The Book of Life: Jewish Kidlit (Mostly)

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I recently heard a piece on NPR about the little jars that hold yarhzeit memorial candles, and how some people repurpose these glasses to hold juice or to use as cookie cutters. It was an interesting look at how death is treated as a part of life in the Jewish tradition. That concept is very beautifully conveyed by the two picture books we'll be talking about in this episode. My guests are Alison Goldberg, author of The Remembering Candle, and Richard Ho, author of A Flame Burns On. <...

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Argentine author Ana María Shua has written over 100 books and is super famous in Latin America but The Passover Pet Surprise is her first Jewish children's book. As you'd expect from such an accomplished writer, it's a well told, heartwarming story with a hint of ambiguity, which works well during a holiday where we are commanded both to retell and to inquire!

SHOW NOTES:

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If you enjoy a good heist story, here's one with a lot of heart. Trouble Finds Evie Lefkowitz is a middle grade novel about a Jewish girl who gets into good trouble in order to right a wrong. Banding together with friends and frenemies helps her expand her thinking and bring more generosity into the world. 

SHOW NOTES: 

CR...

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If you've ever read books to a baby or toddler, you're familiar with board books, those small sturdy books with stiff cardboard pages that can withstand drool and rough handling. But just because these books are designed for babies doesn't mean they are baby-ish. Suzy Ultman's deceptively simple storytelling in board book format has brought about a historic moment. For the first time ever, a board book has won a Sydney Taylor Book Award.

Among the four Jewish board books Suzy has created so far, the...

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Welcome to the 17th annual Sydney Taylor Book Award Blog Tour, taking place February 9-12, 2026. I am participating in the Blog Tour by interviewing Caroline Kusin Pritchard and Selina Alko, author and illustrator of The Keeper of Stories, which was a Sydney Taylor Honor Book in the Picture Book category.

SHOW NOTES:

Here's the schedule for the 2026 Blog Tour

Here's the archive of all past blog tours, beginning in 2009

Selina Alko's website and Instagram<...

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The winners of the 2026 Sydney Taylor Book Awards, recognizing the best Jewish children's and young adult literature of the year, were announced on January 26, 2026 at the American Library Association's Youth Media Awards event. Melanie Koss is the current chair of the Sydney Taylor Book Award committee, and she joined me on the podcast to discuss the 2026 winners of the award.

Sydney Taylor Book Awards

The Sydney Taylor Portal

ALA's YouTube channel, where you can watch a recording of the announcement<...

TRANSCRIPT:

Hello! This is Heidi Rabinowitz, your host at The Book of Life Podcast, and I have some news to share.

A year ago I started a Substack newsletter for The Book of Life Podcast to celebrate the show's 20th anniversary. The free Substack posts include podcast episodes, show notes, transcripts, Jewish kidlit news, and calls to action. 

A number of listeners have very kindly pledged to upgrade to paid subscriptions to support the show. I am now turning on paid subscriptions, and I'm starting a new bonus segment on The B...

SHOW NOTES & TRANSCRIPT: https://open.substack.com/pub/bookoflifepodcast/p/podcast-20th-anniversary-retrospective?r=16b2w9&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true 

It's The Book of Life's 20th Anniversary! In celebration, here's a super deluxe retrospective episode, with short clips from every year of the podcast. We'll start with this anniversary year, 2025, and then move back through time to 2005.

HANUKKAH TREATS: 

LEARN MORE: 

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/12/a-hanukkah-classic-crossover-with-fuse.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/2QqWmvmeK1xGjP9AmSJelGqNVCg?utm_source=copy_url

Fuse 8 n' Kate is a weekly podcast hosted by School Library Journal, in which super-librarian Betsy Bird and her sister Kate evaluate 20+ year old picture books to decide whether they should be considered classics. Since The Book of Life is 20 years old (and hopefully a classic), I asked Betsy and Kate to collaborate on a Hanukkah episode! We did a joint episode that will appear on both our feeds, interviewed each other, and...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/11/november-throwback-jewish-book-month.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/sEuzJ-GYxRIHREm5DRtY94hYkFI?utm_source=copy_url

