Author, author!

I recently fulfilled a promise I made to myself over four years ago, when I turned 50: I published a book.  Took me about three years longer than I had planned, but what the heck, "better late than never."

Those of you who are observant (in the "noticing things sense" not necessarily in the "religious" sense!) may have noticed on the right side of the blog a new section "Reb Barry's new book."  I posted the link, but didn't really promote it too much yet, as I wanted to see a copy of the finished product myself.  I've finally done that, and cleaned up the typos / grammatical errors that were still there after MANY hours of editing, and I finally feel the book is ready for "prime time."

God, Torah, and the Meaning of Life: Musings on the things that matter is a collection of things I've written over the last seven or eight years.  Most of which have been published online before.  So why collect them into a book?

I wanted to write a book that captured my "life's philosophy," largely as something to pass on to my kids.  Having passed the age of 50, I noticed it was no longer unheard of for people my age to suddenly drop dead.  I also observed that in the digital age, when we don't leave physical pages of drafts of things sitting around, posterity is not what it once was.  Yes, stuff on the internet sometimes seems to live forever; but stop paying the bill, and you'll probably find it disappears in the blink of an eye. 

As I started thinking about it, I realized that this book had already been written — just not as a book, but rather as essays, a piece at time.  The essays in the book really do capture my thoughts on everything from the nature of God to how to connect to God to ritual, ethics, Israel, Conservative Judaism, and yes, the meaning of life!

Clicking on either the above link or the picture of the book's cover on the right will bring you to a page with additional information, including a sample chapter, the table of contents, and information on how to order the book in all the most popular formats: hardcover, softcover, pdf and Kindle.

As always, I welcome your feedback, comments, suggestions, etc.  If you read and enjoy the book, a review posted on Amazon would be most appreciated!

B'vracha,

Reb Barry