Reviews: (by author)

Fagan, Cary. Illustrated by Regolo Ricci. The Market Wedding. Toronto: Tundra, 2000. ISBN 0-88776-492-4. $16.95.

Adapting Yiddish writer Abraham Cahan's A Ghetto Wedding, Cary Fagan sets it in Toronto's Kensington Market and brings it fully to life for a new generation of readers. Key to the success of his retelling is the artistry of Italian illustrator Regolo Ricci, whose detailed warm reds and golds illuminate the characters, their varying emotions, and their varied dress, and the vivid scenes of the market, the neighborhood, the rabbi's house, the synagogue, and the celebration. But it's primarily the lovely story that makes the greatest impression: a story of simple people-a fish seller and a hat maker-who fall in love while selling their wares. Morris and Minnie plan to wed, but overstep and overspend on their wedding, intimidating their market friends who feel unequal to the fancy occasion Morris and Minnie have planned and so don't go to the wedding. The newlyweds return to their new home full of sorrow at their own foolishness, but their friends don't desert them. Instead, the real celebration begins when the couple learns about true generosity in their own world, their own neighborhood, their own world.

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