Confession: I skimmed the second half. The author is a podcast host and the chapters are written like a podcast episode, like This American Life of maybe a Malcolm Gladwell piece. It just would have been better to listen than to read this.

Each chapter begins with a story about someone from the 20th century (told in a very interest piquing way) and then transitions to a notable person in the Talmud who had a similar problem as the modern person. The connections don’t always land, but it is a nice story telling format.

I think I would have enjoyed this more if I had some background knowledge on the characters, like if I had grown up going to synagogue, and then the stories really would have popped and come alive. As it was, pretty much everyone was brand new to me and thus unmemorable. I ended up remembering the modern people’s stories more.