Dome of the Rock, Muslim Quarter, (Old City, Jerusalem)
Praise & Press for
This Year in Jerusalem
“Barken, who based the book on his own experiences living on a kibbutz in southern Israel from 2009 to 2010, incorporates characters from almost every walk of life to weave together a complex and well-written story that readers will find hard to tear themselves away from.”
-Baltimore Jewish Times
“The stories in This Year in Jerusalem by Jeffrey F. Barken relate much more than just the author’s experiences volunteering on a kibbutz…Barken’s debut collection, leaves the reader with an appetite for more. The author is currently living for a year in Haifa. Hopefully, his new experiences will make their way into literary form, whether as interconnected stories or possibly, even as a novel.”
-Times of Israel
אחד הדברים היקרים בספר, מלבד התמונה שלנו המצטיירת ממנו, הוא היכולת לספר סיפור ללא שיפוטיות. רציתי מסר מהיקום? קיבלתי אותו בגדול! יש בספר הזה כל כך הרבה יופי, צניעות, עדינות, קבלה ואהבה שלא פלא שקיבלתי אותו עכשיו. רציתי לדעת איך ניתן לקבל דברים ללא שיפוטיות? הנה המסע שלי מתחיל
– Saloona, (Review in Hebrew)
Christian Quarter. (Old City, Jerusalem
“Each story is a video of its own, painted in colors that evoke the senses of sight, smell and touch: The brown curls of a little girl and of a beloved mother before her illness, the spice colors in the market, the whitecaps on a chilly lake, the green (and yellow) turf in the kibbutz and the mud flowing there, the taste and smell of salt, the aromas of a Thanksgiving dinner in Jerusalem! For a while, we are part of this world.”
-Beach Lloyd Press, (Amazon Review)
“The book contains beautiful India ink and acrylic illustrations by Diane Muller. The stories take place in the US and the Middle East and reveal the sometimes deeply overlapping and other times just barely touching links in the lives of a group of world travelers.”
– What Weekly