Attenberg Connects With Her Roots

Jami Attenberg, whose debut collection, Instant Love, came out last month, contributes a piece to Nextbook about discovering her Jewish roots, sometimes in the least expected places. Here’s a tidbit:

So off I went to college in Baltimore, where there were plenty of Jews—and I successfully ignored them. In fact, in all the cities I lived in over the years—from DC to Tampa to Seattle—I managed to ignore them, the other Jews, only stopping to think about my own Jewishness when someone else bothered to mention it. At one point I attended a Catholic wedding in San Diego, a wedding so white I was the token minority. Someone actually said to me, “I heard you were Jewish. Say something Jewish!”

Read it all here. And keep checking this site. I have a signed copy of Instant Love that I will be giving away at some point.