Quebec Books

As a person with a conservative background, let me start off by telling you what this book is not. It is not liberal, despite what reviewer Kennedy of CA may believe. Yes, James Blanchard is a Democrat, but aside from mentioning select election results, there is no liberal or conservative ideology contained within this book. Further, James Blanchard does much to bolster his credibility through listing his own shortcomings and relaying some less than flattering views of the Clinton administration where warranted. I was surprised and impressed by his candor.

Lastly, reviewer Kennedy is just plain silly when implying that former congressman, governor, ambassador Blanchard (with a masters in business and a law degree) "...discovers Canada actually exists..." With the majority of Canadian/American trade flowing between Ontario and Michigan, and the fact that every handful of Michigan pocket change contains at least one Canadian coin, it is preposterous to assume any Michigan resident would be ignorant of the planet's second largest country.

The heart and soul of this book is a very human and relatable James Blanchard giving readers an inside look at what is like to be an American ambassador to Canada and how he may have played a humble, yet key role in the shaping of the two nation`s policies. The former ambassador's most lasting contributions may well lie within the Canadian/American Open Skies agreement and the results of the Quebec referendum.

No doubt, Canadians and Americans of all slants will enjoy learning more about the partner with whom they share the world's longest open border.

If only James Blanchard were still the US Ambassador to Canada! Relations between the two countries would not be in the sorry state they are now. But then the current Republican administration would never send someone like Blanchard to Ottawa. Blanchard made every attempt to get to understand Canada and Canadian issue before he even moved to the capital. He travelled to all ten provinces in the months prior to setting up shop across from the parliament buildings.
This book provides a powerful and insightful backdrop against which to view the current administration's constant harping about the war on drugs. Canada is trying to take a more European approach, treating the problem as a medical issue as opposed to a criminal matter - but that only enrages George Bush's gang. One would think that the US war on drugs was a series of resounding triumphs!
Blanchard also noted that Canada does not 'do inbvasions' but rather does peacekeeping, so advised Clinton not to even ask Canada to take part in an invasion of Haiti. He also noted that we like to do things as part of the United Nations, so that was the best way to approach us. Imagine!
This book should be read by all US ambassadors, in fact all US state department officials for that matter.

As the previous reviewers have said, Blanchard has written a key book for understanding US-Canadian relations. But this is also the most insightful book I have found about Clinton and the Clinton Administration in the areas in which Clinton was most successful, personal relations and trade policy.

...read this book. It is a decent primer for US residents who want to learn more about our oft-neglected neighbor. Warning: Mr. Blanchard is quite liberal, and liberal policies (US & Canadian) are treated matter-of-factly. His conservative successor as governor of Michigan (John Engler) has, in most people's opinions, done a better job. Interested conservatives will still enjoy the book--just keep a few grains of salt handy.

Canadians might get a kick out of a quintessential "American discovers Canada actually exists and is also pretty neato" story.

If you're Canadian, you really need to read this book. If you're American, you really need to read this book. James J. Blanchard has seen our Canadianisms and helped us to do the unthinkable, define ourselves. From coast to coast and beyond, the essence of what we are leaks out on these pages. It is fitting that an American should expose our mysteries and histories. Not that we are hidding them, we just seem to have a hard time accepting them. We remain the True North, Strong and Free. Thankyou James Blanchard.

This is an excellent and entertaining book but upon re-reading after a space of several months, I am puzzled by the introduction that states "More importantly, the Empress should be remembered for having a higher fatality of passengers (840) in one calamity than either Titanic (832) or Lusitania (791)". At least one other source (Wikipedia) indicates that the Empress of Ireland claimed 1,012 lives, the Titanic 1,517 and the Lusitania 1,198. Perhaps someone else can explain whether I am missing something here. Do the words "in one calamity" have a special meaning that I am overlooking?

This book covers the subject well. The ship and the accident are covered in detail and it has some great photos as well as some blueprints.

It doesn't matter how you view history...this is one of the greatest books written on a little known disaster. I read it and was completely overwhelmed by the well-written text. The depth of the story came alive to me. I could picture myself being among those trying to survive the wreck. I would recommend this to anyone who has an interest in great liners and survivor stories.

