discoveries in modern religious history, its contents contained early copies of some of the Dead Sea Scrolls, early manuscripts of the Hebrew Bible, and other sacred literature. The importance of the genizah's contents rivals that of the Rosetta Stone, and by virtue of its sheer mass alone, it will continue to command our attention indefinitely.This is the first accessible, comprehensive account of this astounding discovery. It will delight you with its fascinating adventure story--why this enormous collection was amassed, how it was discovered and the many lessons to be found in its contents. And it will show you how Schechter's find, though still being "unpacked" today, forever transformed our knowledge of the Jewish past, Muslim history and much more.

The Torah: The Five Books of Moses


Anonymous
    The current JPS translation, based on classical and modern sources, is acclaimed for its fidelity to the ancient Hebrew.

The Rabbi of 84th Street: The Extraordinary Life of Haskel Besser


Warren Kozak - 2004
    Always wearing an easy smile, Hasidic rabbi Haskel Besser spreads joy wherever he goes, enriching the lives of his many friends and congregants with his profound understanding of both Orthodox Judaism and humannature.With warmth and admiration, journalist Warren Kozak writes about the rabbi's extraordinary life—from his family's escape to Palestine in the late 1930s to his witnessing of Israel's rebirth in 1948, to his move to New York City, where he lives today.A rare window into the normally closed world of Hasidic Jews, The Rabbi of 84th Street is also the story of Judaism in the twentieth century; of the importance of centuries-old traditions; and of the triumph of faith, kindness, and spirit.

Davening: A Guide to Meaningful Jewish Prayer


Zalman Schachter-Shalomi - 2012
    We go to synagogue dutifully enough. We rise when we should rise, sit when we should sit. We read and sing along with the cantor and answer 'Amen' in all the right places. We may even rattle through the prayers with ease. We sacrifice vitality for shelf-life, and the neshomeh, the Jewish soul, can taste the difference."--from the IntroductionThis fresh approach to prayer is for all who wish to appreciate the power of prayer's poetry and song, jump into its ceremonies and rituals, and join the age-old conversation that Jews have had with God. Reb Zalman, one of the most important Jewish spiritual teachers in contemporary American Judaism, offers you new ways to pray, new channels for communicating with God and new opportunities to open your heart to God's response.With rare warmth and authenticity, Reb Zalman shows you:How prayer can engage not just spirit, but mind, heart and bodyMeditations that open the door to kavanah, the focus or intention with which we prayHow to understand the underlying "deep structure" of our prayer servicesHow to find and feel at home in a synagogueHow to sing and lead niggunim, the simple, wordless tunes that Jews sing to get closer to Godand more

The Jewish Joke: A Short History - With Punchlines


Devorah Baum - 2017
    This smart and funny book includes tales from many of these much-loved comics, and will appeal to their broad audience, while revealing the history, context and wider culture of Jewish joking.The Jewish joke is as old as Abraham, and like the Jews themselves it has wandered over the world, learned countless new languages, worked with a range of different materials, been performed in front of some pretty hostile crowds, and yet still retained its own distinctive identity. So what is it that animates the Jewish joke? Why are Jews so often thought of as ‘funny’? And how old can a joke get?The Jewish Joke is a brilliant—and laugh-out-loud funny—riff on about what marks Jewish jokes apart from other jokes, why they are important to Jewish identity and how they work. Ranging from self-deprecation to anti-Semitism, politics to sex, Devorah Baum looks at the history of Jewish joking and asks whether the Jewish joke has a future. With jokes from Lena Dunham to Woody Allen, as well as Freud and Marx (Groucho, mostly), Baum balances serious research with light-hearted humor and provides fascinating insight into this well-known and much loved cultural phenomenon.

The Guide for the Perplexed


Maimonides
    Written by a 12th- century thinker who was equally active as an original philosopher and as a Biblical and Talmudic scholar, it is both a classic of great historical importance and a work of living significance today.The Guide for the Perplexed was written for scholars who were bewildered by the conflict between religion and the scientific and philosophic thought of the day. It is concerned, basically, with finding a concord between the religion of the Old Testament and its commentaries, and Aristotelian philosophy. After analyzing the ideas of the Old Testament by means of "homonyms," Maimonides examines other reconciliations of religion and philosophy (the Moslem rationalists) and then proposes his own resolution with contemporary Aristotelianism. The Guide for the Perplexed was at once recognized as a masterwork, and it strongly influenced Jewish, Christian, and Moslem thought of the Middle Ages. It is necessary reading for any full comprehension of the thought of such scholastics as Aquinas and Scotus, and indispensable for everyone interested in the Middle Ages, Judaism, medieval philosophy, or the larger problems which Maimonides discusses.