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The Frozen Rabbi

3.11 of 5 stars 3.11 · rating details · 464 ratings · 156 reviews

Award-winning novelist Steve Stern’s exhilarating epic recounts the story of how a nineteenth-century rabbi from a small Polish town ends up in a basement freezer in a suburban Memphis home at the end of the twentieth century. What happens when an impressionable teenage boy inadvertently thaws out the ancient man and brings him back to life is nothing short of miraculous....more

Paperback, 400 pages

Published June 14th 2011 by Algonquin Books (first published May 11th 2010)

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Jul 01, 2010 Felice rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The oldest thing I have in my freezer right now is a 48 count pack of fish sticks I bought in 2007. In the intervening 3 years I have purchased and consumed other fish sticks. I'm not sure why the catch of whatever day it was in 2007 is still in my freezer awaiting an archaeological expedition to make it to the oven. Maybe I just like knowing they are there at the ready? They have survived numerous minor power outages and 2 outages that lasted more than 3 hours. I have to say I'm a little proud...more The oldest thing I have in my freezer right now is a 48 count pack of fish sticks I bought in 2007. In the intervening 3 years I have purchased and consumed other fish sticks. I'm not sure why the catch of whatever day it was in 2007 is still in my freezer awaiting an archaeological expedition to make it to the oven. Maybe I just like knowing they are there at the ready? They have survived numerous minor power outages and 2 outages that lasted more than 3 hours. I have to say I'm a little proud of them.

However, I would trade them in for one Frozen Rabbi. It sounds like a drink doesn't it? "I'll have the Frozen Rabbi, shaken not stirred" and nice as that might be a Frozen Rabbi also makes a terrific novel. Ask for a Frozen Rabbi at your local independent bookstore and you will get a novel that you will love not the do-you-have-Prince-Albert-in-a-can kind of response that you might expect thanks to author Steve Stern.

Fifteen year old Bernie Karp lives with his family in Memphis Tennessee. Everything is all pretty typical. Then one day when Bernie's looking for some food out from the fridge comes a frozen old dude. Go figure. Young Bernie Karp finds the frozen Rabbi in his parents' basement freezer. The Ice Age began generations ago for Rabbi Eliezer ben Zephyr when he was accidentally frozen while meditating and was presumed dead by his colleauges. Later he was found in-cased in a block of ice by a Polish laborer and has been in that family's care ever since. Their own lost Ark of the Covenant to keep and preserve. The Rab-sicle has been a deaf, dumb and blind family burden through the worst the 20th century had to offer for Jews. He has been protected by the family until he defrosts one day in Memphis in 1999.

The big thaw makes young Bernie a bit of a mystic. He has out of body experiences, becomes a seeker of knowledge and has hundreds of questions for the Rabbi. The Rabbi on the other hand becomes more secular and more convinced that America is a paradise every day. The Rabbi bites into every indulgence that contemporary life has to offer. Of course he attracts flocks of followers and his New House of Enlightenment is an immediate successful.

Telling me that a book is funny is the kiss of death. There have been amusing moments in many novels I have read but I have always found that the phrase 'comic novel' is an oxymoron. I have been proved wrong. Steve Stern can write funny. There is funny end to end in The Frozen Rabbi. Everything from slapstick to sarcasm. There is also an outstanding novel in there. From the historical elements surrounding the Rabbi's travels in his ice cube disguise to Stern's dovetailing Bernie's new spirituality into the Rabbi's hedonism. The Frozen Rabbi is waiting to make you laugh so stop waisting time and go get him already.

