A Day of Small Beginnings (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9780316014519)

Poland, 1906: on a cold spring night, in the small Jewish cemetery of Zokof, Friedl Alterman is wakened from death. On the ground above her crouches Itzik Leiber, a reclusive, unbelieving fourteen-year-old whose fatal mistake has spurred the town's angry residents to violence. The childless Friedl rises to guide him to safety -- only to find she cannot go back to her grave. Now Friedl is trapped in that thin world between life and death, her brash decision binding her forever to Itzik and his family: she is fated to be forever restless, and he, forever haunted by the ghosts of his past.

Years later, after Itzik himself has gone to his grave, his son, Nathan, knows nothing of his bitter father's childhood. When he begrudgingly goes to Poland on business, Nathan decides on a whim to visit his ancestral town. There, in Zokof, he meets the mysterious Rafael, the town's last remaining Jew, who promises to pass on all the things Itzik had failed to teach his son - about Zokof, about his faith, and about himself.

Author: Lisa Pearl Rosenbaum
ISBN-10: 0316014516
ISBN-13: 9780316014519
Publisher: Little Brown and Company
Language: English
Published: 11/01/2006
Pages: 384
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.33lbs
Size: 9.42h x 6.26w x 1.29d

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 08/21/2006 pg. 46
Kirkus Reviews 09/01/2006 pg. 871
Library Journal 10/01/2006 pg. 59
Booklist 10/01/2006 pg. 38