100 books like Klezmer

By Joann Sfar,

Here are 100 books that Klezmer fans have personally recommended if you like Klezmer. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

When you buy books, we may earn a commission that helps keep our lights on (or join the rebellion as a member).

Book cover of The Complete Maus: A Survivor's Tale

Donald L. Willerton Author Of Teddy's War

From my list on what our fathers never told us about WWII.

Why am I passionate about this?

My father never talked about his experiences during the war. After he died at 67, we found his handwritten itinerary of three years and ten days in the Army Signal Corps. Plotting it on a map sparked a passion that continued for years, taking me twice to sites in Europe and through hundreds of records and books. I am amazed at all he never told us—the Queen Mary troopship, his radar unit’s landing on Omaha Beach (D+26), the Normandy Breakout, Paris after liberation, fleeing Bastogne, and so on. I grew up on WWII films but never grasped till now what my dad may have seen. 

Donald's book list on what our fathers never told us about WWII

Donald L. Willerton Why did Donald love this book?

To learn about the Holocaust, I read personal remembrances, eyewitness accounts, and detailed descriptions of ghettos, camps, and transports, but this graphic novel based on Spiegelman’s father captured me like none of the others. Its words tell its terrible story masterfully and its drawings fill in what words can’t say, both as his father lived it and as his son learns about it. Banning it from U.S. schools would be completely wrongheaded. It should be required reading.

By Art Spiegelman,

Why should I read it?

7 authors picked The Complete Maus as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The first and only graphic novel to win the Pulitzer Prize, MAUS is a brutally moving work of art about a Holocaust survivor -- and the son who survives him

'The first masterpiece in comic book history' The New Yorker

Maus tells the story of Vladek Spiegelman, a Jewish survivor of Hitler's Europe, and his son, a cartoonist coming to terms with his father's story. Approaching the unspeakable through the diminutive (the Nazis are cats, the Jews mice), Vladek's harrowing story of survival is woven into the author's account of his tortured relationship with his aging father.

Against the backdrop…


Book cover of The Golem's Mighty Swing

Mat Tonti Author Of The Book of Secrets

From my list on graphic novels about Jewish themes.

Why am I passionate about this?

My love of comics and characters goes back to when I was very young. I remember falling in love with Snoopy to the point that I would draw a snoopy head on my worksheets in first grade, and my teacher knew it was from me! Once I got older, and began exploring my Jewish heritage in a more mature way, I was astounded by how many deep and meaningful stories I kept encountering. It was my natural inclination to retell these stories in a comic book format. Part of my mission was to find like minded souls who had a love for comix and a love for Jewish stories.

Mat's book list on graphic novels about Jewish themes

Mat Tonti Why did Mat love this book?

This book was the first time I read a graphic novel with Jewish themes other than the Holocaust. As a comic book artist who was exploring my Jewish roots, it was eye-opening to read a tale with Jewish characters, especially because it deals with the legend of the Golem, a mystical being made of mud and brought to life through Hebrew incantations.  Add to that great action scenes of 1920s baseball, and it makes for a great read.

By James Sturm,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Golem's Mighty Swing as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Before penning his acclaimed graphic novel Market Day and founding the Center for Cartoon Studies, James Sturm proved his worth as a master cartoonist with the eloquent graphic novel, The Golem s Mighty Swing, one of the first breakout graphic novel hits of the 21st century. Sturm s fascination with the invisible America has been the crux of his comics work, exploring the rarely-told or oft-forgotten bits of history that define a country. By reuniting America s greatest pastime with its hidden history, the graphic novel tells the story of the Stars of David, a barnstorming Jewish baseball team of…


Book cover of A Contract With God

Mat Tonti Author Of The Book of Secrets

From my list on graphic novels about Jewish themes.

Why am I passionate about this?

My love of comics and characters goes back to when I was very young. I remember falling in love with Snoopy to the point that I would draw a snoopy head on my worksheets in first grade, and my teacher knew it was from me! Once I got older, and began exploring my Jewish heritage in a more mature way, I was astounded by how many deep and meaningful stories I kept encountering. It was my natural inclination to retell these stories in a comic book format. Part of my mission was to find like minded souls who had a love for comix and a love for Jewish stories.

