And
Midwest Book review just shared:
Mensch-Marks
Joshua Hammerman
Health
Communications, Inc.
3201 S.W. 15th
Street, Deerfield Beach, FL 33442-8190
9780757321771,
$14.95, PB, 240pp, www.amazon.com
Synopsis:
"Mensch-Marks: Life Lessons of a Human Rabbi―Wisdom for Untethered
Times" is Rabbi Joshua Hammerman personal memoir told as a sacred story,
as how-to book, as a series of personal vignettes in dialogue with one another
over the span of decades, resonating with eternal ideas that span centuries.
"Mensch-Marks"
traces Rabbi Hammerman's own personal growth while providing a road map for
people of all backgrounds seeking a life of moral vision. The wisdom is shared
not from a pulpit on high, but rather from an unfolding story of a fellow
traveler, one who has stumbled, failed, and persevered, struggling with the
questions large and small. Through it all, Rabbi Hammerman has tried to live
with dignity and grace, what he calls the "nobility of normalcy."
The central
message of Rabbi Hammerman's "Mensch-Marks" is that we can turn things
around, one mensch at a time!
Critique:
Inherently interesting and ultimately inspiring, "Mensch-Marks: Life
Lessons of a Human Rabbi―Wisdom for Untethered Times" is an extraordinary
and potentially life enhancing read that is unreservedly recommended for
community and academic library Contemporary American Biography collections, as
well as Judaic Studies supplemental studies lists. It should be noted for
personal reading lists that "Mensch-Marks" is also available in a
digital book format (eTextbook, $10.99).
Editorial Note: A
celebrated rabbi and award-winning journalist and blogger, Joshua Hammerman,
has served Temple Beth El in Stamford, Connecticut, for over three decades. His
essays have appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post, Times
of Israel, The New York Jewish Week and many other places. Rabbi Hammerman was
a winner of the Simon Rockower Award, the highest honor in Jewish journalism,
for columns on the Bernard Madoff case. In 2018, he received an award from the
Religion News Association for excellence in commentary. Rabbi Hammerman
received ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary after getting an MA in
journalism from NYU and a BA, magna cum laude, from Brown University.
