A beautiful memoir that focuses on the importance of literature and sharing reading with your children and how that helps instill in them the joy and love of reading.

A memoir of Jewish family and the mother's experience reading the Torah and other literature to her children. As a mother of many who has spent endless hours reading different kinds of literature to her children, I really enjoyed this book. This journey also brought back memories of reading to my own children and I found myself deep in nostaliga and smiling when reading this book.
To me its always interesting to see how other families incorporate literature into their lives and this fit that bill. Great read and one I will come back to often.

I did receive an ARC copy of this book and am leaving a review voluntarily.

I am not the audience for this book. I would recommend to parents, and they need to be religious or spiritual in some sense. Know that there is not an exact, threaded plot, but more individual stories that link up with various parts of religious text.

I think that a book like this could be very rewarding for parents; I would not add this to a memoirs list for everyone, though.

I almost didn't pick this one up because while I love books, I didn't think reading someone else's experiences with reading would be interesting. That was until I saw that the author was Ilana Kurshan, author of If All The Seas Were Ink, a book I loved so much after reading my Netgalley copy, that I also purchased a softcover copy.

I have to say, I thoroughly enjoyed this book! While I have always had a book nearby to read, Ilana truly takes this to the next level finding ways to read while doing everyday things that have to be done, and even though my kids are grown, I am sooooo tempted to get some of those children's' books she mentions.

Children of the Book by Ilana Kurshan is a luminous, heartfelt memoir that explores how literature shapes and deepens the bonds of family life. As a mother of five, Kurshan reflects on the tension between personal passion and parental duty, ultimately discovering that reading is not just a solitary escape but a bridge to connection, growth, and empathy. Drawing parallels between parenting and the five books of the Torah, she beautifully intertwines sacred and secular stories, showing how books can guide, comfort, and unite across generations. A tender celebration of motherhood, faith, and the transformative power of lifelong reading.

This is a story about family, as well as an ode to reading books that explores how the mother's children, and the mother's love of reading, to grow to instill a love of reading in her children.

At times, it explores different ideas, but mostly this is a story of a mother's love for her children, as well as wanting her children to enjoy reading, and her children truly enjoying reading.

Pub Date: Sep 09 2025

Many thanks for the opportunity to read 'Children of the Book'!

I'm not sure what to say about this book without giving it away. I loved the writing. It kept me engaged and wanting to read more. I felt like I was in the story, if that makes sense?

I loved this! Between being a mother and being a book lover, this was so relatable. As a Christian, it was fascinating to get the life of a Jew threaded throughout. And knowing the Bible, I could totally see the parallels she made. Beautiful writing and thoroughly enjoyable to read about daily life in different stages along with stages of a reading life. Would totally recommend this to any book lover, especially mothers!

This book surprised me. At glance of the cover, I expected a memoir about reading aloud to children. I expected anecdotes on the benefits, experiences, and emotions wrapped up in the bonding of time spent with our children wrapped up in stories.

What I received was that AND biblical tie ins. The author is Jewish and uses the Torah to draw parallels of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy to her own life experiences with children, with books, and through the Covid pandemic.

I highlighted so so many nuggets of wisdom. A thoroughly enjoyable read.

A wonderful read!
This novel drew me in from the very first page and kept me hooked until the end. The characters were vibrant and relatable, the writing was engaging, and the story had just the right balance of heart and humor. Highly recommend!
Many thanks to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for my ARC. All opinions are my own.

The book blurb doesn’t entirely communicate what this book is about. It’s really not for me after having read it but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t a good book. I love to read books about books and people’s stories about reading books and I thought I would get more titles that I could recommend. I like to learn about books that are good for children and get a good sense of what they are before I give them as gifts. This was more the author story of aligning her reading with the Torah in seasons, and it wasn’t bad. It just wasn’t what I thought it was. You’ll want to understand that going into it.

#childrenofthebook #netgalley

A Jewish mother reads books, secular and sacred, to her children as they grow up.

Maybe I wasn’t the right audience for this “memoir,” but I did not enjoy it. I kept waiting for the book to have a point, some compelling conflict that was propelling it forward, but it does not have one.

