Ilana Kurshan: If All the Seas Were Ink

(Memoir, 320 p. 2017)

At the age of 27, alone in Jerusalem in the wake of a painful divorce, Kurshan adopted the practice of daf yomi: reading a page a day of the Talmud. Undaunted by the idea that it would take more than seven years to complete the full text on Jewish law, she adapted to its pace, attuned her ear to its poetry, and discovered her passions in its pages.