It all makes me wonder what Walt Disney will do when he gets thawed out.(less)

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Jan 07, 2011 Xirxe rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: bookcrossing, humor, familie, historisches

Schon die erste Seite stimmt darauf ein, was einen mit diesem Buch erwartet: Bernie, 15jähriger Couchpotatoe, findet auf der Suche in der Tiefkühltruhe nach einem Stück Fleisch zur Selbstbefriedigung, einen tiefgefrorenen alten Mann in einem Eisblock. Durch einen Stromausfall unabsichtlich zum Leben erweckt, entpuppt sich der knapp 200 Jahre alte Rabbi als ein überaus geschäftstüchtiger Unternehmer, der sich darauf versteht, die Suche der Menschen nach Glück mit einigem Geschick in klingende Mün...more

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Apr 04, 2013 GiNa rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

With his novel, Steve Stern takes us on a journey through the history of Jewish diaspora. In the 19th century, a Hasidic rabbi is (literally) turning into a block of ice during his meditating in a pond nearby a progrom-ridden shtetl in Poland, found later and being passed down in the Karp family over generations. Until 2002, the rabbi travels from his place of origin to the ghetto in Lodz, to the Lower East Side of Manhattan and finally to Memphis, where he is being defrosted during a blackout,...more

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Mar 03, 2013 Aaron Brame rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Frozen Rabbi is a hilarious, sprawling story of a rabbi who becomes literally frozen in an Eastern European pond in 1889. The novel then concerns itself with two entwined stories--first, the rabbi's long journey across the continent and century until it lands in suburban Memphis, and, secondly, the tale of his thaw and ascendancy as a new-age guru and entrepreneur. Mixed in somewhere is the character of Bernie Karp, the overweight suburbanite who finds him in his father's basement freezer, a...more

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Jan 17, 2013 Miles rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Frozen Rabbi, or as I found myself calling it several times a day, "Der Frozener Rebbe", is a great American Jewish story. We might say that the author's subject is the holy and the profane. In the course of this novel there is no doubt that every mystical and divine and folklorish reality is, and is not, utterly real, and that every profanity and lustful desire is, and is not, the ultimate truth. Steve Stern plays with our minds, making the reader believe, mocking his or her belief, making...more The Frozen Rabbi, or as I found myself calling it several times a day, "Der Frozener Rebbe", is a great American Jewish story. We might say that the author's subject is the holy and the profane. In the course of this novel there is no doubt that every mystical and divine and folklorish reality is, and is not, utterly real, and that every profanity and lustful desire is, and is not, the ultimate truth. Steve Stern plays with our minds, making the reader believe, mocking his or her belief, making the reader lust, mocking his or her lust, and searching all the while for the point where ultimate being and ultimate earthliness meet in joyful nothingness and oblivion.

Stern draws on a full pallet of Eastern European and Lower East Side cultural references, Jewish mysticism, and Memphis, Tennessee lore to paint a picture of astonishing feeling, velocity and depth. Thugs, low lifes, cheats and whores - all there. Lies, robbery, rape and murder - all there. The gender ambiguous, and the abused, and the deluding and the deluded and the simple miscanim (the pathetic ones), all trapped in the helpless physicality of life in a body, are woven into the fabric of the tale. If there is a Jewish truth or a Jewish angle on reality that he doesn't apply to some corner of this story, I don't know what it is. Excursions to a kibbutz in the 1930s and a Tennessee State Penitentiary in the 21st century are also handled with a great sense of language and place. He paints with all the colors of Jewish... on a canvas of Elvis.

To relay plot elements of how der Frozener Rebbe (that holy man! that charlatan! that old goat!) came to be ensconced in his block of ice, and preserved from the late 19th century to the early 21st century before thawing out and creating cosmic havoc in Memphis, would be pointless. For that you should read the book. Suffice it to say that there are at least three or four generations of characters who unwind here, and in the telling we experience an intense cultural authenticity (manner of expression, details of daily life), all in service of a much bigger, funnier and weirder tale than any of the individual lives alone. For readers who don't know much about various aspects of Jewish culture, I felt that this book does a marvelous job of explaining what it is talking about without being the least bit didactic about it. For those who are Jewishly familiar, I think you will be impressed with how well the author tells this vernacular American story, this Memphis Tennessee story, with an informed Jewish voice. Stern's similarity to Eastern Europeans like Isaac Bashevis Singer or Chaim Grade is easy to see, but he inhabits an American Jewish cultural position with a persuasive indigeneous authenticity. (Persuasive indigenous authenticity? Is that even a thing? Der Frozener Rebbe would surely permit it!)

