Dreidels on the Brain

ISBN: 0803740972

Author: ben Izzy, Joel

Condition: Used

At last a great American Hanukkah story! This very funny, very touching novel of growing up Jewish has the makings of a holiday classic.One lousy miracle. Is that too much to ask?Evidently so for Joel, as he tries to survive Hannukah, 1971 in the suburbs of the suburbs of Los Angeles (or, as he calls it, The Land of Shriveled Dreams). Thats no small task when youre a seriously funny-looking twelve-year-old magician who dreams of being his own superhero: Normalman. And Joels a long way from that as the only Jew at Bixby School, where his attempts to make himself disappear fail spectacularly. Home is no better, with a family thats not just mortifyingly embarrassing but flat-out broke.Thats why Joels betting everything on these eight nights, to see whether its worth believing in God or miracles or anything at all. Armed with his favorite jokes, some choice Yiddish words, and a suitcase full of magic tricks, hes scrambling to come to terms with the world he lives in-from hospitals to Houdini to the Holocaust-before the last of the candles burns out.No wonder his head is spinning: Hes got dreidels on the brain. And little does he know that whats actually about to happen to him and his family this Hanukkah will be worse than hed feared . . . And better than he could have imagined.