Marching to Zion

The tempestuous, tragic love story of a beautiful Jewish immigrant and a charismatic black man during the early twentieth century

Mags Preacher, a young black woman with a dream, arrives in St. Louis from the piney woods of her family home in 1916, hoping to learn the beauty trade. She knows nothing about Jews except that they killed the Lord Jesus Christ. Then she begins working for Mr. Fishbein, an Eastern European émigré who fled the pogroms that shattered his life to become the proprietor of Fishbein’s Funeral Home. By the time he saves Mags from certain death during the 1917 race riots in East St. Louis, all her perceptions have changed. But Mr. Fishbein’s daughter, the troubled redheaded beauty Minerva, is a different matter. There is something wrong with the girl, something dangerous, something fateful. And it is Magnus Bailey, Mags’s first friend in the city, who learns to what heights and depths the girl’s willful spirit can drive a man.

Marching to Zion is the tragic love story of Minerva Fishbein and Magnus Bailey, a charismatic black man and the longtime business partner of Minerva’s father. From the brutal riots of East St. Louis to Memphis, Tennessee, during the 1920s and the Depression, Marching to Zion is a tale of passion, betrayal, and redemption during an era in America when interracial love could not go unpunished. Readers of Mary Glickman’s One More River will celebrate the return of Aurora Mae Stanton, who joins a cast of vibrant new characters in this tense and compelling Southern-Jewish novel that examines the price of love and the interventions of fate.

***

Mary Glickman is a writer, public relations professional, and fundraiser who has worked with Jewish charities and organizations. Born on the south shore of Boston, Glickman studied at the Université de Lyon and Boston University. While she was raised in a strict Irish-Polish Catholic family, from an early age Glickman felt an affinity toward Judaism and converted to the faith when she married. After living in Boston for twenty years, she and her husband traveled to South Carolina and discovered a love for all things Southern. Glickman now lives in Seabrook Island, South Carolina, with her husband, cat, and beloved horse, King of Harts. Marching to Zion is her third novel. Her first novel, Home in the Morning, has been optioned for film by Jim Kohlberg, director of The Music Never Stopped (Sundance 2011), and her second, One More River, was a 2011 National Jewish Book Award Finalist in Fiction.

Praise for Marching to Zion:

“A powerful tale of love, hatred, violence, hope, and regeneration. At its center, lives entwined, are a black man and a Jewish refugee, each as staunch and tenacious as the Zion they both seek.” —Sonia Taitz, author of The Watchmaker’s Daughter

“A literary triumph, and easily the best novel I have read this year. Mary Glickman’s story of hope burns brightly through the darkness, driven by characters fighting to maintain dignity above all else.” —Sandi Krawchenko Altner, author of Ravenscraig

“Mary Glickman gives us a nuanced image of our twentieth-century selves, our society woven into stunning art. I see the Mississippi floods, the Jewish and African American dance of interconnection, and ultimately our paired journey toward Zion.” —Carolivia Herron, author of Thereafter Johnnie and Nappy Hair

"This moving novel . . . . handled with credibility by the talented Glickman . . . . is sustained by the rich period detail and by strong and fully realized characters." —Booklist

"Coincidence or not, the publication of Marching to Zion on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of The March on Washington is a powerful reminder of the discrimi­nation and unspeakable hardships African Americans suffered . . . . Marching to Zion is a memorable story, with a very clear message that the journey is not over." —Jewish Book Council

"Readers who are interested in Southern historical novels examining black-white relationships and those who enjoy good storytelling are the natural audience here." —Library Journal

"Religion isn’t the only thing that stirs Glickman to fervor: she writes in a high-drama, no-holds-barred style when it comes to romance. . . . [an] entertaining novel about sins of the flesh and the redemptive power of belief." —Publishers Weekly

"Glickman skillfully conveys the struggles of African-Americans and Jews during this era. . . ." —Kirkus Reviews

Praise for Home in the Morning:

“Home in the Morning kept me home all morning and most of the afternoon as well, since I couldn’t stop reading it.” —Lisa Alther, bestselling author of Kinflicks

“A treasury of tension and compassion.” —Norman Lebrecht, author of Song of Names, Winner of the 2002 Whitbread Prize

Praise for One More River:

"With fine craft, pivoting back and forth in time, the author illuminates 'Southern' Jews. They are recognizably southern in a regional, secular manner, familiar in a cultural sense, and, all too familiarly, seen as a group apart. We are with them as their lives precede and then coincide with two of the most fought over social issues of the twentieth century: the civil rights movement and the women’s movement." —The Jewish Book Council

* National author appearances

* National media campaign

* National online and print review campaign

* Online and trade advertising campaign

* Display and mobile advertising campaign

* Digital author documentary

* Extensive social media outreach

* Featured on openroadmedia.com and its social entities