I wouldn't say that this story has a didactic point, or even any point at all. Like the Rebbe perhaps it points beyond itself. Perhaps laughter is its mystical potion. Perhaps it exists to enable us to experience the joy of being alive, even when being alive hurts.

Read, read, read this book. Transmigrate your souls. Let the heavens and earth be joined in holy fleshly union.(less)

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Nov 17, 2012 Marlee Pinsker rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I started reading this book because a very well read friend of mine said she liked it. It made me predisposed to like the book and I did enjoy the book. I got into one plot and then the other.

Steve Stern writes of a cemetery whose tombstones "appeared to be marching lemminglike downhill toward the Interstate". Then the rabbi suggests that the person being buried was well out of this life, since God seems to be using this world as if it were a bedpan. The crowd is startled by this and wondered if...more

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Sep 17, 2012 Elaine added it · review of another edition

I disliked this book with a passion and I recommend it to no one. In a nutshell, teenage boy finds frozen rabbi in family freezer, Rabbi from a time long ago, family knew of Rabbi, boy defrosts the rabbi. The book covers, through alternating chapters, the rabbis travels from "Out of body" experiences that resulted in his freezing near a river almost 200+ years ago to his defrost, and the boy's story of coming of age. In the present, the boy thinks the Rabbi will be, well, a Rabbi to him, but ins...more

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Jul 23, 2011 Chandler rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Pubescent teenager, Bernie Karp, is searching his family's deep freeze Kelvinator for frozen liver and finds an 18th century Rabbi preserved perfectly in a block of ice. So begins the story of how this Rabbi impacted Bernie's ancestors and is the jumping point for how this Rabbi will impact Bernie's life.

The chapters in this book alternate between past and present. Overall I enjoyed the chapters that covered the Rabbi's journey from Eastern Europe to present day Memphis, Tennessee over the curre...more

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Mar 05, 2011 rebellyell666 rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Inhalt:

Während ein über Jahrhunderte gefrorener, nun aufgetauter Rabbi sich mit Informationen aus dem Fernsehen in Vorbereitung auf die Neuzeit vollpumpen lässt, geht Bernie Karp seiner Familiengeschichte nach…

Schreib-/Erzählstil:

Gewöhnungsbedürftig. Am Anfang konnte ich noch eine gewisse Situationskomik ausmachen, die aber zunehmend verflog. Die Unterteilungen der einzelnen Jahresabschnitte machte es zwar einfach, die Handlungsstränge zu unterscheiden, aber da sich Stern beinahe nur in der Verg...more Inhalt:

Während ein über Jahrhunderte gefrorener, nun aufgetauter Rabbi sich mit Informationen aus dem Fernsehen in Vorbereitung auf die Neuzeit vollpumpen lässt, geht Bernie Karp seiner Familiengeschichte nach…

Schreib-/Erzählstil:

Gewöhnungsbedürftig. Am Anfang konnte ich noch eine gewisse Situationskomik ausmachen, die aber zunehmend verflog. Die Unterteilungen der einzelnen Jahresabschnitte machte es zwar einfach, die Handlungsstränge zu unterscheiden, aber da sich Stern beinahe nur in der Vergangenheit aufhält, kommt die Gegenwart zu kurz und bietet so allerlei Abstruses. Die Charaktere werden zwar eingehend gemustert und mit Schilderungen versehen, dennoch bricht keiner richtig zu einem durch.

