National Geographic Jewish Heritage Travel

Journalist, author, and travel expert Ruth Ellen Gruber presents a new edition of her acclaimed 1992 guide to Jewish heritage sites in Eastern Europe. Widely acknowledged as the best and most comprehensive book of its kind, this is the only Jewish travel guidebook that takes visitors to hundreds of fascinating sites in small villages and remote hamlets as well as major cities.

This expanded and updated edition includes new coverage of Austria, Ukraine, and Lithuania in addition to Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and all of the former Yugoslavia, areas that are the ancestral home to the great majority of North American Jews. Gruber provides specific historical and cultural information about these Central and Eastern European nations. Then she journeys across each country, exploring Jewish roots in major cities and small shtetls, describing the vestiges of each Jewish community and offering personal insights and reflections on the various people she meets.

Readers will find a wealth of practical travel information throughout, including a language guide, listings of useful local addresses, and up-to-date details on sites that have only recently become accessible to visitors. From exploring the massive 16th-century synagogue in the historic Polish town of Pincrow to strolling among the 12,000 headstones crowded into the old Jewish cemetery in Prague, to meeting resident Jews proudly embracing their ancient culture in Slovenia, this volume takes you on a very special and memorable tour. More

Ruth Ellen Gruber an American writer based in Europe, has published and lectured widely on contemporary Jewish issues in Europe and has traveled extensively throughout east and central Europe documenting Jewish heritage sites. She writes a regular Jewish travel column for www.centropa.org and contributes to many publications. A foreign correspondent with UPI for more than a decade, Gruber has won two Simon Rockover awards for excellence in Jewish journalism. Currently, she divides her time between a farmhouse in Umbria and an apartment in Budapest.