Continuing the celebration of my 20th year of podcasting, I've got another archival episode for you from 2006, about Jewish Book Month. In the early days of The Book of Life I usually had multiple guests in each episode, and this one includes four:

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/11/jean-meltzer-queen-of-jewish-joy.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/65Uhjlmyb1QYDBa_KvBpl0TCTyU?utm_source=copy_url

Back in July 2025 I did a brief interview with Jean Meltzer, so she could tell you about Jewish Joy Con, an exciting event coming to Fort Lauderdale, Florida in March 2026. But I promised you a longer interview later - and here it is! Jean talks about her writing, her Jewish Joy Book Club and subscription box, more about the con, and about her newest book, The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah.

...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/10/october-throwback-laurel-snyder-redux.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/eP9KxOhurmOFV6jIhbWPC5jYX8Y?utm_source=copy_url

Continuing the celebration of my 20th year of podcasting, I've got a 2013 archival episode for you with author Laurel Snyder, who at that time was best known for her iconoclastic picture book, Baxter The Pig Who Wanted to Be Kosher. Amazingly, Laurel says that The Book of Life podcast actually impacted her writing! In a 2017 blog article she credited our first podcast conversation as a turning point in her career. She...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/10/one-small-spark-more-than-enough.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/-_ly-iTlaYO1hZfUChOPKsYnXTI?utm_source=copy_url 

If you're a regular Book of Life listener, you know I always ask guests for tikkun olam suggestions about ways to repair the world. Well, that's what this entire episode is about. I've got a pair of Jewish activist picture books for you: One Small Spark: A Tikkun Olam Story by Ruth Spiro, and More Than Enough: Inspired by Maimonides Golden Ladder of Giving by Richard Michelson, a story about tzedakah. These are bot...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/09/september-throwback-sweep-story-of-girl.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://open.substack.com/pub/bookoflifepodcast/p/september-throwback-sweep-the-story?r=16b2w9&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true

To continue with the themes of golems and fighting for justice that we explored in our most recent episode about Kyle Lukoff's A World Worth Saving, AND in honor of my 20th year of podcasting on The Book of Life, I'm bringing you an episode from the archives. It's an interview about the middle grade historical fantasy Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/09/a-world-worth-saving.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/_6lUDoKCnGpaSn-_alokxvSNtEo?utm_source=copy_url

A World Worth Saving by Kyle Lukoff is a queer Jewish fantasy adventure in which a trans boy and an unusual golem must save the world by Yom Kippur! I interviewed Kyle about this new middle grade novel, as well as his seasonally appropriate picture book, I'm Sorry You Got Mad, a wonderful reflection on the art of apology. Shana Tova!

LEARN MORE:

Kyle Lukoff's website

Borrow or Bu...

SHOW NOTES:

TRANSCRIPT:

In honor of my 20th year of podcasting on The Book of Life, I'm bringing you another episode from the archives: Summer Coolness, released in June 2007. The episode featured a now-defunct website called ReaderGirlz, and the website Nextbook that morphed into Tablet Magazine in 2009. There were also many mentions of MySpace. I interviewed Melissa Schorr, author of Goy Crazy, who, according to her website, seems to have mostly moved on from kidlit to journalism. I must say, her most recent book from 2017, Shame Nation: Choosing Kindness and Compassion in an...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/08/the-five-books.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/newZynBRoGzWkdF7PaTnzDLDSP4?utm_source=copy_url

The Five Books is a new literary Jewish podcast hosted by Tali Rosenblatt Cohen in partnership with the Jewish Book Council. I'm very happy to welcome another show to our little corner of the book world, so I invited Tali to do a mutual interview. We interviewed each other, and the episode will appear on both our podcast feeds.

