ISBN: 0-88739-383-7
192 pp.
Size: 6 x 9
Pub Date: 5/2002
Paperback Original
Price: $14.95
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Black and Blue Jew
Chester Aaron
This marvelous novel in stories follows the adventures of the feckless Benny Kahn, from a Pennsylvania schoolboy so clumsy he can't cross a room without falling over his own feet, to an aging tango dancer so graceful a famous Argentine tanguera says he makes her "legs sing songs that joy my heart."
Aaron will have readers laughing and crying aloud, as the poor Jewish immigrants' son attempts to negotiate the foreign territory of an upper class Episcopalian girl he falls for at twelve; or, in a richly ironic army yarn, the young Private Kahn defends his Jewish heritage with wry disinterest, while coming to the aide of an illiterate Ozark farmer who falls prey to American cruelty and greed in the middle of war-torn Germany; or the lonely, recently separated Professor Kahn dates a series of women culled from singles' personal ads; or the English professor turned medical x-ray technician starts-and ends-an obsessive campaign to stop the dangerous routine practice of over-radiating black Americans.
With his delightful blend of humor and wisdom, exaggeration and real pathos, Chester Aaron has successfully wedded the tall tale to modern realism in an unfailing entertaining collection of stories, which, together, tell the life story of the unforgettable Benjamin-Benny, Ben, Professor-Kahn.
Review: "The river of Chester Aaron's Black and Blue Jew rushes through the 20th century and its greatest rapids: war, prejudice, disease, love and revenge. Thanks to Chester Aaron for his clear-eyed view of everything that matters."
-Leah Garchik, San Francisco Chronicle
"A congenial, outrageous book, as warm and comfortable as an old sweater."
-Max Steele, contributing editor to The Paris Review
"A voice, a temperament, a story like no other. In following his central character through episodes from youth to old age, Chester Aaron illuminates the American twentieth century freshly, oddly, and movingly..."
-Donald Fanger, Harry Levin Research Professor of Literature, Harvard University
"Black and Blue Jew invites you, coaxes you in, makes you work, wonder; it plays mumblety-peg with the human horrors we have become fighteningly inured to - cruelty, lust, psychosis, war, depravity, the sins of lost souls in transit. Chester Aaron is a fearless writer of deep passion, humor, and courageous commitment."
- Doris Schwerin, composer, playwright, author
Bio: CHESTER AARON is the author of the novel About Us, as well as a number of young adult novels and books about garlic, including The Great Garlic Book. He currently lives on a small farm in Sonoma County and has been at various times, a sheepherder, x-ray technician, professor, union organizer, writer, father, and husband.
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