Book Review

CONFUSED

from page 115

Orthodox rabbi who converted her
proclaims that he made a mistake in
doing so after hearing that she has
become a lesbian.
Duh.
/-'
And if the personal drama is not
enough to make the reader set down
the book, the writing may be.
This woman, a former publisher of a
, national Jewish magazine, seems unable
to construct her story in a cohesive
fashion. For example, she begins a dis-
course on food and its link to Judaism.
Suddenly, she shifts to memories of her
grandfather, his expansive ranch, his
orders for the ranch hands to hunt and
how that contradicts with Judaism's
teaching on hunting.

A life like a car
spinning out of
control.

It is this inability to tell the story in
an understandable way that leaves the
reader even more dazed and confused
than by the alternative twists and turns
that Fink's life takes.
But perhaps most disturbing in this
\ book is her assertion that her experi-
ence is actually common among con-
verts.
Only a few converts to Judaism
have written about their lives ... Their
stories are positive throughout, perhaps
true for some converts but not for
most, as I've learned ... There is another
story to tell. This one is far stormier,
fraught with ambiguities and vacilla-
_ tions," she writes. "In many ways my
story is universal."
Ambiguities? Sure, we all have them.
Vacillations? Perhaps. But no convert I
know has gone from being a Protestant
to an atheist to an Orthodox Jew to a
secularist, from heterosexual to homo-
sexual, and then have the self-aggran-
dizing and delusional thoughts that his
or her experience is even close to uni-
versal.
This is not a book I would recom-
mend to anyone considering conver-
sion nor to those who have already
gone through it. At best, it offers little
chunks on the history of conversion; at
worst, it is the personal tale of a self-
important, hysterical woman whose life
seems out of control, desperately seek-
ing purpose.
Nor can I recommend this book to
those born Jewish lest you think all of
us who have converted are this insane.

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