Promised Lands - 9781584659204

"That more than a score of writers---seasoned veterans and relative newcomers to the literary scene---have produced a volume of short stories struggling and playing with the themes of Jewishness in America at the beginning of the twenty-first century speaks loudly about the salience and resilience of `being Jewish.' In a complicated descant, these writers demonstrate the enduring mystery and power of the jewish tradition in a post-modern world." Hasia R. Diner, New York University

"Irving Howe was wrong: The Jewish-American writer didn't disappear after the post-immigrant generation but has become restless, multifaceted, and probing. Perhaps literature itself is now under threat but even that isn't a deterrent: To tell a story, and to tell it well, is proof of durability." Ilan Stavans, author of On Borrowed Words: A Memoir of Language

This vibrant anthology showcases new, unpublished short stories by a rapidly growing crop of highly talented young Jewish American fiction writers. Cohering around the core Jewish theme of the Promised Land, all the stories were written especially for this volume. With the kind of depth and imagination that only fiction allows, they offer striking variations on the multivalent theme of the Promised Land and how it continues to shape the collective consciousness of contemporary American Jews. This anthology provides a rich reading experience and a unique window onto Jewish American life and culture at the beginning of the twenty-first century.