All Other Nights by Dara Horn
Seeking Educators, Historians and Literary Enthusiasts
An opportunity to join a diverse curriculum development team
 All America Reads will be developing curriculum materials to accompany Dara Horn’s novel All Other Nights. We hope to develop a broad range of materials and activities that will enable a reader to better grasp the themes, historical context, and modern day interpretations of the novel. Once developed, these materials and resources will be published on the All America Reads website as part of a continuous virtual library for educators and readers.
It is the goal of All America Reads to choose novels that will be pursued across generations and contribute to family literacy. In addition, we aim to provide materials that will enrich the breadth and depth of the novel in a free and accessible format. All Other Nights is All America Reads’ second novel and will join David Baldacci’s novel Wish You Well.
The organization is actively seeking contributions from educators, librarians, historians and literary enthusiasts who have a passion for developing questions, guides and activities to accompany a novel and further explore its contents.
This book may be especially interesting to individuals interested in the Civil War, the American Jewish population during the 1800s, spies, women’s issues, race relations, coming of age struggles, puzzles, and palindromes. All America Reads is interested in a broad spectrum of materials that engage readers in higher level thinking skills. The book is set in New York City, Louisiana, Virginia, Tennessee and Mississippi. The author is enthusiastic about additional materials to support her novel and looks forward to personal communication with students, classrooms, and teachers in the future.
Individual or group contributions developed over the summer would be added to the completed curriculum and made available to interested teachers, classrooms and reading groups for a pilot launch in fall 2010. The website launch of all finalized materials is currently planned for winter 2011. All contributors will receive published credit for their work on the curriculum and on the All America Reads website.
This is a unique opportunity for recent college graduates or graduate students who are examining current trends in teaching literature at the middle school and high school levels. All America Reads aspires to make All Other Nights accessible to students and families utilizing techniques that have proven successful in a variety of settings.
Interested individuals should contact Marnie Hollifield, National Program Director, at marnie@allamericareads.org for more detailed information.
All Other Nights Synopsis
How is tonight different from all other nights? For Jacob Rappaport, a Jewish soldier in the Union army during the Civil War, it is a question his commanders have already answered for him—on Passover, 1862, he is ordered to murder his own uncle in New Orleans, who is plotting to assassinate President Lincoln. After this harrowing mission, Jacob is recruited to pursue another enemy agent, the daughter of a Virginia family friend. But this time, his assignment isn’t to murder the spy, but to marry her. Their marriage, with its riveting and horrifying consequences, reveals the deep divisions that still haunt American life today.
Based on real personalities like Judah Benjamin, the Confederacy’s Jewish Secretary of State and spymaster, and on historical facts and events ranging from an African-American spy network to the dramatic self-destruction of the city of Richmond, All Other Nights is a gripping and suspenseful story of men and women driven to the extreme limits of loyalty and betrayal. It is also a brilliant parable of the rift in America that lingers a century and a half later: between those who value family and tradition first, and those dedicated, at any cost, to social and racial justice for all.
Source: DaraHorn.com
Author Profile
Dara Horn was born in New Jersey in 1977 and received her Ph.D. in comparative literature from Harvard University in 2006, studying Hebrew and Yiddish. In 2007 Dara Horn was chosen by Granta magazine as one of the Best Young American Novelists.
Her first novel, In the Image, published by W.W. Norton when she was 25, received a 2003 National Jewish Book Award, the 2002 Edward Lewis Wallant Award, and the 2003 Reform Judaism Fiction Prize.
Her second novel, The World to Come, published by W.W. Norton in January 2006, received the 2006 National Jewish Book Award for Fiction, the 2007 Harold U. Ribalow Prize, was selected as an Editors’ Choice in The New York Times Book Review and as one of the Best Books of 2006 by The San Francisco Chronicle, and has been translated into eleven languages.
Her most recent novel, All Other Nights, published in April 2009 by W.W. Norton, was selected as an Editors’ Choice in The New York Times Book Review.
She has taught courses in Jewish literature and Israeli history at Harvard and at Sarah Lawrence College, and has lectured at universities and cultural institutions throughout the United States and Canada. She lives with her husband, daughter and two sons in New Jersey.
Source: DaraHorn.com
About All America Reads
All America Reads is a collaborative project designed to encourage young adults (grades 8-12) to read and provide them with the skills and tools to do so. The project engages competent middle and high school readers as well as struggling and reluctant readers by providing them with the necessary strategies for comprehending the text. For more information about the program and to view sample curricula and lesson plans, browse the site using the links to the left and top of the page.
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