Mat's book list on graphic novels about Jewish themes

Mat Tonti Why did Mat love this book?

Will Eisner not only invented the term “Graphic Novel” but he innovated much of the art and craft of comix. He is one of the pioneers whom I have studied to learn how comix work. Contract is also amazing because it deals with Jewish New York of the mid 20th century which is where my parents grew up. I connect to the tales of how to balance being American while celebrating my Jewish heritage, and the many challenges that came with living amongst other cultures in the “Melting Pot."

By Will Eisner,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A Contract With God as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

€œEisner was not only ahead of his times; the present times are still catching up to him.€€”John UpdikeA revolutionary novel, A Contract with God re-creates the neighborhood of Will Eisner's youth through a quartet of four interwoven stories. Expressing the joy, exuberance, tragedy, and drama of life on the mythical Dropsie Avenue of the Bronx, A Contract with God is a monumental achievement, a must in the library of any graphic novel fan.


Book cover of Megillat Esther

Mat Tonti Author Of The Book of Secrets

From my list on graphic novels about Jewish themes.

Why am I passionate about this?

My love of comics and characters goes back to when I was very young. I remember falling in love with Snoopy to the point that I would draw a snoopy head on my worksheets in first grade, and my teacher knew it was from me! Once I got older, and began exploring my Jewish heritage in a more mature way, I was astounded by how many deep and meaningful stories I kept encountering. It was my natural inclination to retell these stories in a comic book format. Part of my mission was to find like minded souls who had a love for comix and a love for Jewish stories.

Mat's book list on graphic novels about Jewish themes

Mat Tonti Why did Mat love this book?

I came across this book while JT was still working on it in the early 2000s. I contacted him much much excitement because I had never met any other contemporary artists who were interested in translating traditional Jewish legends and midrash into a visual form. When it was finally published, I was blown away at how visually rich it was and how it incorporated the traditional Hebrew text of the Scroll of Esther. And it’s not for kids! A true telling of the story of Esther deserves an R-rating at least. And JT does not shy away from the grittier elements of the traditional story.

By JT Waldman,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Megillat Esther as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Megillat Esther is commonly referred to as the Book of Esther: but there is nothing common about JT Waldman's interpretation of this Biblical story. In what may be the world's first religious, scholarly comic book, Waldman tells the epic tale of exile and redemption in graphic form.

When Esther, a Jewish woman, is made Queen of Persia she must keep her identity hidden, all the while maneuvering to save her people from annihilation. This is a story familiar to many Jews who have heard it recounted every year on the holiday of Purim. But readers of all backgrounds will be…


Book cover of Rifka Takes a Bow

Gloria Koster Author Of Dance the Hora, Isadora

From my list on lighthearted picture books with Jewish characters.

Why am I passionate about this?

I am a school and public librarian as well as a writer. I also serve as a member of the Children’s Book Committee of the Bank Street College of Education. We review hundreds of books each year for consideration of a place on our list –The Best Children’s Books of the YearI've chosen to recommend some lighthearted picture books with Jewish characters or themes because a number of my own books fit into this category. Mitzi’s Mitzvah, Little Red Ruthie, and Dance the Hora, Isadora! are three of my Jewish themed books. Each of these titles has been selected by PJ Library, an organization that sends a book each month to children.

Gloria's book list on lighthearted picture books with Jewish characters

Gloria Koster Why did Gloria love this book?

This book reflects the author’s own experience as a child during the heyday of Yiddish theater. It’s an exciting story that will engage kids with a slice of history as they imagine themselves taking to the stage and enjoying the thrill of the limelight. So many Jewish-themed books focus on the holidays, so it’s refreshing to have others that just reflect Jewish life in the past or the present.

By Rebecca Rosenberg Perlov, Cosei Kawa (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Rifka Takes a Bow as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it. This book is for kids age 3, 4, 5, and 6.

What is this book about?

Rifka's parents are actors in the Yiddish Theater in New York, but one day Rifka finds herself center stage in a special role! A slice of immigrant life on New York's Second Avenue, this is a unique book about a vanished time and a place – the Yiddish theater in the early 20th century―made real through the telling of the true life story of the 96-year-old author as a little girl.


