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All-of-a-Kind Family, Sydney Taylor (1951)

Poor Jewish girls lead rich lives in turn-of-century New York

by
Lizzie Skurnick
September 17, 2013

Ask any non-Jew where they first learned about Jews, and chances are it’s from the All-of-a-Kind Family, Sydney Taylor’s brilliant series about five sisters growing up in turn-of-the-century New York. Spanning the Lower East Side to the Bronx to abroad, the books detail the quotidian and the global: buying fish at the market; WWI; a vacation at Far Rockaway; a polio epidemic—creating an intimate and marvelous portrait of Jewish religion, culture, and family for generations of readers.

Lizzie Skurnick, the editor-in-chief of Lizzie Skurnick Books, writes the New York Times Magazine‘s “That Should Be a Word” column, and is a frequent contributor to NPR’s All Things Considered.

Lizzie Skurnick, the editor-in-chief of Lizzie Skurnick Books, writes the New York Times Magazine‘s “That Should Be a Word” column, and is a frequent contributor to NPR’s All Things Considered.