Books, Poetry & Short Stories

Book review: ‘How to Woo a Jew’

Tamar Caspi, How to Woo a Jew: The Modern Jewish Guide to Dating and Mating, Seal Press, ©2014, 274 pages, 978-1-58005-500-0; $17. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—This book officially is scheduled for a February publication date, the same month that Nancy and I will celebrate 46 years of marriage, parenthood, and grand-parenthood.  So what […]

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison

The old, the young, and the alcoholics

Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski, M.D., The Rabbi and The Nuns, Mekor Press, 2013, ISBN 9781614651338. 190 pages. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO– Although the title sounds like the beginning of a joke, this book, in fact, contains numerous recollections of Rabbi Twerski’s career as the head of psychiatry at the Roman Catholic-operated St.

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison, Jewish Religion

A Diagnostic Manual of Mishegas

By Joel A. Moskowitz MD LA JOLLA, California — It is common for laypersons to scoff and ridicule the mentally aberrant and to deride those who ‘treat’ such suffering.  Mishegas is the Yiddish label.  Jay Neugebren, Michael B. Friedman MSW and Lloyd I. Sederer MD have crafted (potchkied) a parody of the DSM-5.  (Diagnostic and

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Science, Medicine, & Education, Trivia, Humor & Satire

Leprechauns and kabbalah

The Hope Chest by Melanie Ross, illustrated by Tess Heimbach, Underwood Publishing, (c) 2012, ISBN 9780-6156-2337-5,  168 pages, $13.95. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO –Leprechauns and kabbalah? Anything is possible, especially in a book written to stimulate children’s imaginations and to carry them off as readers to a far away, magical land. San Diego

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories

Biography examines Joe Kennedy’s attitudes toward Jews

By Joel A. Moskowitz, MD LA JOLLA, California — The father of JFK and Bobby and Ted Kennedy was intimately involved in the world events leading up to World War II.  And David Nasaw’s book The Patriarch: The remarkable life and turbulent times of Joseph Patrick Kennedy tells it all.  Published by Penguin Press this

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International, Jewish History, USA

Barry Rubin offers 11 of his books free to downloaders

Editor’s Note: Prof. Barry Rubin, director of the GLORIA center in Israel which keeps close track of geo-political developments in the Middle East, is an occasional columnist for San Diego Jewish World.   He now is offering free to readers 11 books he has published over the years. HERZLIYA, Israel (Press Release)– The GLORIA Center has

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories

Another season of Jewish poetry planned at JCC

By Eileen Wingard LA JOLLA, California — A committee is now soliciting entries from Jewish poets for the fifth season of “Jewish Poets-Jewish Voices” to be presented in the Lawrence Family JCC’s Astor Judaica Library. I have the privilege of serving on that committtee along with moderator Joy Heitzman, Michael Horvitz,  Bonnie Baron and staff

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Eileen Wingard, Marcia Tatz Wollner

La Jolla doctor foresees computerized revolution for medicine

 The Creative Destruction of Medicine: How the Digital Revolution will Create Better Health Care by Eric Topol M.D.; Basic Books, 2012, ISBN-13: 9780465025503, 320 pages. By Joel A. Moskowitz MD, FAPA, FAAP LA JOLLA, California–Dr. Eric Topol is a genius, who is based here in La Jolla.  The beginning of his book, The Creative Destruction of

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Science, Medicine, & Education

Garry Fabian’s updated Holocaust memoir, ‘A Look Back Over My Shoulder’ now on line

A LOOK BACK OVER  MY SHOULDER By Garry Fabian Editor’s Note: In 1936 Garry Fabian’s family fled Germany to Czechoslovakia, hoping to escape  Nazi persecution, but in vain. By 1942 Garry, aged eight, was interned in  Theresienstadt. He was to spend till May 1945 in that ‘model’ concentration  camp and was one of only about

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Jewish History, Jewish Religion

Temple Solel and Write Out Loud announce collaboration

By Carol Davis CARDIFF BY THE SEA, California — Write Out Loud has a unique mission: to read literature aloud to live audiences – short stories, poems, and other short subjects come to life – as talented actors bring the stories “off the page” to the delight of the audience. Theatre critic Pat Launer called

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Carol Davis, San Diego County, Theatre, Film & Broadcast

Survivors’ son charts their road to Holocaust recovery

An Italian Renaissance: Choosing Life in Canada by Robert Eli Rubinstein, Urim Publications, Israel, and Lambda Publishers, Brooklyn, 2010, ISBN 978-965-524-044-3, 177 pages including appendices and endnotes. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO — Perhaps the author and publishers were a bit too clever in titling this family memoir.  Although a portion of the action

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, Donald H. Harrison

Look, up into the political atmosphere… It’s Captain Israel!

By Donald H. Harrison   SAN DIEGO – StandWithUs is turning another page in popular Israel advocacy—and it’s in a comic book. The Los Angeles-based group, which sends speakers and sign-bearers to counter Palestinian demonstrations and purchases space on billboards to tell Israel’s message, recently issued the first number in a comic book series to

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories

San Diego Jewish Book Fair: Author will tell story of Rick Hodes’ clinic in Ethiopia

This Is a Soul: The Mission of Rick Hodes by Marilyn Berger, HarperCollins, 2010; ISBN 978-0-06-175954-3, $25.99. By Donald H. Harrison SAN DIEGO—Journalist Marilyn Berger travels in circles which one would expect might lead to cynicism, or at least to the blasé attitude characterized by the phrase: “Been there, done that.”   Based in New York

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Books, Poetry & Short Stories, International