Book cover of A House with Seven Windows: Short Stories

Joan Rudd Author Of Building Solid: A Life in Stories

From my list on growing into womanhood in different locations.

Why am I passionate about this?

"Two tickets to ride!Most people get only one life.... and on only one coast. This book is an overview of an era 1948-2020 of cultural shifts and expectations for "girls". At seventeen I left my family and NYC for college, a commune, and then art school on the West coast. Visual artist, woman, mother, and descendant, Joan describes the lifetime challenges that she has met with creativity, humor, and resilience. Two NW cities, two marriages, and two sons born 23 years apart inspire many of her stories. 

Joan's book list on growing into womanhood in different locations

Joan Rudd Why did Joan love this book?

Kadya Molodowsky’s book of stories, A House with Seven Windows are stories mostly set one half of a generation off of my own, just far enough to be recognizable. There is one story about parents investing in a stylish winter coat for their daughter in order to render her more marriageable in appearance for the “market.” My own parents did the same for me when I left for college!

By Kadya Molodowsky, Leah Schoolnik (translator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked A House with Seven Windows as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A House of Seven Windows by Kadya Molodowsky is the famed Yiddish poet's only collection of short stories. Written in simple prose, these stories are subtle portraits - tragic-comic, bittersweet, always generous spirited - of ordinary people: Jews in pre-World War II Eastern Europe and Jews struggling to adjust to life in America. A traditional-minded husband is defeated by his wife who wants only the latest fashion. A community leader's position is supported and maintained by his more energetic and political-minded wife. A couple, ardent supporters of the newly formed state of Israel, nevertheless find themselves at odds with their…


Book cover of Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization

Christopher J. Fettweis Author Of The Pursuit of Dominance: 2000 Years of Superpower Grand Strategy

From my list on unconventional stories on US national security.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a political scientist who specializes in US foreign policy. I’ve been interested in war and peace – and avoiding the former – for as long as I can remember. More than anything else, I wish I could convince Americans of how safe they are, relatively speaking, and how safe they can remain if only we make wise decisions moving forward. The future is brighter than we think.

Christopher's book list on unconventional stories on US national security

Christopher J. Fettweis Why did Christopher love this book?

This controversial book was a Rorschach Test for the security community.

Some read it as a critique of the United States; others saw it as a call for pacifism; others saw it as an attack on Franklin Roosevelt or Winston Churchill. In fact, it was none of those things and all of them. Baker is a novelist who purchased a newspaper archive from the 1930s and 1940s and simply reprinted some of the stories contained therein. He offers little additional comments or interpretation.

The book is an anecdote to the idea that the Second World War was somehow the “good war.”  Like all others, it was barbarism; unlike all others, it was barbarism on a scale never seen before or since. And like all wars, it was, at its root, the story of common people victimized by their governments.

By Nicholson Baker,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Human Smoke as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

At a time when the West seems ever more eager to call on military aggression as a means of securing international peace, Nicholson Baker's provocative narrative exploring the political misjudgements and personal biases that gave birth to the terrifying consequences of the Second World War could not be more pertinent. With original and controversial insights brought about by meticulous research, Human Smoke re-evaluates the political turning points that led up to war and in so doing challenges some of the treasured myths we hold about how war came about and how atrocities like the Holocaust were able to happen. Baker…


Book cover of The Shabbat Box

Sylvia A. Rouss Author Of Sammy Spider's First ABC

From my list on for Jewish preschool children.

Why am I passionate about this?

I believe that good Jewish stories are important tools in building Jewish identity. But when I first taught preschoolers, the books were either too didactic or written for older children. One day, when the children in my class were enthusiastically discussing the Christmas display at the mall, the idea came to me that maybe an eight-legged Spider celebrating the eight days of Hanukkah could compete with Frosty the Snowman. When Sammy Spider asks to spin a dreidel, he is told, “Spider’s don’t spin dreidels. Spiders spin webs.” The response became a favorite with Jewish children and a form of the phrase is part of all the Sammy Spider holiday and values books.

Sylvia's book list on for Jewish preschool children

Sylvia A. Rouss Why did Sylvia love this book?

