My Thirty-Minute Bar Mitzvah

Hilarious and heart-breaking. Hirson has the ability to evoke not just the city of his childhood, but his own thirteen-year-old voice and imagination of the world - with its perceptions, terrors and incomprehensions -- William Kentridge
Vivid... Told with a rare combination of delicacy and candour -- Ivan Vladislavic
A story digging deep into the history of the author's family and affections, into rites of passage, spreading out into notions of belonging and responsibility. . . Both entertaining and deeply moving -- Charles Lambert, author of 'The Children's Home'
This expatriate memoir draws you in with endearing humour, a South African Jewish world seen through the eyes of a boy to whom nothing is explained * Lyndall Gordon, author of 'Outsiders' *
A potent story of a diaspora coming-of-age... [A] moving, historically significant memoir * Foreword Reviews *
This gem of a book is truly a gift for readers * Vrye Weekblad *
Poetic... The intensity and honesty Hirson brings to his narrative brings it close to the reader... Singular * News24 *
Beautifully written, funny and deeply moving, My Thirty-Minute Bar Mitzvah is a perfect memoir -- Finuala Dowling, author of The Man who Loved Crocodile Tamers
A delightful memoir - poetic, racy and mischievous -- Sandile Ngidi