Book Review: “The Golem of Brooklyn” by Adam Mansbach

When I was in my first year as an undergraduate at Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada, I took an introductory Canadian history course (which I aced — I got the only A+ I ever received for an overall subject in school in that class). I was speaking in the class’s auditorium one day, asking a question of the professor perhaps, when I referred to Jewish peoples as “the Jews.” I had meant nothing by it, but my Jewish Teaching Assistant then rebuked me in front of the class, insinuating that I had made an anti-Semite slur. I have not forgotten that lesson, and I try to refer to those who are of this race and religion as “the Jewish people.” You can imagine my slight surprise that a publisher would approach me to give a fair and honest review of Adam Mansbach’s The Golem of Brooklyn. This is a very Jewish book, as it is also a very American one, and I had to wonder if I’m the most qualified to write about it given my position as a white, Anglo-Saxon Canadian Christian who knows not enough of the Jewish culture and way of life in the U.S.  <a href="https://zachary-houle.medium.com/book-review-the-golem-of-brooklyn-by-adam-mansbach-2f63c11cbaaf">Website</a>