Customer Reviews

Yom Kippur a Go-Go: A Memoir

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Compelling book by a great author. Found another of his books, Nevermind the Goldbergs and fell in love with it. Read this one in a day, and it's a compelling and funny story that I couldn't put down. Defintely recommend it!

Matthue Roth's autobiography is the story of a young man who has decided to become an Orthodox Jew in the way punk rock kids go straight-edge. Like, you're born one way, but then it gets serious.

What's more he decided to move to San Francisco and hang out with a ragtag bunch of, I don't know, San Francisco people that I can only assume would have knocked his rabbi's socks off. Which I don't know much about. I came to this book as a Christian-raised East coaster who lacks a big picture in most of the matters described herein.

Simply put, I was blown away.

Whether these memoirs are half-remembered or utterly fabricated is impossible for me to say - for all I know every word of the novel could be direct from a diary and true as gospel - but I have never encountered such a touching and fascinating insight into the process of being a twenty whatever year old kid and moving somewhere looking for something and finding what might have possibly been what you were looking for, and maybe not.

Fascinating because of the detail. When sometimes, after a few too many drinks, I might think to myself how interesting my life has been and, if events were laid in the proper order, it might actually be interesting, could actually feel like a book. Roth seems to have drunk just enough to remember it all perfectly and beautifully. His descriptions of ennui and hopelessness read like boredom preening its fur with waves of electricity rippling down the novel's spine.

Many could easily compare this to Dave Eggar's blockbuster knock 'em sock 'em of young man memoir a few years back. And the comparison isn't too off; these are two stories of two men moving to SAN FRANCISCO, a city that effectively doesn't exist as there is no place in the world that could independantly serve their very different needs. And yet, while in neither of these tales the city provided the satisfaction which the authors originally saught, both have their endings. And as a reader, it was I that was satisfied.

Matthue Roth is a generational misfit, a man who looks to tradition while riding the waves of the Pacific future. His story is a story of shock, awe and exposure that while different than my own is a part of my generational history. Read this book.

Matthue Roth is so not normal. His book is one about a journey, but not a clear-cut path. This road to self-discovery is about the actual trail, not the final arrival, because there is not one; rather, this is just a snippet of an honest voice, a revealing character. YKAGG is basically about a man growing up, moving to San Francisco, exploring his Judaism, as well as everything else around him, and being kick-ass the whole way through, all set to a soundtrack of rhythmic experiences, flowing thoughts, footnotes, and They Might Be Giants. On his path, Matthue befriends rainbow-hued feminists, wandering transgenders, Orthodox rabbis, and strippers, to name a few. His world is interesting, to say the least. But Matthue's voice lends irony and a genuine heart. He is open, and open-minded. His honesty draws in the reader to listen to his stories of a world where everyone has a story too, and where curiosity is golden. As Matthue grows, the reader feels as though he or she has been observing a friend, listening to a tale of guess-what-just-happened-last-night. Matthue Roth is compleely un-pretentious and keeps his punk meets geeky meets introspective edge throughout the memoir. Yom Kippur A Go-Go maintains a certain integrity and is not presented as anything life-changing, but as a look into a time in a life, that of a person who is absolutely crazy, and amazing too.

In Yom Kipppur a go go, the author revels in difference, like so many of us who live here in the San Francisco area. He moves between several sub-cultures and gives plenty of yummy details from both an outsider and a newish insider perspective. This slice-of-life engaged me, made me laugh and made me ponder the integration (or lack of) varying parts of my own life.

Matthue Roth: Ang Huling Hudyo ng Amerika

Kung nais ninyong upang malaman
Paano Upang Sumulat Sa Bituin
Prosa
Basahin Yom Kippur Isang Go-Go:
Isang dakila talambuhay
Sa iyong harapan
At siguraduhin na isulat nang mabilis
Mga tala tabi sa gilid
Tungkol sa aming pagpapatapon
Dahil Matthue na ito ay may
Tapos durog uhog gumapang yugto
Kadukhaan
Umasa himnastiko sa loob araw-bagyo
Katulad Basterds ng Bataan
Mula baybayin sa baybayin

Kung ako ay magandang-dalaga
Magandang-dalaga
Magandang-dalaga
At ina at ama
Tinuruan ako kung paano mag magdasal
Kapag mga pitson umyak
Gusto umikot sa David Ang Hari at sabihin,
Tito Matthue ay dito!

Upang manatili at maglaro at magdasal sandali
Sa amin sumisikdo
Umuna

Ang Pangalan

[English translation for all you sticklers]:

Matthue Roth: The Last Jew of America

If you desire to learn
How To Write Stellar
Prose
Reread Yom Kippur A Go-Go:
A memorable memoir
In yo face to Face
And be sure to scribble
Liner notes along the margins
About our personal exile
Because Matthue's been there
Done splat snot crawl stage
Diving into dumpsters
Hoping windmills into sun-storms
Like Basterds of Bataan
Frum coast to coaster

If I were, baby
Baby
Baby
And Mami e Papi
Taught me how to
Daven when doves cry
I'd turn to Dovid ha'Malekh and say,
Uncle Matthue is here!
To stay and play and just pray awhile
With us, quivering
Before

The'Name

This book was educational in terms of Modern Orthodoxy and made the practice understandable and the observants relateable in ways us Reform and Conservative Jewish types don't usually encounter (or Gentiles for that matter). That having been said, I found this book very grating. Roth is trying VERY hard to be hip, modern and edgy....too hard actually. He hung out with some fascinating and unusual characters throughout his journey, but after awhile I felt he was bashing me over the head with just HOW fascinating and unusual they were. We get it, you're shomer negiah and living with a transgender lesbian. Pretty unusual, got it. You play skins v. shirts basketball with lesbian strippers, transgender dykes and men wearing heels and beehives. Fascinating. You're hip, now let's move on to discuss something else. The book moves along very nicely the first 1/3, gets bogged down in the middle and the last 1/3 is just immobile, stuck in it's own self importance. About half way through the book I started to ask the author "Where is this going?" Answer: nowhere.