It’s basically a book-length review of dozens or hundreds of children’s and young adult books, their characters and arcs continually compared to those of Torah. The tone is often elitist, and the structure, rambling.

Three stars because the Covid-era anecdotes at least held my interest.

What a sweet surprise! Parents and librarians should read this beautiful story of a thoughtful Jewish mother who beautifully chronicles the reading journey of her children and the importance of stories in their lives.

From the words of the author, Ilana Ketshan, “It is a story about traveling through the wilderness, going through periods when we navigate our ambivalence and uncertainty as we try to forge a way forward. It is a story about taking our children as far as we can until we recognize that the time has come for us to let go, and for them to move ahead—and read onward—independently.”

This is a fascinating book and I enjoyed the connection to the Torah. I also enjoyed how the author included her kids in the story.

An intriguing look at children's literature through the lens of the Torah. Kurshan's thoughtful and considered exploration of both beloved works is unique and highly personal.

I hate to rate memoirs because it truly is judging someone's life. My rating here is not for the actual tale - I think reading is important and as a mother and reader myself, I am stunned at how much reading Ilana gets done during the day with her children. I loved little points she made about being a parent reading books for herself, validating a lot of things I feel with four young kids who do need me all the time.

I do, however, feel a little misled with the title of the book. I was thinking we were going to get another book similar to the Read Aloud Companion, or Raising Readers, or something along those lines. This one, beautifully told, is aligned with the stories in the Torah and the seasons we go through as we read the Torah in temple. Love that, but it’s very very niche and I feel like I either skimmed that part or that wasn’t fully mentioned. In any event, this is a deeply personal memoir about reading in the throes of motherhood, in Jerusalem, with young young kids. Worth a library checkout.

Kurshan put words to so much of what I’ve been feeling and thinking as a new mom. The relatability alone made this worth the read for me. As a Christian, I was inspired and challenged by how Kurshan and members of the Jewish faith embed scripture into their memories and lives. I want to see all of the fiction I read through the lens of scripture in the way that Kurshan does. This book is well-written and although it’s for a very niche audience, the right readers will really enjoy it.
Each of the five sections is sort of its own essay. There is some redundancy toward the end.

Thank you to Net Galley, the author and St. Martin’s Press for the eARC!

A beautiful ode to the power of literature and sharing it with those closest to you. Not exactly what I was expecting, but an interesting premise

The Jewish people are truly the people of the book. This book is at once a very specific memoir of a family's reading life with their 5 young children, and also of the power of Old Testament stories woven through lives over generations and millennia of Jews (with powerful echoes for us as Christians). The author has a very unique position as a native English speaker, born and raised in the US, now living in Israel and fluent in Hebrew (working as a translator, in fact). I love how she structured the story of their lives along the pattern of the Five Books of Moses - as it should be.

There was so much nostalgia for me in the Genesis chapter as she mentioned board books and picture books long forgotten now that my children are much older.

I don't think I've ever seen a family so dedicated to reading! When she mentioned reading in between contractions in the hospital and then reading a special piece immediately to the newborn, I was pretty shocked. 😂 That is truly the next level of dedication to the reading life.

This is not a bad book, but I'm abandoning it. The title only tells you half of what's going on here, and it's what attracted me. I love to read, and I was relentless in reading to my daughter in hopes it would make her also love to read; it didn't, but the sadness about that was only a tiny part of why I stopped reading this book.

The book is organized around the five books of the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deutoronomy), with short chapters about different children's books and how they played into the lives of Kurshan's children as they grow up in a very observant Jewish household in Israel, and how their themes tie to the Torah in her mind.

I am just not religious and not that interested in the details of the bible, so the parallels between Genesis and The Very Hungry Caterpillar do not interest me. If you are religious and especially if you are Jewish, this book will resonate deeply for you. It's gracefully written but sadly not for me. I was going to persevere but when I realize I was only halfway through I just didn't want to spend time on it anymore. I would probably not have asked to read it if I knew it was half religious exegesis.