Erika Dreifus

Toward the end of each week, the My Machberet blog presents a collection of links, drawn primarily from the world of Jewish books and writing.

• Published this week: This Cursed Beautiful Land: A Russian-American Story by Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, detailing the American author’s arrest in Russia, 16-month imprisonment there, and eventual release in a U.S.-Russia prisoner swap. “Most of the coverage is about the prison,” writes Benyamin Cohen for the Forward. “But Jewish history runs through the book from its first pages.” Read more.
• Slated for release next Tuesday (October 6): Brett McGurk’s Brink: Inside the Race to Free the October 7th Hostages. This week, however, The Atlantic published an attention-grabbing adapted excerpt (gift link).
• Applications for fellowship grants from the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture are now open. Note that although the deadline is November 23; applications must be preceded by an intake form to determine eligibility. “The purpose of the MFJC Fellowship program is to assist well-qualified individuals in carrying out an independent post-doctoral scholarly, literary or art project, in a field of Jewish specialization, which makes a significant contribution to the understanding, preservation or transmission of Jewish culture.” (Via email, I have confirmed that the grant amount is $10,000.) NB: This opportunity is among the 50+ fee-free and paying/funded competitions and calls featured in the October edition of The Practicing Writer 2.0, which went out to subscribers yesterday.
• Also yesterday: Natan and Jew­ish Book Coun­cil announced the latest Natan Notable Book: Return­ing: A Search for Home Across Three Cen­turies by Nicholas Lemann (Liv­eright Pub­lish­ing, 2026). “Twice a year, Natan Notable Books rec­og­nizes recent­ly pub­lished or about-to-be-pub­lished non-fic­tion books that promise to cat­alyze con­ver­sa­tions aligned with the themes of Natan’s grant­mak­ing: rein­vent­ing Jew­ish life and com­mu­ni­ty for the twen­ty-first cen­tu­ry, shift­ing notions of indi­vid­ual and col­lec­tive Jew­ish iden­ti­ty, the his­to­ry and future of Israel, under­stand­ing and con­fronting con­tem­po­rary forms of anti­semitism, and the evolv­ing rela­tion­ship between Israel and world Jewry.” Returning, as you may recall, was published earlier this year; the award program is currently open for submissions (eligible titles must have a pub­li­ca­tion date between May 1, 2026 and May 1, 2027).
• And from The Jewish Book Garden: a new monthly feature compiling notable gleanings from “Jewish kidlit on the interwebs,” including recent book deals, starred pre-pub reviews, and other news/interviews.

Shabbat shalom and chag sameach.