**2026 PEN AMERICA AWARD FOR TRANSLATION FINALIST • From “one of the great—if not the greatest—contemporary Yiddish novelists” (Elie Wiesel), the long-awaited English translation of a work, Tolstoyan in scope, that chronicles the last, tumultuous decade of a world succumbing to the march of modernity.A NEW YORK TIMES BEST HISTORICAL FICTION BOOK • A KIRKUS BEST FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR • SHORTLISTED FOR THE FREUDENHEIM TRANSLATION PRIZE“A great beard novel...

**2026 PEN AMERICA AWARD FOR TRANSLATION FINALIST • From “one of the great—if not the greatest—contemporary Yiddish novelists” (Elie Wiesel), the long-awaited English translation of a work, Tolstoyan in scope, that chronicles the last, tumultuous decade of a world succumbing to the march of modernity.A NEW YORK TIMES BEST HISTORICAL FICTION BOOK • A KIRKUS BEST FICTION BOOK OF THE YEAR • SHORTLISTED FOR THE FREUDENHEIM TRANSLATION PRIZE“A great beard novel...

When young Zalmen Itzkowitz steps off the train on a dark, dreary day at the close of the nineteenth century, the residents of Miloslavka have no idea what’s in store for them. Zalmen is a freethinker who has come to the rural town to earn his living as a tutor. Yet, rather than teach Hebrew, he plans to teach his students the Russian language and other secular subjects. Residents of the town quickly become divided, with some regarding Itzkowitz as the devil’s messenger and others supporti...