THE LOSS OF THE EMPRESS OF IRELAND HAS ALWAYS BEEN OVERLOOKED. IT WAS NEVER THE MOST FASHIONABLE SHIP, BUT IT WAS A FASHIONABLE SHIP. IT DID NOT CARRY " THE " ELITE, BUT IT CARRIED SOME ELITE. THE HORROR OF THE SINKING CAN ONCE AGAIN BE SEEN THROUGH THE PASSENGERS EYES. AN ABSOLUTE MUST FOR SHIPWRECK LOVERS.

Mr. Zeni has somehow reached into the murky depths of the St. Lawrence River and retrieved the details of the sinking of the Empress of Ireland. Bringing out many small details that were never mentioned in earlier works, David Zeni does so with a style that keeps one reading on page after page. A truly delightful book to read, on a subject seldom written about. If you collect works on shipwrecks or great ocean liners, this is a must for your collection.

Well written account of hiking trip for such a long distance. Sometimes too wordy on spirtual themes.

As well as a resource-full account of Eb's travels, this is also a very entertaining book. Full of daily quotations, poetic descriptions of the landscape and people, and, more than anything, uplifting. Congratulations on a job well-done, Eb. Not just the trip, but its recording for the rest of us.

I received my copy today and I'm up to page 100. It is a blend of humor, a man's journey, and numerous inspiring quotes...that makes me want to hit Eastern Mountain Sports and start the hike. Someday I plan to hike the Triple Crown, etc. Cheers to this man who has had the desire, dream and drive to complete an epic journey and share it with the world. Thanks for a great read and giving me another glimpse into long-distance hiking.

What a wonderful and inspiring book!! If you are a backpacker, outdoorsman, or a couch AT hiker, this book is very enjoyable. Eb makes you feel like you are walking every step with him. The book also helps one to realize the "kindness" and generosity of the American and Canadian people. It was uplifting to read a 500+ page book without one bit of negativity toward anyone by the author. Thank you Nimblewill!

Wow! That's really "Hit the road Jack". I live near the Florida Trail but swamp wading with the snakes and the gators? No way Jose! But I am totally enjoying it from my armchair. Go get them. You are a better man than me Charlie Brown!

Unlike most Holocaust literature, this collection, though it starts in Hungary, focuses on life after the Holocaust. I enjoyed the early stories more - the ones that showed how Dana's parents met and lived in Hungary both before and after the war. Once they get to Canada, we mostly see the various schools Dana attends and how her parents adjust -- the heartbreaking part is that her strong father, Apu, has the wind taken out of his sails once he leaves Hungary. Her once strong father walks with stooped shoulders. I did enjoy this collection and would recommend it. There's something lacking (perhaps lack of soul or depth) that prevents the reader from becoming 100% engaged, but it's hard to put your finger on it. Nonetheless, an impressive debut.

This collection of short stories is certainly exceptional. I couldn't put the book down after I picked it up. Anyone even remotely interested in Holocaust or post-holocaust literature absolutely has to read this collection. It is both powerful and moving, evoking startlingly beautiful description and poetry. If you read one more book in your life this absolutely has to be it.

If "Gone by the wind" is describing the end of an era in the American way of life, so "The county of Birches" describes the end of a era in that part of the world.

In addition though, "The County of Birches" continues in describing life in a new world, and how the roots and fears of the old world intrude and mark life even in the second generation.

The book is written with sensitivity,warmth and humor. A very enjoyable lecture.

For those who believe literature can assist us in understanding the past and recurrent terror of unparallelled loss, of the virtual effacement of a people that is the Holocaust, "The County of Birches" will stand proudly and with dignity in their libraries. This extraordinarily well-crafted series of interlocking short stories, treating the experiences of Dana, the daughter of two survivors, compels the intellectual and emotional attention of the reader. For this novel is an excursion into geographic, temporal and existential displacement. We come to perceive life through Dana's eyes, a prescient child who begrudgingly accepts the precarious balance of her life and her parents' perceptions of survival - that a false step leads to abyss, that being Jewish in the post-Holocaust world poses terrible ethical quandires unknown and of no concern to the outside world, that present childhood carries the unfathomable weight of the past, of generations obliterated, of families literally disappearing. The author, Judith Kalman, has produced a dazzling, memorable and significant first novel.

