Join Moriel Rothman-Zecher for the launch of his novel, Sadness is a White Bird (Atria Books/Simon & Schuster, Feb. 2018). In this lyrical and searing debut novel written by a rising literary star, a young man is preparing to serve in the Israeli army while also trying to reconcile his close relationship to two Palestinian siblings with his deeply ingrained loyalties to family and country. Powerful, important, and timely, Sadness Is a White Bird explores one man’s attempts to find a place for himself, discovering in the process a beautiful, against-the-odds love that flickers like a candle in the darkness of a never-ending conflict.
Michael Chabon calls the novel “nuanced, sharp and beautifully written.” Geraldine Brooks says it is “unflinching in its honesty, unyielding in its moral complexity.”
Temple Israel is Gramercy’s community partner for this event.
Moriel Rothman-Zecher is an American-Israeli writer, spoken-word poet, and activist who served jail time for refusing to enlist in the IDF, the subject of a New York Times op-ed he wrote in 2015. Born in Jerusalem and raised in Yellow Springs, Ohio, he graduated from Middlebury College with a degree in Arabic and political science. He moved back to Jerusalem in 2011 and has been involved with a number of groups working to end the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories. A recipient of a 2017 MacDowell Colony Fellowship for Literature, his work has been published in The New York Times, Haaretz, and elsewhere. Moriel now lives in Yellow Springs, Ohio.
