10/9/2024

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge

Eddie Shapiro

“Here's to the Ladies”

Eddie Shapiro’s latest collection of intimate, career-encompassing conversations with yet more of Broadway’s most prolific and fascinating leading women. Full of detailed stories and reflections, his conversations with such luminaries as Barbara Cook, Kelli O’Hara, Heather Headley, Faith Prince, Stephanie J. Block, Tonya Pinkins, and a host of others dig deep into each actor’s career. Together, these chapters tell the story of what it means to be a leading lady on Broadway over the past fifty years.

11/18/2024

6:00 PM

Exeter Community Library

Lynda Cohen Loigman

“The Love Elixir of Augusta Stern”

On the cusp of turning eighty, newly retired pharmacist Augusta Stern is adrift. When she relocates to an active senior community in southern Florida, she unexpectedly crosses paths with Irving Rivkin, the deliv­ery boy from her father’s old phar­ma­cy — and the man who broke her heart a life­time ago.
Back in 1920s Brook­lyn, a teenage Augus­ta finds her­self caught between her father’s trust­ed sci­en­tif­ic for­mu­las and the curi­ous, uncon­ven­tion­al reme­dies pre­pared by her great aunt Esther. In a des­per­ate bid for clar­i­ty about her romance with Irv­ing, Augus­ta impul­sive­ly uses Esther’s most potent elixir with dis­as­trous con­se­quences.
Six­ty years lat­er, con­front­ed with Irv­ing, Augus­ta is still haunt­ed by the mis­takes of her past. How did her plan go so spec­tac­u­lar­ly wrong? Did Irv­ing ever tru­ly love her or was he sim­ply play­ing a part? 

12/8/2024

4:00 PM

Exeter Community Library

Janice Cohn

“The Christmas Menorahs”

The orig­i­nal ver­sion of The Christ­mas Meno­rahs appeared thir­ty years ago, inspired by a series of efforts to com­bat hatred in Billings, Mon­tana. When a spate of attacks on Jews, Black peo­ple, and oth­ers threat­ened their com­mu­ni­ty, res­i­dents of Billings were deter­mined to express their sol­i­dar­i­ty and take action. In this new edi­tion of the book, which is sad­ly still rel­e­vant, Jan­ice Cohn and Bill Farnsworth relate how one Jew­ish fam­i­ly refus­es to be intim­i­dat­ed by big­otry — and, in the process, the fam­i­ly learns that their empa­thet­ic and coura­geous neigh­bors will defend the val­ues of their town.

12/22/2024

4:00 PM

RCOS: Sisterhood Chanukah Party

Jane Zalben

“Gingerbread Dreidels”

2024 Chanukah and Christ­mas are cel­e­brat­ed on the same day this year! On the first night of Chanukah, Sophie and Max are con­fused. But this year is dif­fer­ent: so both sets of grand­par­ents are com­ing togeth­er to par­take in both Jew­ish and Chris­t­ian tra­di­tions. This inter­faith, inter­gen­er­a­tional sto­ry of love has gelt, gin­ger­bread Chanukah cook­ies, and meno­rahs — red and green and blue and white. His­to­ry of the drei­del, how to play, recipe, and author notes are includ­ed in the backmatter.

1/15/2025

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge

Lawrence Levitt and Stephanie Smartschan

“Evitchka”

Evitch­ka: A True Sto­ry of Sur­vival, Hope and Love tells the sto­ry of an inspi­ra­tional woman and her fam­i­ly in two parts. The first chron­i­cles the life of the Rit­ter fam­i­ly — a young Evitch­ka, her par­ents, grand­par­ents and aunt — and how they were able to sur­vive the Holo­caust in Czecho­slo­va­kia. Before World War II, there were two hun­dred Jew­ish chil­dren in their small town of Humen­né. After the war, there were six. The sec­ond part picks up when an 18-year-old Eva meets a young, soon-to- be doc­tor named Lar­ry Levitt. They had a beau­ti­ful mar­riage for 61 years, but their life togeth­er was not with­out its own chal­lenges, includ­ing Larry’s strug­gles through med­ical school and rais­ing a son with cere­bral pal­sy. Their jour­ney comes full cir­cle when they trav­el with Eva’s par­ents and their chil­dren back to Czecho­slo­va­kia, vis­it­ing Auschwitz and reunit­ing with the cou­ple that took them in. A few years lat­er, incred­i­bly, they have the oppor­tu­ni­ty to repay an unpayable debt when the man who saved them falls ill.

1/28/2025

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge

Stephen Fried

“Profiles in Mental Health Courage”

Pro­files in Men­tal Health Courage por­trays the dra­mat­ic jour­neys of a diverse group of Amer­i­cans who have strug­gled with their men­tal health. Sev­er­al years ago, Patrick J. Kennedy shared the sto­ry of his per­son­al and fam­i­ly chal­lenges with men­tal ill­ness in his best­selling mem­oir, A Com­mon Strug­gle. Now, he and his Com­mon Strug­gle coau­thor, award-win­ning health­care jour­nal­ist Stephen Fried, have craft­ed this pow­er­ful new book shar­ing the untold sto­ries of oth­ers. In Pro­files in Men­tal Health Courage, for­mer Con­gress­man Kennedy adapts his uncle’s idea to inspire the ​“men­tal health courage” it takes for those with these con­di­tions to treat their ill­ness­es, and risk telling their sto­ries to help Amer­i­ca face its cri­sis in our fam­i­lies, our work­places, our jails, and on our streets. This book takes an unflinch­ing look at the expe­ri­ence of men­tal ill­ness and addic­tion that inspires pro­found con­nec­tion, empa­thy, and action.