Dana Weisz is no ordinary protagonist. She shoulders the seemingly herculean task of being a child of survivors, one a proud, defiant mother whose integrity provides strength to Dana, the other, a once-aristocratic, now-humbled father whose quiet, "mysterious" love provides comfort and identity. At once, Dana senses her very existence as a replacement for her murdered half-sister but feels guilty even living a "normal" life, perceiving her own "normal" concerns as superfluous to her parents, given the trauma they have experienced.

To be Jewish under these circumstances produces its own internal ambivalence. "What good had it brought any of them being Jewish...[Name] one time it ever proved an advantage to be Jewish." When her parents aggressively promote academic prowess in her older sister, Lillian, they claim: "With your brains...there is nothing you can't do." Dana responds that anything is easy "if your standard was being gassed, tortured or stripped of everything you hold dear; the rest would seem a breeze." Kalman is at her best when she describes Dana's devastating encounter with contemporary Jewish indifference (circa 1965) to the Holocaust. Dana's experiment in Sabbath school results in her being profoundly insulted by her Jewish classmates who make crass jokes about the Holocaust when they examine a Life magazine twenty-year retrospective.

Judith Kalman's stirring narrative alone, which encompasses three generations of history and three distinct geographic settings, distinguishes this novel. But Ms. Kalman peppers her stories with sentences about the Holocaust that hit home very, very hard. This rather compact novel has unbelievable impact. It is not an easy or quick read; it forces the reader to stop, to ponder, to question, to try to understand. The author serves both history and memory admirably.

Absolutely one of the best military fiction books I've ever read! The action is fast and the author paints a vivid picture of the combat sequences in the reader's mind. I felt like I'd have to wash the blood spatter off after the battle sequence was over. The character developement doesn't get cumbersome but still nails enough of each player's background so the reader can relate to them as actually "knowing" them. I highly recommend the book and look forward to the author's next work.

By LTC Mike Merola (U.S. Army retired): Michael Karpovage, new to the military action genre, nails it in his first attempt. Flashpoint Quebec blends the technology with the tactics and puts them to play masterfully in this action-packed read. Set in contemporary times, focused on real issues of the day, Flashpoint takes the reader on a whirlwind ride exploring the fabric of the men who make up our modern day military. A must read for military enthusiasts and those who simply enjoy action. Not since Harold Coyle's Sword Point has a new author of military fiction nailed it as well as Karpovage.

The combat scenes were tremendous! You really captured the intensity. The sniper sequence was shocking.

"Well I finally finished - I am a slow reader :). What an awesome book! I must say I enjoyed the descriptive scenes during battle the most. You painted quite a visual for the reader. Too bad about Coyle... All I could think about while reading was Computer Ambush - "somewhere a soldier screams". It also reminded me a lot about Black Hawk Down. Mind you I never read the book, I only saw the movie - but the similarities are hard to miss.

I really liked how time was depicted. It made the scenes easier to follow as you read about each event from both sides separately. You really did your homework didn't you? Obviously I am not military fanatic, but the detail you provided about weapons, history, and prior conflicts is impressive. I think it makes the story that much more interesting."

Quebec City Crisis was a book that I enjoyed, even though I do not like hockey. I rate it four stars because, being a non-hockey player, I do NOT get the hockey games they play. Roy MacGregor forges books that are both mystery and hockey.
I have read Mystery in Lake Placid, The Night they stole the Stanley Cup, Terror in Florida, Ghost Of the Stanley Cup, and Sudden Death in New York City. Same thing, all good books, yet all uncomprehensible hockey games. My favourite character was Bart Lundrigan, the mysterious newspaper person.

The tounrament where some famous hockey stars like Mario Lemieux, Guy Lafleur and Wayne Gretzky first showed the world their talents. Now it is time for the Screech Owls to do the same. The dream trip turns into a nightmare. Travis is asked by a newspaper to keep a diary and someone sabotoged it. The fans start booing them and the Screech Owls must find a way to find the culprit. Will they find him in time?

I think this book is excellent, i have read all the screech owl books in order up to this one, except i read Nightmare in Nagano before this cuz that wuz the only one my friends had that i had cuz we had to do a report. I haven't finished the book yet but i will be finished the book at the end of the month. I love Roys books and i absolutly adore the way he describes the hockey games that the Owls play (i play hockey in real life). I love the way roy has hockey and mystery genre into one book and how all of his mysterys actually make sense after all the hockey games and investigations. I love the mysterys and i plan to read the rest of the owls books (even if i can't keep up with the pace they are being made). Thanks roy for the many great books! Keep reading and never stop writing all those books that i adore soo much.