LEARN MORE:

The Five Books Podcast website

Highlights of...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/07/announcement-jewish-joy-con.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/K_DNE5hooD1D-ujpoI2gQUXpsZs?utm_source=copy_url 

LEARN MORE:

Jean Meltzer's website

Jewish Joy LLC (the Jewish Joy Book Club and the Jewish Joy Box)

Jewish Joy Con, March 13-15, 2026 in Ft. Lauderdale, FL

CREDITS:

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/07/july-throwback-inquisitors-tale.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/idZDWVCvKcbXcYPMmx4uUuonYQE?utm_source=copy_url 

As a follow up to my recent interview with Adam Gidwitz about Max in the Land of Lies, and in honor of my 20th year of podcasting on The Book of Life, I'm bringing you an episode from the archives, from January 2017. I met Adam Gidwitz at an author "speed dating" event at the American Library Association conference, where he was promoting his middle grade fantasy The Inquisitor's Tale, which later went on to win...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/07/max-in-land-of-lies.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/4wQEsnmUalkzvYUesd-o7pDjudQ?utm_source=copy_url

Last July, Adam Gidwitz was on the podcast talking about his middle grade Holocaust historical fantasy novel, Max in the House of Spies, and he told us it was part of a duology. Well, now the second book is out, and I think it's even more powerful than the first one.

Max in the Land of Lies continues Max's page-turning, hair raising adventures... AND continues the profound exploration of prejudice that we...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/06/pride-month-throwback-new-queer.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://open.substack.com/pub/bookoflifepodcast/p/pride-month-throwback?r=16b2w9&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true 

In celebration of Pride Month and The Book of Life's 20th year of podcasting, I'm re-releasing an archival episode from June, 2021. It's an interview with Adam Eli, a young activist and author of The New Queer Conscience, a manifesto about how the queer community can use k'lal yisrael as a model for solidarity.

If you enjoy this blast from the past, check out oth...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/06/pride-month-special-gender-binary-is.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/0xdCC0WUSVL8flI0x3kljyCApps?utm_source=copy_url

I don't normally interview an author about a single chapter of a book, but for my friend Lee Wind, I'm making an exception. He's written a fascinating nonfiction book, The Gender Binary Is a Big Lie: Infinite Identities Around the World, and Chapter 2 is about "The Six Genders of Classical Judaism." I just had to learn more.

We also talked about his two new picture books (both featuring 2-dad...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/05/a-special-message-from-heidi-high-low.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/tomHSY9SlPPB1XDOQwsavTXOeUM?utm_source=copy_url 

I'm squeezing in this quick extra episode to share with you my personal response to the shooting at the Capitol Jewish Museum, with calls to action and a message of hope. 

LEARN MORE:

HIGH

LOW

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/05/jahm-throwback-book-of-life-in-america.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/bd9VMkp1cnjgHm9z4cbdq7Usaak?utm_source=copy_url

In celebration of May's Jewish American Heritage Month (aka #JAHM) and The Book of Life's 20th year of podcasting, I'm re-releasing the eighth-ever episode of the show, from July 2006. The theme was "The Book of Life in America."

In the early years of the show, each episode featured multiple guests, and topics ranged beyond books to Jewish music, film, and web. In 23 minutes and 12 seconds, this episode packs...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/05/mendel-mess-up.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/MYzjopAD_3R8aSnpGTydMmKNjv4?utm_source=copy_url

Terry LaBan is an alternative cartoonist, a graphic recorder (we'll talk about what that means later), and now he's written his first graphic novel, called Mendel the Mess Up. I'm going to borrow the description from the starred review in Publishers Weekly. They said "Put Fiddler on the Roof and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum in a blender, add a jigger or two of Seinfeld, and the result...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/04/listen-to-podcast-read-transcript-buy.html 

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/EnXlWNdrqXuQ4V3kzlKGwyqpPWk?utm_source=copy_url 

A Feather, A Pebble, A Shell is a lovely meditation on the natural landscape of Israel, written and illustrated by Miri Leshem-Pelly. Miri's voice is calm and dreamy, and I could hear birds chirping and dogs barking in the background as she spoke. Our conversation was both fun and serious. We talked about art, nature, books, Instagram challenges... and also about the war in Israel and its impact on humans and animals.

