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Partly strong, partly broken : a novel / Nathaniel Popkin.
Athenaeum of Philadelphia - New Acquisitions Circdesk Popkin Partly
By Request
Log in to request item- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Popkin, Nathaniel R.
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- October 7 Hamas Attack, Israel, 2023--Fiction.
- October 7 Hamas Attack, Israel, 2023.
- Synagogues--New Jersey--Fiction.
- Synagogues.
- Faith (Judaism)--Fiction.
- Faith (Judaism).
- New Jersey--Fiction.
- New Jersey.
- Book clubs (Discussion groups)--Handbooks, manuals, etc.
- Book clubs (Discussion groups).
- Genre:
- Authors' inscriptions.
- Physical Description:
- 249 pages ; 23 cm
- Place of Publication:
- Philadelphia : New Door Books, 2026.
- Summary:
- A novel of personal as well as political conflict, Partly Strong, Partly Broken raises provocative questions about faith, empathy, and what it takes for any community to survive in today's America.--Nathaniel Popkin
- "Set in a suburban New Jersey interfaith community during the fall of 2023 and told through the eyes of the passionate, inclusivity-minded Rabbi Adinah, the novel unfolds as the shadow of Hamas' gruesome attack on Israel and Israel's subsequent devastation of Gaza looms over an already fractured community. The narrative opens with Rabbi Adinah returning from a summer in Haifa, only to find her synagogue literally falling apart: a hurricane has torn through the roof, and her office is flooded. Within her congregation, a new conservative member causes strife in her weekly Torah class, and differing opinions about Israel threaten to upend her authority. In the wider community, a young Syrian refugee she mentors lies in a coma, the victim of a brutal hate crime, and the treasured alliances she's cultivated with leaders of other faiths become increasingly challenged. Rabbi Adinah struggles to keep her community together while her foundational beliefs and closest relationships are tested. Through a kaleidoscope of characters, Popkin reflects the contemporary American experience, unraveling the existential consequences that political divisions pose to a community that has long offered strength, purpose, and belonging to all its members.PARTLY STRONG, PARTLY BROKEN tackles questions that have fractured countless families, friendships, and communities even before October 7th. What does it mean to be a Jew in America today? How can the suffering in Gaza and Israel's promise of refuge be reconciled? When core religious, personal and political values conflict, how do people respond? The novel doesn't offer easy answers--but it grapples with these questions with urgency, intimacy, and honesty. By exploring them through fiction, Popkin captures the emotional and moral complexities, the nuances and contradictions, that are too often drowned out in rancorous debate"-- Provided by publisher.
- Notes:
- Includes reading group questions.
- Local Notes:
- Athenaeum copy: Beardwood Fund bookplate.
- Athenaeum copy inscribed by the author.
- ISBN:
- 9781735558592
- 1735558591
- OCLC:
- 1579077017
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