Breaking the Silence

This blog was started in honor of a truly terrible book I picked up yesterday at GoodWill for about 1.50 called Jacob's Way. I should have known what I was in for just by looking on the back:

Fleeing a bloody pogrom that threatens their tiny Russian village, Reisa Dimitri and her grandfather Jacob, sail the ocean to a new life in America. They are swiftly embraced by New York's Jewish community. But God has other plans that will call them far from the familiar warmth and ways of their culture.

Sounds ominous.

Accompanied by their huge, gentle friend, Dov, Reisa and Jacob set out to make their living as traveling merchants in the post-Civil-War South. There, as new and unexpected friendships unfold, the aged Jacob searches for answers concerning the nature of the Messiah he has spent a lifetime looking and longing for.

Ah. It's going to be one of those books. Just in case you had any doubts, I checked the inside flap. The author, despite his very Jewy name, "is one of today's best-known Christian novelists, specializing in historical fiction... He lives in Alabama." And the book is published by that most authoritative of Jewish clearinghouses, Zondervan.

Within a few minutes of paging through this treasure, I was laughing out loud and getting odd looks from passersby. I knew I had to have it. Even more, I knew I had to blog about it. This was further reinforced by looking at the Amazon reviews this dreck had picked up. One person claims the book,

teaches a lot about history, in this case the history of Jewish/Russian immigrants to America, and provides an uplifting story that points to God. A lot of the struggles of the main character, Reisa, mirror the struggles many people of other faiths experience when confronted with the truth of Christianity.

Someone else writes,

This wonderful, inspirational book helps Christians like myself understand how Jewish folks view God, allowing one to sense their deep love and repect of God. As the story line shows, Christians can gently lead Jews to Jesus through example.

So not only is this book totally ignorant about the culture it's purporting to write about, it's also apparently meant to be used as a missionary tract. Triple Schmuck Score.

The book is over 400 pages, but given that the quality of writing is close to that of an angsty high schooler, I anticipate it will not take long to get through this. In the meantime I hope to blog it in chapters. Hope you'll come along for the ride.