2/12/2025

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge

Steven Ujifusa

“The Last Ships from Hamburg”

In The Last Ships from Ham­burg, Steven Uji­fusa tells the sto­ry of the sec­ond Exo­dus that, between 1881 and 1914, brought two and a half mil­lion Russ­ian and Cen­tral Euro­pean Jews to the Unit­ed States. This mass migra­tion was pre­cip­i­tat­ed by out­bursts of anti­se­mit­ic vio­lence fol­low­ing the 1881 assas­si­na­tion of Russia’s Czar Alexan­der II. The Jews became the scape­goat, as they had been so many times before. Risk­ing all they’d ever known, they ille­gal­ly escaped from Rus­sia by train, head­ing to Ham­burg, Ger­many, where they board­ed steamships to the shores of the Unit­ed States. Many were drawn to the US by the ​“dis­es­tab­lish­ment” clause of the con­sti­tu­tion that allowed free­dom of reli­gion, as well as eco­nom­ic and edu­ca­tion­al oppor­tu­ni­ties and the pos­si­bil­i­ty of own­ing land. Their haz­ardous pas­sage was made pos­si­ble by the coor­di­nat­ed efforts of two Jew­ish men: one in Ger­many, Albert Ballin, and the oth­er in the Unit­ed States, Jacob Schiff. Ballin was a vision­ary. As man­ag­ing direc­tor of the Ham­burg-Amer­i­ca ship­ping line, he worked hard to retro­fit exist­ing ships and build new ones — all of which helped tremen­dous num­bers of Jews set sail for Amer­i­ca. Schiff, the phil­an­thropist and man­ag­ing part­ner of the bank­ing firm Kuhn, Loeb and Co., was like­wise devot­ed to res­cu­ing Jews from Rus­sia and East­ern Europe and bring­ing them to the Unit­ed States.  

4/22/2025

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge

Arthur J. Magida

“Two Wheels to Freedom”

The extra­or­di­nary true sto­ry of a young Jew­ish art stu­dent who not just sur­vived but resist­ed and saved hun­dreds of lives — all while retain­ing his infec­tious zeal for life. Cioma Schon­haus was 11 years old when the Nazis first came to pow­er. His clev­er­ness and resource­ful­ness even­tu­al­ly made him an unlike­ly hero and bon vivant.As a young adult, Cioma sab­o­taged weapons in the muni­tions fac­to­ry where he worked, and as a trained artist, Cioma mas­ter­ful­ly forged fake IDs for sev­er­al hun­dred Jews. When he learned the Gestapo was clos­ing in on him, Cioma mas­ter­mind­ed a sin­gu­lar­ly dar­ing escape: spend­ing a month bik­ing to Switzer­land. He became the only per­son to cycle his way out of the Third Reich.

5/14/2025

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge

Glenn A. Fine

“Watchdogs”

In Watch­dogs: Inspec­tors Gen­er­al and the Bat­tle for Hon­est and Account­able Gov­ern­ment, Glenn Fine — who served as the inspec­tor gen­er­al of the Depart­ment of Jus­tice from 2000 to 2011 and as the act­ing inspec­tor gen­er­al of the Depart­ment of Defense from 2016 to 2020 — describes the essen­tial work of inspec­tors gen­er­al and pro­vides a fas­ci­nat­ing insider’s view of gov­ern­ment at the high­est levels.

9/9/2024

6:00 PM

Exeter Community Library

Lauren Grodstein

“We Must Not Think of Ourselves”

In 1940, Adam Paskow becomes a prisoner in the Warsaw Ghetto, cut off from his former life and awaiting an uncertain fate. Weeks later, he receives a surprising request: would he join a secret group of archivists preserving the truth of what is happening? Adam takes testimonies from his students, friends, and neighbors. He learns their childhoods and daydreams, their passions and fears, and desperate strategies for survival. The stories form a portrait of endurance in a world where no choices are good ones.

9/11/2024

12:00 PM

JCC: Noontime Knowledge (VIRTUAL PROGRAM)

David Tatel

“Vision”

David Tatel served near­ly 30 years on America’s sec­ond high­est court, the Unit­ed States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Cir­cuit, where many of our most cru­cial cas­es are resolved — or teed up for the Supreme Court. He has cham­pi­oned equal jus­tice for his entire adult life; decid­ed land­mark envi­ron­men­tal and vot­ing cas­es; and embod­ied the ide­al of what a great judge should be. Yet he has been blind for 50 of his 80-plus years. Ini­tial­ly, he depend­ed upon aides to read texts to him, and more recent­ly, a suite of hi-tech solu­tions has allowed him to lis­ten to reams of doc­u­ments at high speeds. At first, he tried to hide his dete­ri­o­rat­ing vision, and for years, he denied that it had any impact on his career. Only recent­ly, part­ly thanks to his first-ever guide dog, Vix­en, has he come to ful­ly accept his blind­ness and the role it’s played in his per­son­al and pro­fes­sion­al lives. His sto­ry of fight­ing for jus­tice over decades, with and with­out eye­sight, is an inspi­ra­tion to us all.