In Monkey Boy, Francisco Goldman’s “brilliantly constructed auto-fiction” (NPR), we meet Francisco Goldberg, a middle-aged writer grappling with the challenges of family and love, legacies of violence and war, and growing up as the son of immigrants – a Guatemalan Catholic mother and a Russian Jewish father – in a predominantly white, working-class Boston suburb. Told in an irresistibly funny, tender and passionate voice, this extraordinary portrait of family explores the pressures of living between worlds.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR, Boston Globe, Kirkus Reviews, AND Washington Independent Review of Books

WINNER OF THE ALMA AWARD FOR BEST JEWISH FICTION

“Monkey Boy is a moving story on what it means to be Jewish and Catholic, what it means to have immigrant parents from vastly different parts of the world, and how a Guatemalan Jewish kid in a white Boston suburb finds his way in the world.” — ALMA

About the Author
Francisco Goldman has published four previous novels and two books of nonfiction. The Long Night of White Chickens was awarded the American Academy’s Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction. The Interior Circuit was named by the Los Angeles Times one of 10 best books of the year. The Art of Political Murder is now an HBO documentary. Goldman’s most recent novel, Say Her Name, won the Prix Femina étranger. His books have been published in sixteen languages.

About Rachel Buff
Rachel Ida Buff teaches history and comparative ethnic studies at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She is author, most recently, of A is for Asylum Seeker: Words for People on the Move/A de Asilo: Palabras para Personas en Movimiento (Fordham University Press, 2020). Currently she is working on a novel, Holy Toledo, and a book of essays, Thinking Like a Caravan.

The book may be purchased from Boswell Books 

In partnership with Boswell Books
Co-sponsors: UWM’s English Department, Creative Writing and Cultures and Communities programs, and Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies

Part of the Stahl Center’s ‘Colors of Jewishness’ series, made possible with generous funding from Bader Philanthropies and the Ettinger Family Foundation