I see the Jewish sensibility in my books as being somewhat in the tradition of the crass, male comic- like Lenny Bruce, and maybe also kind of Philip Roth-ian, this sort of urge and desire to say everything and get it all out.

There is maybe a Jewish sensibility that I tapped into in my previous books, but Queen Solomon is the first book where I’m dealing with Jewish topics, Jewish themes, Jewish marginalia … I think it’s because I’d never really allowed myself to fully go into everything I wanted to say about Jewishness before. Tamara Faith Berger: Queen Solomon is my first seriously Jewish book. Natalie Aflalo: Do you consider the books you write to be “Jewish books”?

It’s a challenging book that tackles, among other issues, racism in the Jewish diaspora, the legacy of Israel’s aliyah operations, and the fluidity of victimhood.īerger talked to the Jewish Book Council about the impact that learning about Ethiopian Jews had on her as a pre-teen, the tradition of crass Jewish comics, and what she hopes readers will take away from the book.

Tamara Faith Berger’s latest novel, Queen Solomon, is a dark coming-of-age story that follows a disturbed teenage narrator during the summer his family hosts an Ethiopian Jewish girl from Israel, and the enduring influence that summer has on him.

Deeper and deeper madonna tamara