Christmas Jars

Written by: Jason F. Wright

First line: Louise Jensen was sitting alone, licking her fingers two at a time and paying serious attention to her greasy chicken-leg-and-thigh-platter, when she heard muffled crying from the booth behind her at Chuck's Chicken 'n' Biscuits on U.S. Highway 4. 

Why you should read this book: This definitely falls under the category of "books that I read because they were there" (in this case, "there" being, "in this AirBnB where I'm reuniting with my family since we're all vaccinated"). It's a sappy sweet pay-it-forward Christmas miracle story about an orphan girl who grows up to be a journalist in search of her first big scoop. When her apartment is burglarized on Christmas Eve, her despair turns to wonder and determination after an anonymous stranger leaves a jar of money at her door.

Why you shouldn't read this book: Saccharine, predictable, and dully expository. 

The Yiddish Policeman's Union

Written by: Michael Chabon

First line: Nine months Landsman's been flopping at the Hotel Zamenhof without any of his fellow residents managing to get themselves murdered.

Why you should read this book: In prose so lush you could graze a herd of cattle on it, Chabon creates an alternate history in which the State of Israel lasted a mere three months before before being overrun by enemies in 1948; subsequently, the United States allowed a large number of Jews to settle in a temporary district in Sitka, Alaska. Here, in the modern day, we meet Detective Meyer Landsman, seeking solace from his multiple losses in a bottle of Slivovitz until some yid he doesn't even know gets his ticket punched in the terrible flophouse where Landsman is biding time until the district reverts to American control and he loses his job and everything else. His new boss, who happens to be his ex-wife, childhood sweetheart, and the only woman he's ever loved, tells him to let it go, but Landsman finds himself compelled to follow the case to its bitter end, even though every lead leads him deeper into personal danger and troubled territory.

Why you shouldn't read this book: You have a limited vocabulary and no Yiddishkeit.