Later

A great book! It's suspenseful and fun to read about when the Screech Owls, a 12 year old traveling hockey team, travels to Quebec City for a hockey tournament. They didn't know it, but there would be trouble ahead. This mystery is a great book for both fans and players. I play hockey and find this series to be very addicting. You won't be able to put this book down.

If you are looking for a book with a wide variety of interconnected tours in the Lake Champlain Region, you cannot do much better than this one! From easy juants to planning 10 days around the Lake, it is a great resource. Really looking forward to doing some bike exploring in the region.

I used this book to take a six-day bike tour from Burlington, VT to Montreal, Quebec, and I had a great trip. The author's directions are so accurate that I was able to ride all the way to Montreal without consulting a map! The author recommended hotels that are conveniently located for cyclists and chose roads and bike paths that were scenic and generally had light traffic. This book is a valuable resource for any bicycle tourist!

Part of the outstanding "Backcountry Guide" series from The Countryman Press, 25 Bicycle Tours In The Lake Champlain Region: Scenic Tours In Vermont, New York, And Quebec offers wonderfully satisfying bike hikes through New York's Adirondacks, Vermont's Green Mountains, and the scenery and charms of Quebec's historic towns and villages. Including a wide range of lodging and dining options, cyclists can explore the southern tip of the lake in Whitehall, New York, to the quaint college town of Middlebury, Vermont. The various tours range from scenic and flat 10 mile loops to adventurous 82-mile rides through the easter Adirondacks. Whether for an afternoon's pleasant exercise or a weekend of high cycling adventure, 25 Bicycle Tours In The Lake Champlain Region is an enthusiastically recommended regional guide.

"We are Hitler's children," Jack Engelhard's mother once sadly spoke, explaining the family of four's desperate poverty as they all crowded together in the one room of a house they were allowed. Explaining the loss of so much of the rest of their family in Nazi ovens. Explaining finally, their gratitude for life as only people who had to struggle for it every minute could know. "Lech Leja" intones the Biblical commandment. "Go forth!" And indeed this family had...straight out of Hell.

This little book in its wise, humorous, and slightly sarcastic tone shows what awaited them on the other side. It is primarily an autobiographical sketch of Jack's life through his adolescent years, spent in Montreal. The book can easily be read in the course of a day, but while you're reading you'll be riveted by the stories, with their unique combination of pathos and humor, laughter and tears...their unique JEWISHNESS...their uncommon WISDOM.

Everyone who has known the privilege of being born in a land with no war and raised in peace and freedom should read this book. It tends to remind you, as you share this family's appreciation of their blessings, just how great are your own. Five Stars

John W. Cassell
John W. Cassell is the author of five novels on the American Counterculture of the 1960's-1970's including Crossroads: 1969 and Odyssey: 1970 and numerous "Amazon Shorts" short stories primarily in the genre of military fiction, including Armageddon: 1973 and Leap into Darkness Part 1: Not my Best Birthday

Remembrance Enters Eternity
Escape from Mt. Moriah
Jack Engelhard (ComteQ Publishing)
118 pages, hardback
Reviewed by Eugene Narrett
(Eugene Narrett is a writer and a Professor of Literature at Cambridge College in Massachusetts).

Remarkable lives, lives filled with chiaroscuro, make for great literature, fiction or non-fiction, and Jack Engelhard's remarkable life has led to a notable literary gift. He has demonstrated this with novels so taut with ideas and action that they find their way to Hollywood (& inevitable simplification -- Indecent Proposal) and more recently, with a volume of memoirs whose succinct evocations of person, place and mental process allow worlds of sentiment to stand silently present without crowding or directing the reader's own thoughts and response. Impelled by his sensitivity to the ambiguities of motive, to empathy, ambivalence, & striving for a saving certainty, Engelhard is a master of the telling moment and phrase, of the summary comment (though his characters often get the last word) that implies even more than it clearly states. In evoking the fullness of a human person he has the simplicity and deftness of a master: a sharp mind, self-awareness, and a deep & feeling heart.