Meine Meinung:

Haben Sie schon einmal die sprichwörtliche Katze im Sack gekauft? Sie haben vielleicht die Werbung oder Inhalte einer gewissen Sache gehört und möchten sich näher vertraut machen und das Ding vielleicht sogar ins Herz schließen und dann liegt es plötzlich an gewissen Funktionen, dass Sie eben das nicht tun können?
So ging es mir mit Der gefrorene Rabbi. Die Story – keine Frage – sehr gut gewählt. Und auch besser erzählt als dieser Hollywoodfilm (ich glaube mit Eddy Murphy) mit diesem Propheten. Aber es dringt nichts richtig durch. Das Jiddisch wirkt zeitweilig doch sehr verwirrend und keinerlei Übersetzungen kann man finden, um dem Dschungel zu entgehen. Sehr schade – so bleibt Kultur auf der Strecke. Dennoch sind die einzelnen Liebesgeschichten eigentlich sehr schön zu deuten. So schreibt Stern doch im Grunde, dass man auch ohne Äußerlichkeiten Menschen in Herz schließen und lieben kann.
Teilweise wirkt es so, als sei der vermeintlich gefrorene Rabbi nur dazu da, damit Stern einen gewissen Verkaufsschlager am Markt platzieren kann. Aber das mögen nur böse Zungen behaupten.

Fazit:

Ich schwanke. Zwischen sehr guten und interessanten sowie spannenden Passagen, birgt die Story auch reichlich Abstruses und ein – meiner Meinung nach – überflüssiges Ende. Aber auch dieses Buch (sowie der Rabbi) wird seine Anhänger finden.
(less)

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Aug 01, 2011 Stuart rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The Frozen Rabbi is kind of like Tom Robbins for Jews, escapist fiction where the characters don't really matter and it's all about the mood and the whimsy. The use of language is better than Tom Robbins. You can easily skip 30 pages and not miss anything of importance. All in all, I'd give this two and a half stars, two for the absence of anything substantive and three for the fact that it's written far better than most beach reads. Then again, I should knock it down back to two because the Yid...more

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Feb 19, 2012 Chuck Lipsig rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: other-fiction

There are two stories here. One is how the titular rabbi was frozen in a block of ice, during the 19th century, after a storm comes up, while he is meditating outdoors and how this frozen rabbi was passed down through the generations, taken cross the Atlantic, and ended up in Memphis, Tennessee. The other is what happens, when a nebbishy, Jewish teenager finds the frozen rabbi, in the downstairs basement and how subsequently; how the rabbi revives, when a blackout turns the power to the freezer...more

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Feb 10, 2011 Randi Reisfeld rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

You don't have to be Jewish to enjoy The Frozen Rabbi -- but it sure would help. Even more if you know a bissel Yiddish, since it's sprinkled liberally throughout. The highly original premise is what drew me: back in the way olden days in Poland, the head rabbi of the shetl goes to meditate near a body of water. He's in an "out of body" experience when the river overflows, drowns him and freezes, leaving the rabbi encased in a block of ice-perpetual preservation. Said block of ice is adopted by...more

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Jul 13, 2010 Aaron Poorman rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: subliminalmaybe

The Karp family are hiding something in their freezer, and it isn't large thick slabs of glorious bacon ; although if certain accounts are to be believed it may taste something like pork. Fifteen year old couch potato Bernie Karp ( the novel's primary protagonist) happens upon his family's heirloom whilst searching for an attractive piece of meat which he intends to put to use in a rather inappropriate manner. Hunger pangs emanating just south of his stomach Bernie comes face to face with a full...more
The Karp family are hiding something in their freezer, and it isn't large thick slabs of glorious bacon ; although if certain accounts are to be believed it may taste something like pork. Fifteen year old couch potato Bernie Karp ( the novel's primary protagonist) happens upon his family's heirloom whilst searching for an attractive piece of meat which he intends to put to use in a rather inappropriate manner. Hunger pangs emanating just south of his stomach Bernie comes face to face with a fully grown man frozen in a block of solid ice.

