THE HOUSE OF LOVE AND PRAYER

In this extraordinary collection of short fiction, Tova Reich dives deep into the world of Orthodox Jewry—a world that her stories, like the shows Unorthodox and Shtisel, embrace with respect and affection while also poking at the faultlines in its unshakeable traditions.

The nine stories collected in this volume are all populated by seekers—of holiness, illumination, liberation, meaning, love. Their journeys unfold in the U.S., Israel, Poland, China, often in the very heart of the Jewish world, and are rendered with an insider's authority. The narrative voice bringing all this to life has been described as fearlessly satiric and subversive, with a moral but not moralizing edge, equally alive to the sacred and the profane, comically absurd to the point of tragedy.

Tova Reich's most recent novel, Mother India (2018), was longlisted for the South Asia Literature Prize and a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award. Other novels include Mara, Master of the Return, The Jewish War, My Holocaust, and One Hundred Philistine Foreskins. Her stories have appeared in the Atlantic, Harper's, Ploughshares, and elsewhere. She is the recipient of the National Magazine Award for Fiction, the Edward Wallant Book Award, and other prizes. She lives on the fringe of Washington, DC.