American short story Writer and Novelist best known for her collection The Pagan Rabbi and Other Stories, her novel The Puttermesser Papers, and other works that focus on Jewish life in America. Her 2010 novel, Foreign Bodies, was nominated for both the Jewish Quarterly-Wingate Prize and the Orange Prize.
After graduating from New York University, she received an M.A. in English from Ohio State University.
She was bullied in school for refusing to sing Christmas carols.
She was born in New York City to Russian-Jewish immigrants. She married attorney Bernard Hallote. The couple has a daughter named Rachel.
David Foster Wallace called her one of the greatest living American Writers.