The next night at the dinner table Bernie mumbles about the 'old man in the meat freezer'. Bernie's father explains "Some people got taxidermied pets in the attic, we got a frozen rabbi in the basement. It's family tradition." The way in which this scene plays out serves as a good example of the kind of comedy Steve Stern is capable of delivering, which he does with some frequency. It's situational and at times ironic . Chapters then alternate between Bernie's story and several of his ancestors whose adventures document the travels of the Rabbi who remains burdensome, yet sacred cargo for five generations. These interludes are quick glimpses at the changing times and the immigrant experience in general, and sometimes more specifically the Jewish experience.

Perplexed Bernie wants to know more about the Rabbi who is supposed to bring good luck - yet the journal of his grandfather, which explains the rabbi's past, is written in Yiddish. Bernie can't make heads or tails of it, until lighting strikes, quite literally. Once again when Bernie is left at home to his own devices fate intervenes. A flash flood hits and the power goes out. When the storm subsides Bernie is startled by a noise from the basement. He goes to investigate and finds the Rabbi , fully-thawed, half-naked, and inexplicably alive.

Initially worried about his parents' reaction Bernie hides the Rabbi in the family rec room. A place his parents never bother to venture. The two begin to tutor each other in their respective languages. With little else to do the Rabbi also gets a crash course in modern times and American society by watching television. An education which proves to have profound effect on the holy man's faith and philosophy. Bernie too undergoes a significant transformation. He begins having out-of-body experiences which are at first alarming but ultimately euphoric for the young boy. The new studious nature with which Bernie adopts in imitation of his mentor has drastic physical consequence as well. The formerly chubby cheeked layabout begins to lose weight and pimples. This garners suspicion from his parents, but also attracts the attention of a girl – Lou Ella, who is intrigued by his spiritual episodes and believes she can help trigger them. This story of young love is paralleled again and again within the history of the Karp family. The previously mentioned chapters show a cycle of ascendancy, fall, and redemption. These chapters are engaging if brief. Still Bernie and the thawed Rabbi's story remains the central plot.

Parts of this book feel like a classic coming of age novel, and in some ways it may be – only on a larger more expansive scale than the one most first consider. Stern's breadth of imagination is impressive throughout. It's a whimsical take on Yiddish folklore which rightly draws comparison to Micheal Chabon. Stern's 2005 effort The Angel of Forgetfulness won the National Jewish Book Award which is now on my to-read list. This story poses questions of fate, faith, discovery, and heritage. The Frozen Rabbi is easily one of the most surprising books I've read this year.

* Review with musical accompaniment can been read & heard on my new blog. http://subliminalmaybe.blogspot.com (less)

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Jan 16, 2013 Amelia rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: adult-fiction, sci-fi

Amazon has never steered me wrong before, until now. And it's not to say that I hated this book, because I didn't. I just had a hard time getting along with it. I kept thinking I should put it down for good and read something else. While the characters are interesting, the plot leaves a lot to be desired. It's like molasses running uphill in the middle of January in New England. The Frozen Rabbi could have been a lot shorter and a lot better. And there are some plot points (that I won't mention...more

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Jan 25, 2012 Scott Singer rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I bought this book on a whim because it sounded like Encino Man had Brendan Frasier played a Polish Rabbi. That aspect is here in the book, but I would really split the plot into two separate stories: how a young boy changes once he unfreezes the titular rabbi, and the family history of the boy's ancestors centered around the rabbi in a block of ice.

In truth, I found the family history part more compelling than the modern half. The events that befall this family from generation to generation pai...more

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Aug 07, 2010 Neco Turkienicz rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I began reading and was fascinated by the book very quickly. The story, the Jewish background, the Yiddish, all of it. The language was a bit challenging for me, english not being my mother tongue, but Stern's style kept me hooked almost until the end. I would really give five stars to this book if it wasn't for the ending. It felt to me as if Stern didn't know how to end the story, as if he was building up to something he couldn't define as he started writing. So he decided to trash it all, to...more

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Feb 11, 2011 Sherry rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2011