...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/04/bonus-passover-interview-next-year-in.html 

Next Year in the White House: Barack Obama's First Presidential Seder, written by Richard Michelson and illustrated by E.B. Lewis, is a nonfiction picture book that gives us the true backstory of how Passover first came to be celebrated in the White House. It's a stunning book; it received starred reviews from Kirkus and Booklist, and was named to the Association of Jewish Libraries' Spring 2025 Holiday Highlights list.

Because this is a true story, I was able to interview one of the "characters" -- Eric Lesser, s...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/03/dara-horns-one-little-goat-passover.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/zU6o8qxtZlvMmyrGuICLUOmimzQ?utm_source=copy_url

Dara Horn is the author of 5 Jewish novels for adults, the provocatively titled nonfiction essay collection People Love Dead Jews, and now a graphic novel for kids: One Little Goat: A Passover Catastrophe. She writes brilliant, insightful articles for The Atlantic and other publications which set my brain on fire when I read them. I recommend you run out and read everything she's ever written. But before you do, listen to this interview!

...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/03/night-owls.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/NeK1Grf7bTzi-TYHpbLocZlEbH4?utm_source=copy_url

Night Owls is an paranormal YA romance adventure about Clara and Molly, two estries who run an art house cinema in the Village in New York City. In case you're wondering, estries are Jewish owl-shifting bread-eating female vampires! This book is my new favorite, and I'm not the only one. This debut novel won gold from the Sydney Taylor Book Award AND the National Jewish Book Award! The story is fun and fast...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/02/finn-and-ezras-bar-mitzvah-time-loop.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/FR6MxDDT0mG1gxfhcfN-6KoLAHA?utm_source=copy_url

Finn & Ezra's Bar Mitzvah Time Loop by Joshua S. Levy is a 2025 Sydney Taylor Honor Book, and I'm thrilled to interview my friend Josh as part of the Sydney Taylor Book Award Blog Tour. February 10-14, 2025, winning authors and illustrators will be interviewed on various blogs, podcasts, and Bookstagram accounts, and of course the interviews will remain available for you to enjoy at any time. Check BookOfLifePodcast.com for links. Be...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/01/the-2025-sydney-taylor-book-awards.html TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/g5yluS6SsAbhu4hkoKy62TZUgac?utm_source=copy_url

The winners of the 2025 Sydney Taylor Book Awards, recognizing the best Jewish children's and young adult literature of the year, were announced on January 27, 2025 at the American Library Association's Youth Media Awards event. Aviva Rosenberg is the current chair of the Sydney Taylor Book Award committee, and she joined us to discuss the 2025 winners of the award.

LEARN MORE:

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/01/one-of-kind-life-of-sydney-taylor.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/pOzW-X6i92Kh4g_Ou-vEKIAGWcM?utm_source=copy_url

Sydney Taylor was the first author to write kids books that served as windows into Jewish life, not just mirrors. Her All-of-a-Kind Family series was game changing. These were the first books about Jewish characters to become popular with readers of all backgrounds, and they are still popular today.

Jo Taylor Marshall, Sydney's daughter, sponsors the Sydney Taylor Book Awards that recognize the best Jewish kidlit each year. And...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2025/01/the-bubbe-of-them-all-kar-ben-publishing.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/K9B8p4G3Nr-quRj9KYrkhRaGZio?utm_source=copy_url

Appropriately, as we kick off this podcast's 20th anniversary year, in this episode we are going to think about change and continuity. We say goodbye to an old friend, Joni Sussman, who is retiring after twenty years of leading the Jewish children's publishing company Kar-Ben. And we'll say hello to a new friend, Fran Greenman-Schmitz, who will be taking up the reins at Kar-Ben. I've been in this business a long time...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/12/cheering-on-jewish-books-hanukkah-gift.html

TRANSCRIPT:  https://otter.ai/u/o0Yx3uuZxPHcUStwWsJbUa7xkmY?utm_source=copy_url 

HANDOUT: https://tinyURL.com/CheeringJewishBooks 

VIDEO WITH SLIDES: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSBTYGDhCl4&t=2s

For Hanukkah 2024, I got you a Jewish Book Advocacy Kit! Let me explain.

