Noah Gordon Books In Order

The Physician

‘Populated by engaging characters, rich in incicdent, and vivid in historical detail.’THE NEW YORKTIMES BOOK REVIEWIn the eleventh century London, Rob Cole left poor, disease ridden London to make his way across the land, hustling,juggling, peddling cures to the sick and discovering the mystical ways of healing. It was on his travels that he found his own very real gift for healing a gift that urged him on to become a doctor. So all consuming was his dream, that he made the perilous, unheard of journey to Persia, to its Arab universities where he would undertake a transformation that would shape his destiny forever…
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Shaman

Robert Jeremy Cole, the legendary doctor and hero of The Physician, left an enduring legacy. From the 11th century on, the eldest son in each generation of the Cole family has borne the same first name and middle initial and many of these men have followed the medical profession. A few have been blessed with their ancestor’s diagnostic skill and the ‘sixth sense’ they call The Gift, the ability to know instinctively when death is impending. The tragedy of Rob J.’s life is the deafness of his son, Robert Jefferson Cole, who is called Shaman by everyone who knows him. Shaman‘s life is difficult. First, he must learn to speak so that he can take his place in the hearing world, and then he must fight against the prejudices of a society where physical differences matter. As Shaman struggles to achieve his identity, the Coles, along with the rest of America, are drawn into the conflict between the North and the South.

Choices / Matters of Choice

With Choices, Noah Gordon brings to a close his great trilogy spanning the generations of the Cole medical dynasty. Beginning with the legendary 11th century doctor Robert J. Cole, each eldest son has borne the same name and middle initial, and some have possessed the uncanny sixth sense known as The Gift the terrible and instinctive knowledge that someone is about to die. In Choices, it emerges again in the present, but this time in a daughter, Roberta Jeanne d Arc Cole, known as R.J. She defies her beloved father when she chooses to study law rather than medicine, yet destiny is to overtake her when she realizes that she has inherited The Gift. As she holds the hands of a sick man, R.J. feels a dreadful certainty that he is going to die. Tragically, he is her own lover. Struggling with her grief, R.J. knows she must bow to the inevitable and become a physician. But her life changes when she moves to a small town practice and is faced with a terrible dilemma.

The Rabbi

Michael Kind was a rabbi, but he was also a man. A man who couldn’t help that his heart led him to Leslie, a beautiful minister’s daughter. Defying parents and teachers, they dare to love one another and build a life together, in this sweeping drama of love and identity, compassion and crueltly, and a complicated world that will not accept their decisions…
.’A rewarding reading experience.’LOS ANGELES TIMES

The Death Committee

At Suffolk County General Hospital, three brilliant young men are brought together by their ambition and passionate dedication to life. But they work in the shadow of The Death Committee, a formidable hospital tribunal where doctors sit in judgment of their peers, deciding who is to blame when a death could have been prevented. During an unforgettable year of love and fear, failure and victory, the young doctors must face the crucial dramas and triumphs of hospital life.

The Last Jew

In the year 1492, the Inquisition has all of Spain in its grip. After centuries of pogrom like riots encouraged by the Church, the Jews who have been an important part of Spanish life since the days of the Romans are expelled from the country by royal edict. Many who wish to remain are intimidated by Church and Crown and become Catholics, but several hundred thousand choose to retain their religion and depart; given little time to flee, some perish even before they can escape from Spain.

Yonah Toledano, the 15 year old son of a celebrated Spanish silversmith, has seen his father and brother die during these terrible days victims whose murders go almost unnoticed in a time of mass upheaval. Trapped in Spain by circumstances, he is determined to honor the memory of his family by remaining a Jew.

On a donkey named Moise, Yonah begins a meandering journey, a young fugitive zigzagging across the vastness of Spain. Toiling at manual labor, he desperately tries to cling to his memories of a vanished culture. As a lonely shepherd on a mountaintop he hurls snatches of almost forgotten Hebrew at the stars, as an apprentice armorer he learns to fight like a Christian knight. Finally, as a man living in a time and land where danger from the Inquisition is everywhere, he deals with the questions that mark his past. How he discovers the answers, how he finds his way to a singular and strong Marrano woman, how he achieves a life with the outer persona of a respected Old Christian physician and the inner life of a secret Jew, is the fabric of this novel. The Last Jew is a glimpse of the past, an authentic tale of high adventure, and a tender and unforgettable love story. In it, Noah Gordon utilizes his greatest strengths, and the result is remarkable and moving.