This book started out slowly. It wasn't until page 130 that I was completely engaged and reading became effortless. I found the ending disappointing. However, the middle of the book was very good. The story goes back and forth between the turn of the 20th century and the turn of the 21st century. A rabbi, frozen in deep meditation, is carted by a family to the new world where he remains in suspended animation until he is thawed by young Bernie Karp whose jewish family migrates to Memphis Tenness...more

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Jan 06, 2013 Adina rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Usually I love Jewish fiction with intertwining stories and lots of Biblical and mystical allusions, so I thought this book would be right up my alley. It was not, and here is why:

-Firstly, there was too much pointless Yiddish thrown around – and this is coming from someone who understood most of it. I can’t imagine how I would have felt if I hadn't had any grasp of the language.
-The stories were a little too long and dragged out. I think it could have benefited by being edited down.
-Finally, th...more

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Mar 23, 2013 Jeffrey rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: book-club, general-reading

This is a totally meshugeneh book! I thought I might get some words of wisdom from the Frozen Rabbi. Instead, all I got was tsuris. His family is a bunch of shmegeggis, shnorrers, and schlemiels. It's a wonder he stayed alive as long as he did, frozen or not, with this bunch to look after him. And words of wisdom: you shouldn't hold your breath. While the whole book is painted with broad strokes, the scenes of NYC in the early 20th century had vibrant color and a hint of realism that the rest of...more

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Dec 19, 2012 Stephanie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I had made up my mind before I started reading this book to disliked it, but once I started reading I found it to be very interesting. It was a book club selection and that is what I like most about being in a book club it broadens your horizens. Story is very interesting the rabbi frozen ages ago, to be thawed in this generation. It doesn't take the rabbi long to figure out this world and you have to wonder why it is so easy for a man of faith to be consumed not with salvation but profit. The s...more

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Dec 07, 2011 Dmehringer rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

ZERO STARS
Intrigued by the title, repulsed by the story. A rabbi is meditating in 1800's Poland, goes into a trance while at a lake, doesn't wake up, is frozen in the ice, removed by a family, and kept frozen and protected by that family for over 100 years. I like multi-generational stories, but this is ridiculous. The rabbi (in his zinc lined casket so he doesn't melt) is brought to America, kept in a Kelvinator freezer, and then one day the Rabbi melts and is once again alive. The family which...more

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May 30, 2011 Tim Hicks rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

That was just plain enjoyment. You'll laugh, you'll cry ... This is a densely-written book that rewards you for paying attention; don't take a month to read it.
If you don't know any Yiddish, go read something else first, maybe some old MAD magazines or another author - but you won't need much, and most of the terms are spelled out or obvious in context. There are plenty of interesting characters of the "put them together and stand back to watch" kind. Your willingness to suspend disbelief will...more

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Aug 02, 2012 Susan rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The two protagonists of this picaresque novel are Bernie Karp, a lumpy teenager, and Eliezer ben Zephyr, the rabbi he discovers in a block of ice in the family freezer. After the rabbi defrosts as a consequence of a power outage, the story bifurcates. One branch tells how the 19th century rabbi came to end up in his block of ice in Memphis, Tennesee. The other follows the adventures of Bernie and the rabbi as he encounters the 20th century capitalist version of religion. Unfortunately, I found B...more