The Shabbat Box is by Lesley Simpson. Ira’s preschool uses a box to store all the Shabbat objects and when school ends on Shabbat, one of the students gets to take the box home. But when it’s Ira’s turn to take it home, he loses it in the snow. Upset, he decides to make a new Shabbat Box for his class. On Monday, at sharing time, his friends are all surprised and pleased by Ira’s new Shabbat Box. And, then to the children’s delight, the teacher tells them she found the missing Shabbat Box, and now they have two! The story is a favorite of preschoolers.

I love how The Shabbat Box transfers the Shabbat classroom experience into an experience at home. For many of the children, Shabbat occurs only in the classroom and this story helps both the child and the family see how they can celebrate Shabbat at…

By Lesley Simpson, Nicole In Den Bosch (illustrator),

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Shabbat Box as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

It's finally Ira's turn to take home the Shabbat Box from school. But a bad storm blows open his book bag and the box is lost. What will Ira do? A warm introduction to Shabbat for preschoolers.


Book cover of The Books of Jacob

Michael David Lukas Author Of The Last Watchman of Old Cairo

From my list on magical historical.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always been fascinated by history, by the way that the past informs the present, how it makes us who we are. And I’ve found myself drawn, as a reader and as a writer, towards those stories that incorporate some element of magic into the past. I’ve written two magical historical novels. And my third book, which I hope to be finished with soon, is a fabulist tale set in the future, which I like to say is history that hasn’t happened yet. 

Michael's book list on magical historical

Michael David Lukas Why did Michael love this book?

Yes, it’s almost a thousand pages long. But this sprawling magical historical novel by the Nobel Prize winner is one of the best books I’ve read in years. Following the rise and fall of the 18th-century Jewish mystic and would-be messiah, Jacob Frank, the novel paints a vivid picture of a vibrant multicultural society in Poland and beyond.

By Olga Tokarczuk, Jennifer Croft (translator),

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked The Books of Jacob as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In the mid-eighteenth century, as new ideas begin to sweep the continent, a young Jew of mysterious origins arrives in a village in Poland. Before long, he has changed not only his name but his persona; visited by what seem to be ecstatic experiences, Jacob Frank casts a charismatic spell that attracts an increasingly fervent following. In the decade to come, Frank will traverse the Hapsburg and Ottoman empires, throngs of disciples in his thrall as he reinvents himself again and again, converts to Islam and then Catholicism, is pilloried as a heretic and revered as the Messiah, and wreaks…


Book cover of The Book of Esther: A Novel

Michael David Lukas Author Of The Last Watchman of Old Cairo

From my list on magical historical.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’ve always been fascinated by history, by the way that the past informs the present, how it makes us who we are. And I’ve found myself drawn, as a reader and as a writer, towards those stories that incorporate some element of magic into the past. I’ve written two magical historical novels. And my third book, which I hope to be finished with soon, is a fabulist tale set in the future, which I like to say is history that hasn’t happened yet. 

Michael's book list on magical historical

Michael David Lukas Why did Michael love this book?

As someone writing a post-apocalyptic retelling of the biblical Book of Esther, I was immediately drawn to this counterfactual history set amidst an isolated Eastern European nation of Turkic warrior Jews. Called the “Jewish Game of Thrones” the book goes deep into a magical alternative universe that will have you hungering for a sequel.

By Emily Barton,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Book of Esther as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

What if an empire of Jewish warriors that really existed in the Middle Ages had never fallen—and was the only thing standing between Hitler and his conquest of Russia? 

Eastern Europe, August 1942. The Khazar kaganate, an isolated nation of Turkic warrior Jews, lies between the Pontus Euxinus (the Black Sea) and the Khazar Sea (the Caspian). It also happens to lie between a belligerent nation to the west that the Khazars call Germania—and a city the rest of the world calls Stalingrad.

After years of Jewish refugees streaming across the border from Europa, fleeing the war, Germania launches its…


Book cover of The Complete Maus: A Survivor's Tale
Book cover of The Golem's Mighty Swing
Book cover of A Contract With God

Share your top 3 reads of 2024!

And get a beautiful page showing off your 3 favorite reads.

1,224

readers submitted
so far, will you?

5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in Jewish history, Europe, and comics?

Jewish History 481 books
Europe 956 books
Comics 124 books