Sweet Like Sugar [Paperback]

Wayne Hoffman (Author)

Book Description

Release date: August 30, 2011

In Yiddish, there is a word for it: bashert - the person you are fated to meet. Twenty something Benji Steiner views the concept with scepticism. But the elderly rabbi who stumbles into Benji's office one day has no such doubts. Jacob Zuckerman's late wife, Sophie, was his bashert. And now that she's gone, Rabbi Zuckerman grapples with overwhelming grief and loneliness. Touched by the rabbi's plight, Benji becomes his helper - driving him home after work, sitting in his living room listening to stories. Their friendship baffles everyone, especially Benji's sharp-tongued, modestly observant mother. But Benji is rediscovering something he didn't know he'd lost. Yet the test of friendship, and of both men's faith, lies in the difficult truths they come to share. With each revelation, Benji learns what it means not just to be Jewish, but to be fully human - imperfect, striving, and searching for the pieces of ourselves that come only through another's acceptance.

Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Kensington; 1 Original edition (August 30, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 075826562X
• ISBN-13: 978-0758265623
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.9 x 8.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #413,635 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent, emotional look at spirituality and reconciliation September 9, 2011

By Bob Lind TOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Paperback

Benjamin Steiner grew up in a traditional (though just "almost Kosher") Jewish home in the DC suburbs. Now in his mid 20's, and openly gay, he feels disconnected from his family, his religion and - to some extent - his life, as he struggles to get his graphic design business going while placating his parents with participation in the Passover Seder.

A man comes into his life, but not exactly what Benjamin had been hoping for. Benjamin becomes a helper and listening ear to an 80-year old widowed Orthodox rabbi who lives near his office, a relationship that his family and friends don't understand, but seems to fill a need on some level. They become a teacher to each other, as the rabbi helps the young man understand Judaism as a way of life rather than just a religion. Benjamin tries to help the stubborn rabbi adapt to a more relaxed approach to traditional teachings, including reconciliation with a person from his past, and a revelation that a gay person can still be a good Jewish man.

Though I'm not Jewish, the book resonated with me on many levels, in the way that gays and lesbians try to reconcile their childhood experiences and lessons with the life we find available to us. The author treats a sensitive, relatable subject with intelligence, realistic emotion and a positive outlook toward what we can accomplish. Well written and much recommended, five stars out of five.

- Bob Lind, Echo Magazine

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Love, Spirituality and Surprise September 7, 2011

By Gilbert Cole

Format:Paperback

Hoffman's second novel is a beautiful achievement. Deeply felt, written in muscular and lucid prose, it defies easy categorization. The two protagonists are at terribly different stages of their lives but each working on the problem of being part of a loving couple: one, a 27 year old gay man is struggling to- even wondering if he can- establish a relationship that can last, the other, an orthodox Rabbi in his 80's who has lost his wife of many years and is not sure he wishes to- or can- emerge from his grief. This unlikely pair becomes another loving couple. The depth of their relationship surprises. The ways that each finds in the other things that attract and repel is told unflinchingly. Each finds that what the other sees in himself is something that he may not have expected to find. Each is surprised by how they are changed by this unexpected relationship.

One of the more refreshing features of Hoffman's book is his treatment of what can so easily be termed "spirituality"- a term that has so readily been cheapened. In Hoffman's world spirituality is earned. It is never cheap, there is no guidebook to find it, and it requires questioning what one has always thought one knew about oneself. Hoffman's sophisticated point of view about anyone's spirituality allowed this reader to feel his own private surprise. That surprise continues to resonate. This is a powerful, quiet, beautiful book that lasts.

Gilbert Cole, Ph.D, L.C.S.W.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Like an apple tree January 6, 2013

By JACK

Format:Paperback

I cannot remember how Wayne Hoffman's novel "Sweet Like Sugar" wound up on my reading list, but I am glad it did. In my experience, most "gay" fiction is dismal and desperate in its frenetic depictions of a gay man's worth being only as good as his most recent hook-up with a "hot" man; or the gay man's frustrated, perennially solitary existence as the sidekick of a straight woman. "Sweet Like Sugar" however, has allowed me to encounter a "gay" novel that transcends the often bleak presumptions of the gay fiction genre. For example: "What does cheesecake have to do with Shavuot?" Hoffman has Benji ask, but leaves the question unanswered. This Gentile reviewer eagerly consulted Google to find out.

The greater allure of the narrative is in what it doesn't portray. The main character, Benji, is an attractive 27-year-old gay man who frequents Dupont Circle gay bars, who attends the White Party (where easy sex and drugs and techno music abound), and seems to no trouble attracting the "hot" men. Yet Hoffman eloquently manages to imply Benji has a sex life without feeling the need graphically to detail it.

Now for the incredible bits: that two healthy, sexually-active Jewish gay men (Benji and his "bashert" Jamie) would spend an evening making Jewish cookies; that Benji and Jamie would seem to have their most intimate discussions not about the hot sex or the love that may be growing between them, but about the their respective quest for deeper knowledge of their respective Jewish roots. That Benji and Jamie, two gay men, possibly at the peak of their sexual attractiveness and activity, engage in intellectual religious discussion seems unreal -- possible, I guess -- but unreal. Then again, as Michelle, Benji's roommate and heterosexual BFF advised, once Benji began dating a "nice Jewish boy" perhaps a shared heritage did make for a stronger foundation for enduring compatibility that extends beyond the secular preoccupations usually associated with being gay.

Wayne Hoffman has written a subtle, poignant, and amusing novel. I will keep an eye out for more of his fiction.