Customer Reviews

Much Ado About Jessie Kaplan

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is an absolutely delightful book. The plot is engaging, and the writing is elegant. Ms Cohen truly has a way with words, and the book is loaded with expertly crafted turns of phrase. The writing is Austen-esque, with its superb portrayals of the minutiae of daily life and its detailed look at the comedy of manners that is the life of its characters. The humor is engaging, drawing snorts of laughter and of recognition as situations arise that are, at least by analogy, part of my own life.

This books deals impeccably and elegantly with several themes of the human comedy. These include: the rite of passage into adulthood that is the bar (or bat) mitzvah (fabulous portrayal of a twelve-year-old girl here), several rites of passage for adults, including maturing into true adulthood, mid-life crises, and coping with aging parents, and the rite of passage that is aging itself (we should all be as lucky as Jessie!).

This is a wonderful book, and a worthy second novel (not a sequel) to the glorious Jane Austen in Boca, Ms Cohen's first novel.

I enjoyed Ms. Cohen's first book, Jane Austen in Boca, so much, that when I saw that she had published a second novel, I did a little dance in front of my computer. She writes the type of book in which kind, funny, intelligent people do their best to live honorable lives despite all the obstacles that the world (and often their families and friends) throw into their paths. The characters are vivid, their problems are universal. It's lovely, smart and beautifully written book.

This novel was a fun little romp, especially for those who have at least a basic understanding of Shakespeare's plays. I'm not sure the end of the Jessie Kaplan plot was well explained or reasoned out, it felt too sudden (I can't give more detail for risk of ruining the plot).
My main criticism is that Cohen, while desciribing the Bar/Bat Mitzvah culture of East Coast Jews (Midwest and south is a bit more reserved), missed an opportunity to make a sharper critique of the situation in which the ceremony is downplayed and the party is the main event. Certainly Cohen issued a critique of this culutre, but it is weak at best and with a bit more humor and even exaggeration she could have made a point more forcefully. The main charachter, Carla, seems downright uninterested in the ceremony, except for the speech, for most of the book.
Good poolside reading. YOu won't gain any deep insights into the human condition. I hope that Cohen wasn't trying for that, or she missed badly.

Much Ado About Jessie Kaplan is a fun, quick, and funny read. The book is chock full of current cultural references that make the reader feel as though she's living in the world of the central characters. In the midst of planning her daughter's bat mitzvah, Carla Goodman's elderly mother, Jessie Kaplan, begins to speak and act strangely. She starts serving the family venison stew and uses obsolete vocabulary. Soon it comes out that Jessie believes she's the reincarnation of Shakespeare's love interest. The entire family thinks she's going senile; however, when Carla's English teacher, Hal, starts to press Jessie for details, he finds that her strange references are dead-on.

The plotlines that Cohen weaves together throughout this book are quirky and funny yet somehow still entirely believable. I really enjoyed the planning of Stephanie's bat mitzvah, which quickly gets out of hand (as such events often do).

I'd recommend this book to anyone looking for a fun, quick read. While it's not particularly deep, it's definitely entertaining.

After enjoying Paula Cohen's first novel, "Jane Austen in Boca," I looked forward to reading "Much Ado About Jessie Kaplan." I was not disappointed, although I think I prefer Cohen's first. The author's absolute strong point, as evinced in both novels, is her ability to develop elderly characters of richness, complexity, and sympathy. So perhaps it may be that Jane Austen in Boca, set in a retirement community, simply contained more of what Cohen does best.

Jessie Kaplan, both the character and the novel, is a delight. Cohen deftly weaves several plots - the delusions of a seventyish grandmother who believes in a former life she was Shakespeare's girlfriend and the prototype of Jessica in The Merchant of Venice; the impending bat mitzvah of her granddaughter, Stephanie Goodman; and the romance between her daughter Margot and Stephanie's English teacher, Hal Pearson. All these come to a delightful head, first in a remarkable trip to Venice, then at the mashed potatoes sundae station and on the dance floor of Stephanie's bat mitzvah party.

Cohen, an English professor, has a deft way of weaving quotes, anachronistic words, and metaphors into the context of grand bourgeois Jewish suburbia. Underlying the comic aspects of the novel are serious questions about family relationships, appearance and reality, and the role literature plays in real life. Cohen also does a good job of explaining the significance of the bar mitzvah ritual underneath the glitz and glitter. As Dr. Leonard Samuels, Cherry Hill's favorite psychiatrist observes, "...in the end, it's a sacred ceremony of initiation and a hell of a party. What's not to like?"

What indeed?

I'm a huge fan of Paula Marantz Cohen. I stumbled upon her first novel, Jane Austen in Boca, while browsing in the library, and I've been a fan ever since. For some reason, I missed the publication of her second novel, Much Ado About Jessie Kaplan, even though I read her most recent one, Jane Austen in Scarsdale: Or Love, Death, and the SATs.

Although it's hard to name a favorite, Much Ado About Jessie Kaplan is certainly in contention. It's the story of Carla, a stay-at-home busy planning her daughter's bat mitzvah, volunteering all over town, helping her husband with his struggling medical practice, and figuring out how to calm down her misbehaving ten-year-old son. To make matters more interesting, her mother, Jessie Kaplan, who lives with Carla and her family, suddenly remembers she was the Dark Lady, Shakespeare's mysterious girlfriend in a past life.