The author knows that the roots contain the essence of the tree and its fruit, and that they live in its seeds, however far the winds of circumstance may carry them. And so in this volume, vignettes about his root, his father, are frequent for the man was an exemplary figure of loss and spiritual richness. Noah Engelhard was one of those immigrants who never adapted to the wrenching culture shock of his forced transplantation (from France to Canada during WW II). Originally a youthful Torah scholar & leather cutter in Poland, wars in the east brought him to France where he prospered as a master designer of leather handbags, and owned a factory in Toulouse. But the Nazi occupation destroyed that, and his generosity to other refugees exhausted the remainder. In Canada, his classic designs were out of fashion and he, Noah ben Yakov became "Joe," the guy who fetched Cokes in another man's factory: "Joe! Joe! Where's my Coke!"

Like many immigrants, the author's father was a Jew too gentle and ambivalent to impose his teaching methodically on his son; he was an uprooted Jew who carried the House of Study within him and who searched every Sabbath for a synagogue in which the Rabbi was not a shallow positivist, affirming his congregation's attenuated Judaism; who searched even for a serious argument that would revive the world of Torah that had been violently uprooted.

Left to his own choosing, the life of a scholar would have suited my father fine. He belonged in a House of Study, secluded from the turmoil of business, removed from the urgencies of daily cares. In a Yeshiva his knowledge of Torah could be stimulated, his wisdom put to the test -- and his worth as a scholar and a man could be recognized and appreciated.
But that never happened.

In that clarity of description, in that gift for succinct summary and alertness to pathos, in that sensitivity to the emotional demands and language a culture imparts, Engelhard's literary gifts shine.

Along the way, in brisk but loving detail he sketches another world, a distinct culture not merely remembered but felt so fully it is reconstructed in spirit:

Approaching the [factory] landing you could hear the roar of the sewing machines. Closer, you smelled the adhesives and the leather. Cutters were bent over huge tables slicing up giant stretches of animal hides. They were grinding in frenzy, never gazing up from their machines, as though somewhere in their urgency of livelihood they had lost the human sense of wonder and curiosity.

As Engelhard paints it, the world of exile extends from the fashionable and also the back streets of post-war Montreal, from two-bit backbreaking jobs, to tenuous status as low-rent tenants at whim, to country vacations paid for by nerve, worry and improvised labor. Always aware and happy with what he's gained in the New World, especially as an American, he is keenly aware and deftly sketches the soul-wrenching loss & distortions that emigration, especially forced emigration, imposes on the individual and on relationships.

But these experiences -- with rats in the weeds at a garden-nursery, with Jew-hating city toughs, with relatives, rich and poor, who couldn't relate, with eviction and frequent poverty -- did not defeat but aroused and deepened the author's sense of awe at the variety and mystery of human motive and deeds. His insight was quickened by seeing his parents various and imperfect efforts to adjust to the loss of one world and immersion in another in which he moved almost effortlessly; but like many first genera_tion Jews, never with a sense of fully belonging; always with a sense that something essential had been left behind.

This volume's attention to up-rootedness (so like the masterly paintings of Samuel Bak, of whose art, and whose own memoir, this work reminds me), and a lifetime reflecting on the many facets of this experience, enable Engelhard to offer several wonderful epigrams about the singularity of three millennia of Jewish experience, so awesomely recapitulated in the past 60 years, the years of his life (born July 1940, as the Nazis overran France). In discussing the nearly untranslatable Jewish expression, "nu," a word that carries bemused acceptance within it, Engelhard speaks of the paradox of Jewish survival, of belief in or memory of a pure flame inside a soul repeatedly buried in dust and ashes. What results when filtered by centuries "is a kind of hopeful resignation," he writes; a will to live and somehow taste some of life's sweetness that always carries "both hope and hopelessness." The mind sees and the heart feels the defeats and impossibilities of realizing the dream; yet the flame in the soul still glows. As the Hassidic saying puts it, "the soul of man is the candle of God." And though God is only mar_ginally present in these stories, one senses that Engelhard is always ready, even eager, for Him to speak.