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Mar 26, 2013 Danielle rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I picked up this book because I have two good friends who enjoyed it, so I wonder if my disappointment in this book was merely due to high expectations. That having been said, I really felt like Stern was trying to juggle more than he could handle. I can envision a world in which this book was written by a more skilled author, and that is a book I would love to read. However, the book that I had in front of me did not resonate emotionally in the way it seemed to want to. There are two plots, one...more I picked up this book because I have two good friends who enjoyed it, so I wonder if my disappointment in this book was merely due to high expectations. That having been said, I really felt like Stern was trying to juggle more than he could handle. I can envision a world in which this book was written by a more skilled author, and that is a book I would love to read. However, the book that I had in front of me did not resonate emotionally in the way it seemed to want to. There are two plots, one in the present where the frozen rabbi of the title wakes up, and then one in the past that tracks the course of the rabbi through generations of the same family. It is the story of the Jews told through a block of ice (ice is a huge motif) and the story of the state of modern Judaism. I usually eat this kind of stuff up. EAT IT UP. I think my problem here was really just Stern's writing style. In the past especially he draws upon a few different literary traditions, uses overblown, flowery language combined with yiddish and informal sentences...to humorous effect? Maybe? I found that in writing as if he is telling an old tale Stern created exactly that effect in me: I felt like I was just reading an old tale whose characters were unreal, never existed, and therefore were not worth empathizing with. I literally did not care about the characters in the past, and therefore found myself not caring about the history of Jewish struggle as a whole. I have never felt so distanced from the suffering of my ancestors, which usually is a topic I feel deeply about. It wasn't until very late in the book, when the past had almost caught up to the present, that I felt anything at all. Stern also enjoys avoiding narrating actual action, preferring to simply pass over weeks or months with a few sentences. I remember at one point he wrote a paragraph that to me basically sounded like, "And then all this cool stuff happened but I'm not going to really go into it because you might be too interested and we have to get through this narrative nonsense so I can finally make it to my point." Thanks, buddy. (less)

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Jul 28, 2010 Erik Simon rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Wow. Just, wow. It's been some time since I've read a contemporary novel this incredible, this magical, this deeply satisfying. Early on, I almost put it down a couple of times, but for some nebulous reason I pushed on, and it soon swept me away.

Sometimes, funny novels do little more than be funny; they don't really go anywhere, and the joy they bring is very limited. For me, CONFEDERACY OF DUNCES was just such a book. But other times, funny novels move into unexpected deeper directions and off...more

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Dec 11, 2011 David Green rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I choose this book simply on it's unique title and interesting cover. A fascinating read. The story covers many generations of a Jewish family and does an excellent job of immersing you in the culture and locales of the jews as they move through 1880s Poland/Russia, 1920's Lower East Side, 1940's Palestine and finally Memphis, Tennessee. While Stern is terrific at developing fleshed out characters, his erudite use of language is a real challenge. I wish I had not just an English dictionary at my...more

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Apr 21, 2011 Daphnar rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Magic realism from the vein of Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer. Since there was less symbolism and it was a less dense book, I thought I was following (unlike Everything is Illuminated in which I was totally lost) the alternating chapters of the history of a frozen rabbi with mystical powers (and how he got that way) with the modern day chapters of what happens once he thaws. I didn't think the book delivered a strong enough commentary on modernity. Also, the actions of the cha...more

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May 19, 2013 Bree Hooker rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I feel ridiculous rating this lower than Tyra Banks' delightfully terrible novel. The Frozen Rabbi walks a fine line between literary aspiration and engaging plot, and I loooooooved most of it. Stern's writing voice is wonderful, the interlocking storylines are complex enough yet fit together cleanly, and it was often hilarious. Then the ending happened. Had I just skipped the last 40-50 pages, this book and I could've continued our affair indefinitely. Seriously, where was the editor? The tone...more I feel ridiculous rating this lower than Tyra Banks' delightfully terrible novel. The Frozen Rabbi walks a fine line between literary aspiration and engaging plot, and I loooooooved most of it. Stern's writing voice is wonderful, the interlocking storylines are complex enough yet fit together cleanly, and it was often hilarious. Then the ending happened. Had I just skipped the last 40-50 pages, this book and I could've continued our affair indefinitely. Seriously, where was the editor? The tone changes abruptly, the story drags, characters quit acting like themselves and start acting spectacularly stupid. Even then, the good parts overwhelmed the mediocre, until the very final page.

