Winner of the Peter Taylor Prize for the Novel, Minyan is both bittersweet and hilarious in a way that hurts to laugh. It is the tale of Norbert Wilner, a man who has mastered the art of arrested development who, at 37, is still single and living in New York City, surrounded by the Jewish guys he grew up with in Jersey. They are all searching for God, women, and most of all, a good pastrami-on-rye with spicy brown mustard, a side of potato salad and a cream soda.
Bernstein is a Hindu, Greenblatt's a Sufi, Weissbaum worships Willie Mays, and nobody likes Finkelstein, the big-shot lawyer and born-again Christian. And Freddy Lipschitz has just died. As these middle-aged men gather to mourn their childhood friend, they begin to take stock-and make shtick-of their failed relationships, missed opportunities, questionable careers, and the underlying sense of dread that pervades their existence. For despite growing up in the seemingly carefree atmosphere of America in the 1950s, Norbert and his friends still find themselves living in the long shadow of the Holocaust. Fearful children of nervous Jewish mothers, they were instructed to be wary of everything and everyone; to lock the doors, wear earmuffs, and marry Jewish girls.
"Who knew, at age 12, that there could be a direct link between little Mary-Anne Hamilton and Hitler? But there was. The innocent Sunday school cross around her neck may as well have been a swastika, to anyone who had survived the war, as my mother did. I saw a cute girl in pigtails; my mother saw Hitler Youth, saw ovens and smoke and her dead grandmother."
A chance meeting with the eccentric Reb Miltie helps Norbert begin to find salvation through the humor, teachings and melodies of the Ba'al Shem Tov, the founder of Hasidism, as well as through the camaraderie of his life-long friends as they passionately pursue meaning, marriage, and the healing properties of brisket.
About the Author:
Eliezer Sobel is also the author of Blue Sky, White Clouds: A Book for Memory-Challenged Adults. Among 20,000 books for caregivers, this is one of the only books for the patient. A simple picture book, it requires no memory to read and enjoy. If you are caring for a loved one with dementia, this book provides a shared activity that can stimulate tender moments of connection regardless of their stage of memory-loss.
See www.blueskywhiteclouds.com for further information.
Sobel is also the author of:
The 99th Monkey: A Spiritual Journalist's Misadventures with Gurus, Messiahs, Sex, Psychedelics and Other Consciousness-Raising Experiments, the tale of the author's hilarious and poignant 30-year journey that regularly took him from the sublime to the insane in equal measure;
Wild Heart Dancing: A Personal One-Day Quest to Liberate the Artist & Lover Within, designed to awaken and unleash the reader's dormant creativity in a one-day, at-home self-retreat;
Why I Am Not Enlightened, an e-book that will make you feel better about failing to be a Perfectly Realized Master;
and The Manual of Good Luck, long out of print but still makes for a good story. Read about it here:
www.eliezersobel.com/manualgoodluck.html
Eliezer blogs on PsychologyToday.com, has led creativity intensives and meditation retreats around the United States. and is a certified teacher of the 5Rhythms(TM) movement practice developed by Gabrielle Roth.
He is married to Shari Cordon.
www.eliezersobel.com
NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR:
Minyan first appeared in hardcover in 2004, published by the University of Tennessee Press, a the daunting price of $32. Although it was a first prizewinner and praised by several National Book Award winners, it was never truly promoted or marketed and quickly disappeared into the Graveyard of Obscurity, a realm of literary purgatory where many unsung gems languish unread. The present edition is the 1st time Minyan has been available in paperback, and it is also available as a Kindle, Nook and iBook. If you enjoy it, please spread the word and help in its resurrection. Thanks! Eliezer
Read an amusing back-story about Minyan here:
www.eliezersobel.com/minyan.html