Many of these short vignettes have a clarity so vivid in detail and sparse in evocative diction that they shine, filling the everyday prosaic world with the spirit of the world to come. In this they are like Hassidic folk tales transposed to the cities of suburbs of the new world in the 1940's and '50s, tales whose traits kept their wonder for someone who saw one world in the context of another. This quality is very palpable in memoirs like, "Relatives from America," "A Sabbath Drive," "A Telegram from Isr_ael," and "A Sister from the Past." Mystery and ambiguity fill the unspoken spaces of these simple tales. Needing a lift into town on a Sabbath afternoon in the country, young Jack gets a lift from a friendly French Canadian driver though neither understands the other: one has no English; the other, little French. But the vignette is not one of simple goodness or trans-cultural compassion. Though seemingly no one knew or saw him riding in a car on Sabbath, a few weeks later the Rabbi of Jack's Yeshiva summ_oned him and his father to meet. "You were seen hitchhiking on the Sabbath," he charges. "When?" his father asks. "Where was this?" There's no answer, just the unexplained fact. Hadn't he learned over and again that "One sees"? That "on the Day of Judgment, even the walls will testify against you..." Was the kindly driver a tempting demon? Is it possible that just as was believed in the vanished world of Jewish Poland, nothing is hidden, not even in suburban North America for a family that is sporadically _religious; perhaps especially for those who are sporadically religious?

Wonder arises from those simple moral dilemmas everyone finds as they walk their daily lives, or simply gets the mail. One day a telegram comes from Israel: Jack's father's mother, whom Jack himself has never seen and with whom his father has scarcely communicated in half a century, has "at age 102, been gathered to her people," in Israel. Why should his father, who treasures the memory of his mother's saintliness, know such a sad fact, one he cannot change? So the youth conceals the telegram until the ban_al routines of a laundry day bring it to light. And then, a guilty revelation dawns: "I had committed a sin; I had interfered with the mitzvah of sitting shiva and saying kaddish. My sin could never be undone." Walking the streets of Montreal that evening, the dark sky suddenly opened to reveal an intense brightness, as if in supernal confirmation of his thoughts. And yet, consoling the penitend, his father's forgiveness comes like a benediction: "You meant well; what's done is done." In the meantime, wonder and the Beyond have asserted themselves in a heart formed by millennia of exile and the imperative to remember and hold on. Common sense and the commonplace do not negate, Eng_elhard suggests, but serve as vessels for retaining wonder and faith. Assimilation is never complete; it too becomes a medium through which transcendenc will emerge and shine, layering people and events with eternal meaning and dignity.

And these are remarkable people, teeming memorably in a book so spare and easy in its telling one reads it in less than two quick hours. And then one returns to reflect, to reflect on the warm-hearted but officious sister, whose loneliness makes her needy, and whose finely honed sense of shame leads her to depart as suddenly as quietly as she arrives. On a middle-aged man, a holocaust survivor, weeping at the sight of a newspaper photograph, of a Jewish soldier, finally; of a talented, bullying choirmaster_, and the shame of muddy boots at a wedding; of an adolescent watching the World Series at a malt shop while the local Romeos flirt and then go out back with the beauty behind the counter, taking the TV with them. These anecdotes are rich with a range of initiations and a broad palette of moods, insights, and memorable encounters with Truth packaged simply for our wonder.

The collection ends with an anecdote in which Engelhard, remembering an annual visit to an Orthodox synagogue, finds himself among men of his father's generation and culture, looks at himself as a new father in the context of what kind of Jewish tradition, and what sources of Jewish strength he, an externally assimilated Jew, will be able to bequeath to his own son. As he listens to the chanted prayers and ancient melodies, he writes

It occurred to me then, that I was now 42, and when my father was that age, he was an old man, one of the old men of the synagogue.
He also knew everything.
Years from now I wonder, who there will be to show me the right page? And will there be any old men left for my son? He is only two years old, and the old men cover him with love.
To them he is the flame. He is their eternity.

In his doubt, sense of loss, and in his love, Engelhard affirms his caring and his faith for the threefold intertwining of his son, his people and tradition. In the above question, his succinct but poetic description answers itself in an ancient verse. "In Zion there will be a remnant, and they will inherit..."

These wonderfully readable memoirs have the vivid reality of a lived dream; they sparkle like the islands of an enduring world amid the dazzling, distracting sea-spray of our everyday lives that immerse us in the present. We know there is more to us: that there must be a living soul. He intentionally shaped his reminiscences into eighteen memoirs, explaining that the number '18' in Hebrew spells "life," chai, and also the affirmation, "he lives!"


Memory and sensitivity, like self-restraint and shame, are branches of love and of
understanding the mysterious beauty of life. To offer another metaphor, they are a well of soul distilled into generations of Jews for millennia by unique paths of suffering and hope. Beyond what the mind believes or reason can show, the vivid descriptions and memories in this book are forms of honoring this tradition, sparkling simple facts attesting to its endurance.

