The Mystics of Mile End: A Novel
By Sigal Samuel
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About this ebook
Sigal Samuel’s debut novel, in the vein of Nicole Krauss’s bestselling The History of Love, is an imaginative story that delves into the heart of Jewish mysticism, faith, and family.
“This is not an ordinary tree I am making.
“This,” he said, “this is the Tree of Knowledge.”
In the half-Hasidic, half-hipster Montreal neighborhood of Mile End, eleven-year-old Lev Meyer is discovering that there may be a place for Judaism in his life. As he learns about science in his day school, Lev begins his own extracurricular study of the Bible’s Tree of Knowledge with neighbor Mr. Katz, who is building his own Tree out of trash. Meanwhile his sister Samara is secretly studying for her Bat Mitzvah with next-door neighbor and Holocaust survivor, Mr. Glassman. All the while his father, David, a professor of Jewish mysticism, is a non-believer.
When, years later, David has a heart attack, he begins to believe God is speaking to him. While having an affair with one of his students, he delves into the complexities of Kabbalah. Months later Samara, too, grows obsessed with the Kabbalah’s Tree of Life—hiding her interest from those who love her most–and is overcome with reaching the Tree’s highest heights. The neighbors of Mile End have been there all along, but only one of them can catch her when she falls.
Sigal Samuel
Sigal Samuel is an award-winning fiction writer, journalist, essayist and playwright. Currently a writer and editor for the Jewish Daily Forward, she previously worked for The Daily Beast. She has also published work in The Rumpus, BuzzFeed, The Walrus, and This Magazine, among others. She has been a featured writer at the Blue Metropolis International Literary Festival, a winner of Room Magazine’s writing contest, and a two-time finalist in Event Magazine’s nonfiction contest. An accomplished playwright, Sigal has written and produced six plays in Montreal, Vancouver and New York, two of which garnered national awards. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia in 2012. Originally from Montreal, she now lives and writes in Brooklyn.
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