The awful ending brought my other irritation to a head: the female characters just aren't players. This novel absolutely doesn't pass the Bechdel movie test. Most authors struggle with the inner lives of their opposite-gendered characters, and often it's a failure that I can let slide. But the men here are so complex and human and lovable for their flaws, whereas the women are entirely defined by their male relationships. They are mothers, wives, or sisters, and they are all completely adrift when separated from their man. If he'd stuck with only giving us the perspectives of the men, it could have been okay, because then I could pretend that they had vast aspects of their lives that we just never saw. But no. They all willfully have their identities subsumed by a chosen man. Plus there are nearly as many dead mothers as in a Disney movie. The final thing that really pissed me off: at least three of the "main" (as in, appearing on more than two pages) women are victims of rape, and it isn't handled well at all, and those that willingly touch penises are slut shamed. Again, if all the men had such major sexual hangups this would bother me less, but several of the men are quite promiscuous.

I don't want to sound overly negative. The good here does outweigh the bad. It's just that the good parts set the quality bar so incredibly high that the bad parts are extra disappointing. With a more critical editor this would have easily been my favorite book of the year so far.(less)

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Jan 27, 2013 Gwen rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

As the story jumped between the origins of the frozen rabbi (c. 1890) and Bernie Karp (c. 1999), I alternated in which story I found more interesting. Both stories were absorbing, the former from a historical perspective -- major moments in Jewish history -- were quite engaging, including some unanticipated ones, while the latter was about personal growth and development in surprising ways. Relationships take center stage as we follow different characters, and most of them are believable. The pr...more

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Jan 23, 2013 Linda rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I still can not figure out why I bothered to finish this book. It was truly awful. Every character was horrible without a single redeeming characteristic. I am fairly certain the author wanted to make some sort of lofty point, but after reading the entire book, I can't figure out what that could be. The flashback/flash-forward storytelling wasn't too bad, but it didn't flow in any way that made sense. Another thing, if you don't have a fluent Yiddish vocabulary, you will miss a lot, because appa...more

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About Steve Stern

Stern was born in Memphis, Tennessee in 1947, the son of a grocer. He left Memphis in the 1960s to attend college, then to travel the US and Europe — living, as he told one interviewer, "the wayward life of my generation for about a decade," and ending on a hippie commune in the Ozarks. He went on to study writing in the graduate program at the University of Arkansas, at a time when it included se...more Stern was born in Memphis, Tennessee in 1947, the son of a grocer. He left Memphis in the 1960s to attend college, then to travel the US and Europe — living, as he told one interviewer, "the wayward life of my generation for about a decade," and ending on a hippie commune in the Ozarks. He went on to study writing in the graduate program at the University of Arkansas, at a time when it included several notable writers who've since become prominent, including poet C.D. Wright and fiction writers Ellen Gilchrist, Lewis Nordan, Lee K. Abbott and Jack Butler.

Stern subsequently moved to London, England, before returning to Memphis in his thirties to accept a job at a local folklore center. There he learned about the city's old Jewish ghetto, The Pinch, and began to steep himself in Yiddish folklore. He published his first book, the story collection Isaac and the Undertaker's Daughter, which was based in The Pinch, in 1983. It won the Pushcart Writers' Choice Award and acclaim from some notable critics, including Susan Sontag, who praised the book's "brio ... whiplash sentences ... energy and charm," and observed that "Steve Stern may be a late practitioner of the genre [Yiddish folklore], but he is an expert one."

By decade's end Stern had won the O. Henry Award, two Pushcart Prize awards, published more collections, including Lazar Malkin Enters Heaven (which won the Edward Lewis Wallant Award for Jewish American Fiction) and the novel Harry Kaplan's Adventures Underground, and was being hailed by critics such as Cynthia Ozick as the successor to Isaac Bashevis Singer. Stern's 2000 collection The Wedding Jester won the National Jewish Book Award, and his novel The Angel of Forgetfulness was named one of the best books of 2005 by The Washington Post.

Stern, who teaches at Skidmore College, has also won some notable scholarly awards, including fellowships from the Fulbright and the Guggenheim foundations. He currently lives in Ballston Spa, New York, and his latest work, the novel The Frozen Rabbi, was published in 2010.

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