Join us for an evening with
Jonathan Safran Foer, author of the novels
Everything Is Illuminated and
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close and the nonfiction book
Eating Animals. His work has received numerous awards and been translated into thirty-eight languages.
Jonathan will be discussing his new book,
Here I Am, an instant
New York Times bestseller
. Unfolding over four tumultuous weeks in present-day Washington, D.C.,
Here I Am is the story of a fracturing family in a moment of crisis. As Jacob and Julia Bloch and their three sons are forced to confront the distances between the lives they think they want and the lives they are living, a catastrophic earthquake sets in motion a quickly escalating conflict in the Middle East. At stake is the meaning of home and the fundamental question of how much aliveness one can bear. One of the year's most anticipated novels,
Here I Am is bestselling Safran Foer's most searching, hard-hitting and grandly entertaining novel yet.
The event will be moderated by Keith Raffel, the bestselling author of five mystery thrillers.
Over the course of his checkered career, Raffel has taught writing at Harvard, served as counsel to the Senate Intelligence Committee, run for Congress, started an internet software company, and, most important of all, been an Oshman Family JCC board member. The New York Times called his first effort, Dot Dead, "a murder mystery worthy of a Steve Jobs keynote presentation." His fifth, Temple Mount, set mainly in Jerusalem, has been described as "Silicon Valley meets Raiders of the Lost Ark." These days he can usually be found at his favorite Palo Alto café, gulping down green tea while grappling with the manuscript of his next book.
Paperback copies of Here I Am will be available for $17 plus tax at the event. Ticket/book bundles are available in advance.
Part of the Jewish Luminaries Series
Tuesday, July 11
7:30 PM
Schultz Cultural Arts Hall
$22 Ticket and book
$15 General Public (ticket only) | $12 Members and J-Pass holders (ticket only)
Contact: Ilanit Gal | (650) 223-8649 | [email protected]
Reviews of Here I Am:
"Funny scenes and characters leaven the melancholy of
Here I Am, as it chronicles the way small problems in a marriage can amass until they devastate . . . Foer, who first won readers over with youthful exuberance, now proves he can write just as well about growing older.
Here I Am is a stunner of a family saga." — Jenny Shank,
Dallas Morning News
"Brilliant . . . The book ends on a sorrowful and deeply poignant scene, but even the moments of pain and loss do not diminish the vital spirit, so authentically Jewish, that is the real glory of
Here I Am." — Jonathan Kirsch,
Jewish Journal
"A substantial, engaging novel, full of suspense, searching and humor, calling upon its readers, in turn, to locate themselves with respect to the intimate portrait it draws of families responding to personal and political crises." — John Goldbach,
The Toronto Globe and Mail
"[
Here I Am is] an ambitious platter of intellection and emotion. Its observations are crisp; its intimations of doom resonate; its jokes are funny.
Here I Am consistently lit up my pleasure centers . . . This is also Mr. Foer's best and most caustic novel, filled with so much pain and regret that your heart sometimes struggles to hold it all . . . This book offers intensities on every page. Once put down it begs . . . to be picked back up . . .
Here I Am has more teeming life in it than several hundred well-meaning and well-reviewed books of midlist fiction put together." — Dwight Garner,
The New York Times