My local public library invited me to give an online talk in honor of Jewish Book Month. As I thought about what to say, I remembered great advice from my friend, author Liza Wiemer, about all the...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/12/a-very-december-25th-hanukkah.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/UWPCM0P5Hpt6NgXH36TIfIelswY?utm_source=copy_url

Happy Hanukkah! Christmas and Hanukkah overlap this year, with Hanukkah beginning on December 25, so it's a good time to think about the juxtaposition of these two holidays. Hanukkah is a minor holiday but its proximity to Christmas brings it extra attention. Let's talk about that!

GUESTS:

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/11/jewish-book-month.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/EHJzDppX2El7s3XjfPnLd-PqW4I?utm_source=copy_url

Here's a bonus episode for you, in honor of Jewish Book Month, which is marking its 99th year. 

Arielle Landau, the program coordinator at the Jewish Book Council, joins me to talk about the Council's special campaign to Celebrate Jewish Books, and how YOU can participate!

Watch my Instagram @BookOfLifePodcast and Facebook for daily Jewish Book Month recommendations, November 24-December 24, 2024. In light of the state of the w...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/11/creature-double-feature-part-i-deke.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/9oU8bBDsH32kp0wvR50fWFGLTF0?utm_source=copy_url

For the month of November 2024, we've got a 2-part series, CREATURE DOUBLE FEATURE: ANTISEMITISM AND THE SUPERNATURAL. Our first guest is Deke Moulton, author of Don't Want to Be Your Monster (about Jewish vampires) and Benji Zeb Is a Ravenous Werewolf (about Jewish werewolves).

These middle grade fantasy novels go beyond simple adventures with supernatural heroes. I love how they both delve deeply into the very nature of prejudice...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/11/creature-double-feature-part-ii-emi.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/LlqEguYzidUDn_uqBHgEK5B1QKY?utm_source=copy_url

For the month of November 2024, we've got a 2-part series, CREATURE DOUBLE FEATURE: ANTISEMITISM AND THE SUPERNATURAL. Our guest for Part II is Japanese American Jewish author Emi Watanabe Cohen. Her debut novel was The Lost Ryū (about dragons), and her sophomore novel is Golemcrafters (about golems, of course).

I loved The Lost Ryū so much that I volunteered to review it for The Sydney Taylor Shmooze blog, because I wa...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/10/festive-friends-part-i-teshuvah-and.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/x1-e3vOomTqZOrPvQPzePL4ZOKQ

In honor of this holiday-packed month, I've got a 2-part series for you. I'm calling it Festive Friends, because each episode features a pair of friends talking about books relevant to our fall holidays. Here in Part I, the Festive Friends are Gayle Forman, author of Not Nothing, and Marjorie Ingall, author of Getting to Sorry. While neither of these books are explicitly about Rosh Hashanah or Yom Kippur, they are both about teshuvah, growth, and...

SHOW NOTES: https://jewishbooks.blogspot.com/2024/10/festive-friends-part-ii-asian-jewish.html

TRANSCRIPT: https://otter.ai/u/xKGzqMhNsej4ALLe6F7e2wBfNJg

October 2024 is packed with Jewish holidays, so we've got a 2-part series for you to celebrate: Holiday Friends. In each episode, we hear from a pair of friends about their books that will help us celebrate the Jewish holidays. In Festive Friends Part I we heard from Gayle Forman, author of Not Nothing, and Marjorie Ingall, author of Getting to Sorry.

Here in Festive Friends Part II, we meet Erica Lyons and Christina...