This book is a winner within its own niche of brilliance, almost like the universe was holding a sun spot open for this author's childhood chapters, for precisely his, "Memoirs of a Refugee Child's Triumph."

The book felt almost like a child's book, but not like the sometimes silly stuff which is presented as children's literature. Instead, this book felt like it was meant for the children among us who were born adult, in the good sense of the word, born wise, born serious, born knowing there's much work to be done here; not work of the body, but work for the soul of humankind, which has been lost, ignored, pushed down, and choked.

What most makes me want to read Engelhard's books, especially after The Bathsheba Deadline: An Original Novel (see my review), is the pleasant environment of his easy-flowing style, which percolates with a subtle sense of joy, possibly the result of his deep love of writing surging through every inspired or perfectly chosen word.

The next appeal for reading this author's books is that I know I'll find truths in them I've looked for in print but have rarely found. The soul craves the freshness of finding something new, something regenerating, solidly hopeful in a quiet way which comes from facing ugliness without flinching, then moving forward again because there's still something of value ahead, something worth knowing. Nu, nu, nu (see the book's introductory essays for an explanation of that saying).

I'm thankful that Jack Engelhard honored his resistance to attempting an overwhelming research project to write a different, redundant angle on this story. As he implied in his introduction, all the book needed was for his memories to be convinced he was dedicated, at that time, to collect them on paper.

Having received two of Jack Engelhard's books together I couldn't decide which I wanted to read first. When I was ready to begin one of them, I thought I might decide by reading a few paragraphs of the opening story of each. By default, I began with MORIAH, thinking I'd stop after a page or two, then do the same with INDECENT PROPOSAL. But, I didn't quit reading MORIAH.

By the following morning I had read the whole of that balsamic bible of a book. I loved it. I was impressed as much as I hoped I would be...

When I first saw the book's cover, I had puzzled at the biblical scene. I didn't immediately recognize it as the Rembrandt representation of God's request of Abraham to offer his son on Mount Moriah. I appreciated having the factual details presented inside the cover as well as on it. I was intensely intrigued about that event being said to have led to the creation of the Jewish people. I wanted to know more.

As I opened the covers of ESCAPE FROM MOUNT MORIAH, I was deeply curious about the childhood of a person who has come to write as Jack Engelhard has.

As I read further into the flap copy and introductory remarks, I began anticipating reading something special, not just a book I would welcome getting lost in, living in as a refreshing contrast to my daily routines; but a book in which I would find something worth knowing, something new, different from the repeated density in the majority of books available to readers, maybe something of actual truth.

The heart craves that, especially when it's rarely found.

Usually, I'm not attracted to short story collections, even knowing they might be true, significant, and well-composed. But, I was immediately attached to the chapter titles and blurbs here, especially the appealing Jewish feel of them. The meaning and number of Chai was magnetic to me, as were the type styles.

The book felt to me to be more of a bible than the established ones.

-- Jack Engelhard may not have been the same type of prodigy as his father was (I have no doubt that his father, Noah ben Jacob, has gone to peace and is still there).

-- Jack may not have assimilated every holy word and underlying truth in the Books of Moses, as his father had, but, with Jack's light touch, he has written his own holy words of truth, and has honored his father in the process.

Jack wrote Noah as he was, as well as how he appeared to Jack in Jack's efforts to know him in both his dark/wounded and bright/spiritual exposures, and Jack related to his father to the best of his straight-on, eyes-focused nature.

My favorite chapter was "A Telegram From Israel," conveying a holy moment confirming compassion, even though it kept Jack's father temporarily in the dark about his mother's death. Describing the moment of that sacred omen, Engelhard writes, "... from utter darkness came incredible radiance." The father's response to Jack's act of compassion was perfection, as was his father's conclusion about the coincidence of the experience of brilliance breaking through dark clouds.

That situation made me wonder if God might have wanted Abraham to say "No" to His request of offering. I want to believe that Abraham's God was a loving one and would have made right either choice for that unique, splitting-of-universes decision.

Possibly my second favorite chapter was Engelhard's holding to his words, "I resign," (the chapter's title) instead of damning himself with, "I quit."

Or, was my next favorite the respect awarded to young Jack by the druggist, Mr. Roberts, following Jack's successful grappling with fears surged in "The Purple Gang" territory.

