Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook
Malkah’s Notebook

Mira Z. Amiras

Malkah’s Notebook

A Journey into the Mystical Aleph-Bet
$34.95
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About the Book

"Musing through a space that’s somewhere between an illuminated, psalmic narrative poem and a graphic novel attuned to the soul, Malkah’s Notebook is an intimate trip through Jewish mysticism and feminist theology." —Foreword Reviews

Malkah is a child when her father tries teaching her to read Torah. But they don’t get very far. As Malkah studies, her questions multiply. She discovers an earlier, hidden story of creation within the Hebrew Aleph-Bet letters in the first line of Genesis. And a door opens. Malkah’s discovery takes her on a lifelong journey in search of her beginnings—into Jewish mystical texts, far-off places, archaeological digs, ancient gods, and ultimately into the nature of existence itself.

Part bedtime story, part poem, part journal, and coupled with highly evocative illustrations, Malkah’s Notebook is a love letter to the Hebrew alphabet that unlocks life’s greatest mysteries.

Awards and Press

Foreword Reviews

Musing through a space that’s somewhere between an illuminated, psalmic narrative poem and a graphic novel attuned to the soul, Malkah’s Notebook is an intimate trip through Jewish mysticism and feminist theology.

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The Jewish Voice and Opinion

Malkah’s Notebook... is an inspiring celebration of the Hebrew alphabet.

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Natalie Reid - Author of The Spiritual Alchemist: Working with the Voice of your Soul

Both visually captivating and profoundly stirring, Malkah’s Notebook perfectly captures the woman’s journey— You will come away asking questions you have never thought to ask and perhaps starting to seek in places you had never thought to enter.

Rabbi Elisheva Salamo - San Francisco and Johannesburg

Malkah’s Notebook is a book to be savored.

Rabbi Lavey Yitzchak Derby - Omek HaLev Center for Jewish Spiritual Learning and Practice

Stunning visually, inspiring and deepening… a masterful depiction of a spiritual journey, of a life and a life’s work, of the holiness of questions, and of the magnificent harmony of many mystical traditions all presented with tenderness and love.

Yair Dalal - Mizrachi composer

musician

Malkah’s Notebook is a fabulous piece of art, with food for thought in every image, letter, word, and line. Storytelling filled with new perspectives, full of imagination, inviting us to open our minds on what we thought we knew.

Daniel Matt - author of God and the Big Bang

The Essential Kabbalah

An inspiring journey into the realm of Kabbalah.

Beowulf Sheehan

author of Author and photographer

Malkah’s Notebook: A Journey into the Mystical Aleph-Bet shares the beauty of language, its becoming, its form, its meaning, and its wonder to fill the journey of life.

Jewish Book Council Awards - Judge's Remarks

Part long-form poem, part con­tem­po­rary illu­mi­na­tion, and part graph­ic nov­el.

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More In This Series

Malkah's Notebook Collection  •  Mira Z. Amiras
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Malkah’s Notebook

A Journey into the Mystical Aleph-Bet

$34.95
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Malkah’s Journals: Our Lady of the Rivers (#1) $18.95
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Malkah’s Journals: The Day Before Creation (#2) $18.95
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Malkah’s Journals: The Dolphins of Knossos (#3) $18.95

Meet the Author

Mira Z. Amiras is an anthropologist, author, and award-winning filmmaker. She was raised on her mother’s accounts of the Inquisition and Holocaust, her father’s tales of the creation and beauty of the universe, and her grandparents’ foods, folklore and music of ancient Sefarad. Mira has lived, studied, and traveled throughout the Middle East and North Africa, camped out 7,000 miles through Africa, and traveled overland from Istanbul to the Nepalese border. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and is Professor Emerita of Comparative Religion and Middle East Studies at San Jose State University. Mira is past president of the Society for the Anthropology of Consciousness, and was a member of the Executive Board of the American Anthropological Association. She lives in San Francisco with her family—witnessing the birth of new tales as we speak.

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Meet the Illustrator

Josh Baum was born in London and grew up in Bristol. He studied painting at the Masana School in Barcelona then moved to Sfat to study in a Hasidic yeshivah where he trained as a Hebrew scribe. After writing a Torah scroll in Jerusalem, Josh attained an MA in Fine Art from Central St Martins in London, for which he was awarded the Future Map prize. In his work as both artist and scribe, he explores the Hebrew letters as sacred signs as well as objects of profound beauty. Josh is a published author and illustrator and lives in Mitzpe Ramon, Israel, where he is director of the art school.

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