Bloodlines – Recovering Hitler’s Nuremberg Laws, from Patton’s Trophy to Public Memorial

By Anthony Platt

The physical typescript of the Nuremberg Laws – from their discovery by two Jewish American soldiers in Eichstätt, Germany, in 1945 to their first public exhibition in 1999 at the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles – is the focus of Anthony Platt’s riveting book, Bloodlines.

Platt, a professor emeritus at California State University, Sacramento, was on sabbatical with his partner and co-author Cecelia O’Leary doing research at the Huntington Library in 1999.

His curiosity was aroused by the controversy stirred by the Huntington’s announcement that it was loaning an original copy of the Nuremberg Laws to the new Skirball Cultural Center. Received by the library from Gen. George S. Patton, Jr., in June 1945, the documents had been out of sight in the Huntington’s vault 54 years.

Three Floors Up

by Eshkol Nevo; translated from Hebrew by Sondra Silverston

As its title suggests, this book tells three stories taking place on different floors of the same apartment building in a Tel Aviv suburb.

While these neighbors see each other in passing, leaving the ATM, or through shutters being closed, there's little direct interaction. The plots of the stories don't intermingle.

Arnon Levanoni, his wife Ayelet and their daughters Ofri and Yaeli live on the first floor across the hall from Ruth and Herman, an elderly German couple. Hani Gat lives on the second floor with her daughter Lyri and her son Nimrod. Her husband Asaf is away so often on business that the neighbors secretly nickname her "the Widow." Devora Edelman, who lives on the third floor, actually is a widow. She and her husband Michael were judges before they retired. She hasn't seen her troubled son Adar for years, ever since he turned his back on his family, after a tragic accident.

The Book Smugglers: Partisans, Poets and the Race to Save Jewish Treasures from the Nazis

by David Fishman

This is story is as exciting as a spy thriller. But instead of smuggling information across enemy lines, this tale is about how dedicated band of scholars, writers and teachers in the Vilna Ghetto who saved priceless books, letters, artwork, Torah scrolls and Judaica from destruction by the Nazis.

Among the treasurers they saved were the record book of the Vilna Gaon's kloyz (house of prayer) covering events from 1768 to 1924; early chapters of Zionist Theodor Herzl's diary; letters and manuscripts by writers Leo Tolstoy, Maxim Gorky, Sholem Aleichem and poet Hayim Bialik; a drawing by Marc Chagall; and sculptures by Ilya Gintsburg.

Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love

by Dani Shapiro

Based on a DNA test she took because of her husband's interest in genealogy, Dani Shapiro discovered the man she grew up believing was her father actually wasn't.

This book is the telling of her search for answers: How did this  happen? Why did her parents never tell her? Who is her biological father? Who is she now that everything she believed has changed?

With both parents dead, she can no longer get answers directly. She instead dissects memories,  slowly making connections. She realizes why she never felt like she belonged in her family, with blond hair and blue eyes that were so unlike her relatives.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union

By Michael Chabon

If Raymond Chandler had sat down with Isaac Bashevis Singer over a bottle of schnapps, they might have produced The Yiddish Policeman’s Union.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union combines a noir murder mystery with Jewish messianic beliefs in a “what if . . . “ context that springs from an actual historical fact.

Chabon’s starting point is the 1940 Slattery Report that recommended that Alaska be used for temporarily resettling European Jews fleeing the Nazis. Ultimately, Alaska Territory Delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives Anthony J. Dimond prevented a vote on the Slattery recommendation from ever taking place.