The plot is somewhat preposterous at first glance, but Paula Marantz Cohen's deft storytelling and rich character's made me root for the unbelievable. I laughed out loud more times than I can count, and yet, I was touched by each and every character, as they were all refreshingly realistic, yet rich and loveable. I found myself wishing I could go to Stephanie's bat mitzvah and chat with the family. Perhaps most amazingly, I learned an absurd amount about Shakespeare, Venice and Jews in the 1500s. Paula Marantz Cohen is the best kind of academic; she seamlessly blends history and literature with a modern, amusing, and touching story.

I found myself wanting to visit the Jewish ghetto in Venice. I found myself vaguely wishing that I'd had a bat mitzah. And throughout, I enjoyed the author's humor and
her writing style. She treats serious topics "lightly" & quite effectively. I'd have given it 5 stars if there had been a little more resolution of the lost sonnets issue. Not so much resolution that the book's magic vanishes, mind you. It needs just a little bit more to be perfect.

I thought this book was funny and reminded me a lot of past experiences, thoroughly enjoyed it. The book also came in excellent condition

Jessie Kaplan was a typical Jewish grandmother who settled every fight, served as the family counselor, and had the best chopped liver in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, but when she begins to "remember" her previous life as William Shakespeare's girlfriend, Carla Goodman becomes worried about her widowed mother. However, all this does is add to her growing list of problems: her teenage daughter's bat mitzvah's arrangements, her possibly ADHD ten-year-old son, and her husband's failing career as a gastroenterologist, not to mention her little sister's social life dilemma. This stay-at-home mother hopes she can find help in the genius Dr. Leonard Samuels's famous psychiatry skills, but if he can't help who will? The next thing she knows her ancient mother is off with some English teacher and his Yale colleagues in Venice searching for William Shakespeare's forgotten sonnets. Paula Marantz Cohen illustrates in her second fictional novel how life can be completely turned around by a four hundred year old dead guy who just happened to write a few legendary literature works on the way.
From the first page to the last, the author will make her readers laugh about the crazy Goodman-Kaplan household. First there is the unsuccessful father who needs his private practice to get back on it's feet and with the advice of his lovely wife, Mark hires a fresh out of college public relations manager with some exciting ideas. Now with a new, sleek haircut, designer suits, and all that bling, he has the ability to become the town's best and only gastroenterologist/television personality. There is also Mark and Carla's ten year old Jeffrey that has been recommended by basically all the staff to be put on Ritalin in order to stop being Cherry Hill's first junior delinquent in the fifth grade. Thankfully, after a visit to Dr. Samuels, Jeffrey discontinues consuming all sources of chocolate, including chocolate milk, which is his all time favorite, and the craziness ends. Last but not the easiest, Stephanie Goodman is a typical pre-bat mitzvah girl who can't find the right dress and will not have kosher food at her party, but surprisingly at the ceremony, the girl proved that she was ready to become a woman.
Carla's sister Margot is as messed up as the rest. She's a successful trial lawyer in sunny California and proves to be the champion at everything, except for love. Luckily for her, she finds the perfect match the way any woman would dream of, through her mother. In coincidence, it happens to be her niece's seventh grade English teacher, Hal Pearson, who looks just like William Shakespeare, in the opinion of Jessie anyway. Jessie confesses to Hal her memories of being the daughter of a wealthy Venetian sea merchant in the late 1500s, he approaches his Yale colleagues and goes on a quest to find the lost sonnets that Shakespeare wrote to Jessie, she claimed to have hidden under the floorboard of her former home.
Cohen put a great deal of effort and research into this brilliant book. Jessie's knowledge of the Shakespearean works, his astonishing love life, and the geographical details of the Getto Nuovu in Venice make the story of the Kaplans seem like something that happened in everyday occurrences. For example at back-to-school night in Hal's classroom, he mentioned the two subjects of the Shakespearean sonnets: a young man and the Dark Lady, but Jessie argues all were aimed at the lady, the male ones trying to make her jealous. She also says her knowledge was from personal experience, which set off the great expedition.
In the end, the Yale team of professors discovered no buried poems, but Hal did find the locket Jessie claimed Will had given her, during a solo visit to the old building. In everyone's best interest, he decided to keep the discovery to himself. Much Ado About Jessie Kaplan will take its readers on a crazy, historical ride that is sure to be enjoyed by all.

R. Turner

************************SPOILER*********************************I loved this book. I didn't think I would like it because I usually read literary fiction. This book has a few characters, which makes this book, Much ado About Jessie Kaplan a fast easy read. Carla, the main character( mother), her son is distrupting the school and causing havoc, the daughter about to become a bat mitzvah, and can't pick out the right dress, the right food and the music, the husband's practice going down the tube, between it is her mother, Jessie thinking she is shakespeare's lover. I would be ready to pull out my hair about now. Anyone, who is in the middle of planning a large reception( bar mitzvah, wedding etc) would relate to this. The question is, is it wrong for her mother to think she is shakespeare's lover. Do we let her think this way. The daughter who is becoming a Bat Mitzvah says it best in her ceremony(d'var torah). We interput things according to who we are and what we think. It's not a matter of it being true or false but of it making sense and helping us to see things that we did not see before. We can't really tell the future and we can't really understand the past- but we can find ways to interpet them that help us live our lives better."
I enjoyed reading this book, It was hilarious I could not put it down. It was a let down, when it was not as important to find the lost sonnets in Venice. But, the book had to end.
Maybe the author will sell the rights for a movie.