The core of sadness for my empathy was in the uncle's reaction to love from a nephew in "Relatives from America," and the brutality trials Jack suffered in "The Fairmount Synagogue Choir."

Jack Engelhard is the one who conveys emotion without emotion. (In his review of my Amazon Short, DARK DIAMOND TWILIGHT, Engelhard had said that of my writing style).

After finishing MORIAH, I felt great admiration for Engelhard's father, and was devastated that Noah wasn't allowed to live his life as the highest, holy Rabbi he could have been.

Yet, maybe he accomplished more, for his son, for himself, and for his world, through those dedicated times in the synagogues, in which he grew from a polite, quiet discounting of the officiating Rabbi's inaccuracies in reading scripture, into a bold countering of the corruption of truth. Maybe the reason Noah never found his equal with whom to argue into the truest interpretations of the holy books, was because he had no equal in that. He had only the truth of the meaning in, under, and above the words. I would bet that every Rabbi Noah encountered with his corrections never forgot what Noah had said. Maybe those Rabbis went forth percolating with the right vision from Noah, somehow radiating that cleansing of misconception into our future, the future of rightness to come.

Through his books, Jack is continuing Noah ben Jacob's legacy of synagogue interruption, contributing his literary voice, which I believe has surpassed the golden choir boy (Jack's honed skill Vs the darling golden boy's luck).

As I had read through each chapter, I noticed a flickering in the voice Engelhard used in MORIAH. He seemed to speak as the child he was, with flashes opening onto a voice of the present of his writing the book. One of my favorite uses of voice would be like that, the child writing about the child, except for those few cracks through time when the present heart slips back, sending wisdom gained through time, to heal the child that was, and still is.

To the child in each of us, living eternally,
Linda G. Shelnutt
Shelnutt is the author of several books on Amazon Kindle and Amazon Shorts, including QUARTER MOON DUES.

Handy little book for site seeing and dining.

This book was perfect for a weekend in Montreal. I looked through tons and Fodor's just keeps it simple with good maps, recommendation that aren't lacking in any way, and it is well organized. We took a couple of the restaurant recommendations and I had one of the best meal ver (literally) at Toque! and would strongly recommend the mystery meal. Out of this world. This book is a sure thing though if you are debating which guide to grab for an upcoming trip. Have fun!

Fodor's guide has been very helpful on my trip to Montreal. We were very satisfied with our hotel, which we read about in Fodor. We planned our itinerary around the different areas recommended by Fodor and were able to enjoy and find them all. We also took a side trip to Oka, which was probably my favorite thing we did on this trip. Fodor's explanations of the different places, neighborhoods, and restaurants made our experience in Montreal and its vicinity meaningful and memorable. This is truly a guide of great value.

Very entertaining book, gets you hooked on the author. I will be reading more. Protagonist extremely likeable and entertaining. Makes you laugh out loud.

This is my favorite humorous mystery series by one of my favorite British authors. Nick Madrid is a self-deprecating masterpiece of an unlikely investigative hero. Laugh out loud situations and rapid dialogue combine with a strong mystery to be solved. A great read.

Bridget, Frank and Nick fly from England to Montreal to cover the Just for Laughs Festival for different newspapers. While Nick is tied up in a yoga position, he sees a young woman flash past his hotel room window. He concludes she is a jumper who he later learns was Cissy Parker, a movie starlet. The police rule it an accidental death due to drugs, but Nick has doubts when Frank mentions he heard a man screaming at a woman on the eighteenth floor.

A reporter Julie informs Nick that she took pictures at a celebrity bash that Cissy attended. The starlet offered her a lot of money to buy the negatives, but Julie refused. One of the photos shows Cissy with an unidentified man. When Nick learns the victim was pregnant he concludes she was pushed. Not realizing the danger he causes to himself, his friends and others associated with Cissy on both sides of the ocean, Nick keeps digging as more homicides occurs.

In between murder, beatings, chases, air travel, NO LAUGHING MATTER contains amusing comical scenes, but the prime story line is the protagonist is drawn into a homicide investigation that he prefers to avoid. Once he begins making inquiries, he continues to the bitter end, which he realizes could be his death, in an effort too learn the identity of the mastermind behind the killings and the beatings he suffered. Talented Peter Guttridge provides a journalistic investigative mystery that stars a fine cast worthy of sequels.

Harriet Klausner