This extraordinary novel is part of Grigory Kanovich’s "Litvak saga," his tribute to Jewish life before the Holocaust. Set in a small Lithuanian town in the late nineteenth century, the story begins with the arrival of a stranger who sets everyone on edge and seems to know their secrets. Is he a messenger from God, a long-lost son, a saint, or a madman? As the stranger in the velvet yarmulke makes his rounds, we meet an unforgettable cast of characters—Rabbi Uri, the aged rabbi; Itsik Magid, the strapping young woodcutter; the resourceful widow Golda; Markus Fradkin, the wealthy timber merchant, and his beautiful daughter Zelda; Yeshua Mandel, the tavern keeper, his troubled son Simeon, and their devoted servant girl Morta. A work of realism as well as a parable, Kanovich’s novel illuminates the most intimate fears, dreams, and longings of the shtetl’s inhabitants.

Shtetl Love Song is a requiem for the pre-war Jewish shtetl, for a people and a way of life that was destroyed. Set in the rural Lithuanian landscape on the eve of World War II, `Shtetl Love Song' is full of tender affection, soft irony, and sharp observations. Guided by the memory of his beloved mother, the masterful narrator takes us into the very midst of his enchanted family world, recreating the past that is irrevocably destroyed and yet fully alive in his memory. Kanovich, himself a child of a Lithuanian shtetl who survived the Holocaust almost by a miracle, made it his mission to serve, against all odds, as a custodian of the collective memory of generations of Litvaks, Lithuanian Jews.' - Mikhail Krutikov, Professor of Slavic and Judaic Studies, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. The novel won the Liudas Dovydenas Prize awarded by the Lithuanian Writers' Union. Winner the Liudo Dovydeno Prize awarded by the Lithuanian Writers' Union