Daniella Levy

Letters to Josep has quite an interesting backstory. The author, a Jewish woman from Israel, befriends a Catholic man who becomes very interested in her and her faith. They become good friends and start exchanging emails where the Catholic man “Josep” asks her questions about her faith and she responds in kind. Being a Catholic, he wasn’t raised in Jewish thought and was curious on how those who only read with what Christians call the Old Testament went about their day to day life. Josep admits that the emails became too much for him, he was a busy man and Levy was giving him a lot to digest.

This is when Levy decided to create a blog, where she would post the content she was putting into the emails all in one space, so he could frequent them at his leisure. The book contains these “letters” of sorts and go on to explain key tenets and beliefs of Judaism.

Levy presents a compelling and heart-felt case for her religious values and devotions. Comments like “I prefer observant Jew to Orthodox Jew” show that she isn’t trying to be overly dogmatic but rather just wants you to see Jewish life through her eyes. Even though I’ve studied Judaism before, I feel like this Introduction has told me more than any of my previous studies. It treats the adherent of Judaism and the curious seeker as human beings and someones we get so caught up in our beliefs we forget that.… (mehr)

Alma has inherited a gold ring, a ring that has been based down from generation to generation. When she decides to spend a semester abroad in Spain, she undertakes a project to uncover her families genealogy and the history of the ring. Manuel, decides to travel with her and search for his own family history.

This book was extremely slow and extremely predictable. It unraveled exactly as I expected, there were no surprises or unexpected moments. During Manuel's chapters, Alma comes off as extremely ditzy. I almost wondered if she was the same confident woman from her chapters. Overall, a bust.… (mehr)