Luckily we had a big enough forum to discuss the work of Jacobson. It was a most enjoyable evening (thank you Sally) despite the fact that most members of the group struggled to finish the book! Our impression was that this is very much a "blokes'" book and we found the characters and their voices hard to relate to.
We thought that the author was clever using "Finkler" to be synonymous with "Jew" in this novel. He was then able to freely play around with this word and all it's connotations and variations. We generally felt that we needed more of an insight into Jewish customs and vocabulary to fully appreciate the author's cleverness and humour.
We give this book a rating of 5/10.
Our next book is A Short History of Tractors in the Ukraine by Marina Lewycka and our meeting is now postponed to August 31st at Jane's.
