The Prison Minyan
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3.8 • 16 Ratings
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
A darkly comic tale of faith, fraud, and forgiveness behind bars.
Welcome to Otisville, America's only Jewish prison, where fraudsters, forgers, and tax evaders find community and solace. Led by a rabbi serving time, the inmates of the 'minyan' grapple with right and wrong amidst the challenges of prison life. But when a celebrity inmate arrives, shaking up the status quo, and a poetry professor finds herself in danger, the minyan must decide whether to uphold their values or succumb to the corrupting forces around them.
In this sharply observed novel, Jonathan Stone explores themes of redemption, morality, and the search for meaning in the most unlikely of places. Perfect for readers of contemporary fiction, Jewish literature, and stories that blend humor with profound insights, The Prison Minyan offers a wise and deeply human perspective on crime, faith, and the enduring power of community.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Thriller writer Stone (the Julian Palmer series) delivers a puckish Philip Rothesque satire of a Jewish community, specifically the members of the Otisville, N.Y., prison population. He imagines a diverse microcosm of miscreants at the low-security prison: there's Phil Steinerman, serving nine years for fraudulent blood testing clinics; Marty Adler, who is doing nine years for matrimonial fraud; Rabbi Morton Meyerson, sent there for five years for embezzlement; and others, forming the eponymous minyan. Pithy character portraits are folded into the first half of the novel, blossoming later into amusing episodes. The writing workshop, "a staple of federal prison," spawns several delightfully dizzy verses. The abrupt elimination of rugelach and blintzes leads nearly to a revolt and prompts the inmates to try to take over the food deliveries. On this level, the novel feels like a season's worth of amiable sitcom episodes. But Stone offers more, thankfully, than low-hanging comic fruit. He skillfully digs into the challenges and trials of his inmates and their incarceration as they undergo soul-searching and examine their lives, all without abandoning his effective one-liners. As Adler gratefully observes about guards turning a blind eye, "Anti-Semitism finally workin' for us." The accounts of their schemes and scams, before and after their incarceration, keep the episodic romp afloat.
