Product Description

In 2003, a mild-mannered historian named Moses Lapinsky begins to jot down notes for a biography. The biography is to be of his father Sonny, a famous Jewish-Canadian boxer from Toronto who has been portrayed as a brutal bruiser in a scurrilous book by a Toronto Star journalist. As Moses buries himself in research, he is transported back to the pivotal event in his father's life ... It was August 1933: a sweltering Toronto night. During a softball game at Christie Pits field, four youths unfurled a white sheet emblazoned with a black swastika. The boys shouted, "Heil Hitler!" Within seconds, a group of Jewish youths from Kensington Market charged at the Swastika-wielding boys, setting off a four-hour race riot involving 15,000 people and injuring hundreds.

In an epic novel full of humour, sorrow, bravery, folly and the stuff of everyday life, Tulchinsky traces the fortunes of the Lapinskys from the evening of the riots through World War II and into the 1950s. Here's a brilliant depiction of a defining moment for a family-and a city-struggling with ideals of freedom and tolerance in a world broken by war.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #537305 in Books
• Published on: 2003-08-21
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 495 pages

Amazon.ca
The Five Books of Moses Lapinsky is the touching, well-wrought story of the Lapinsky family, Jewish immigrants living in Toronto in the '30s and '40s. The focus of the novel falls on Sonny, the third son of four, and his relationship with his father, Yacov, a street peddler and stubborn traditionalist. When Sonny marries an Italian girl, Yacov says the prayer for the dead over him although he secretly admires his son, who will grow into a champion boxer. A key event in the story takes place in August 1933 when all four sons are involved in the Christie Pits riot, a battle between Nazi sympathizers and Jewish youth at a local ballpark. The tragedy that strikes the family there echoes Yacov's experiences during a pogrom in Russia.

This is a true-to-life depiction of Jewish family life during the Depression. The period dialogue ("Aw Boss. That's nice, but we better go and break the news. You know. To our families-like.") sounds just right and is not overdone. The descriptions of the boxing matches are pure adrenalin and the characters feel genuine, especially Sophie, the long-suffering mother, and Checkie Seigelman, a small-time, cigar-puffing gangster. Unfortunately, the structure is a bit contorted, resulting in descriptions of the riot both near the beginning and again near the end, and some sections feel like filler. At times the writing is cartoonish ("Ralph goes down, silver and white stars swirl across his vision") but for its depiction of the period, this novel is worth a read. --Mark Frutkin

Booklist, starred review
"Tulchinsky writes adeptly and with passion ... and she has something important to say." (Globe and Mail)

"A stunning depiction of family dynamics ... deserves a large readership."

Toronto Star
"A lovingly written, sweeping drama."