Kosher Chinese

A funny and informative account of life in Guizhou province, deep in the heart of China. As a Peace Corps volunteer, Michael Levy came to know and love a part of the country that few visitors see, a world away from Beijing and Shanghai. --Peter Hessler, author of River Town and Oracle Bones

As a Peace Corps volunteer, Michael Levy taught for two years in a corner of China overlooked by tourists and correspondents. Kosher Chinese is a heartfelt, engaging memoir that captures at once the poignancy and humor of daily life in the new China. Levy's narrative balances his own acclimation to China with his students' acclimation to university life, and independence. This is what it feels like to be immersed behind the headlines--for Levy, it came to feel like home. --Michael Meyer, author of The Last Days of Old Beijing: Life in the Vanishing Backstreets of a City Transformed

Michael Levy is the tour guide to the real China we all long for. Funny, insightful, full of warmth and wit, Kosher Chinese brims with interesting characters and scenes, and it marks the debut of a fresh new voice in American writing. --Bruce Feiler, author of Walking the Bible and The Council of Dads

With intelligence and zesty good humor, Levy tells the story of his sojourn as an ESL teacher in Guiyang... A rollicking, thoroughly refreshing debut. --Kirkus

As in Peter Hessler's River Town...and Peter J. Vernezze's Socrates in Sichuan..., Peace Corps experience is the inspiration for Levy's cheekier and freewheeling but insightful adventure story. --Library Journal

Michael Levy is an educator, writer, and traveler, who currently teaches in Brooklyn, New York, at Saint Ann's School. Levy returns frequently to Guiyang to check in on his students and visit the basketball courts where he momentarily attained stardom. While in the United States, he keeps strictly kosher. While in China, he eats anything with four legs except the table.