Heat Factor: There’s a little hint of something and then a hand wave

Character Chemistry: It’s not that kind of book

Plot: Goldie wants to make sure her granddaughter is taken care of by a good Jewish man, so she hatches a plot to make little meet cutes at her doctor appointments

Overall: This book is really compelling, and it’s about love, but it’s not a romance

This book is primarily from the eponymous Goldie’s perspective, a perspective that jumps non-linearly through her lifetime based on whatever else is happening in her life at a given moment. Sometimes, there is also a 3rd person POV from her granddaughter, Maxie, who is a PhD student dealing with all the tribulations of figuring her single self out at thirty-ish. The book opens with Goldie meeting a new resident at her Assisted Living facility, Henry, who convinces her to dance, but they both use walkers, so Goldie falls and ends up at the hospital. All of this hullabaloo—by which Goldie is completely mortified and would like everyone to ignore—ultimately leads Goldie to hatch a plan to get Maxie a husband by making Maxie her medical advocate and taking her to all her doctor appointments. Young, male, Jewish doctors, of course.

When I found this book on NetGalley and read the blurb, I assumed that the romance was between Maxie and the driver who ends up taking her grandmother to most of her appointments. The driver, of course, is not only not Jewish (his name is T-Jam Bin Naumann), but is an art professor who works multiple odd jobs to stay afloat and who looks like… Well, not like a doctor. Ultimately, this romance does play out, but also I was at least halfway through the book and Maxie and T-Jam had been on page together three times only. Because the book does not focus on Maxie and T-Jam’s relationship, the chemistry between these characters is basically non-existent. It’s kind of like watching your friends get together, and you’re happy for them, and you’re sympathetic to their struggles, but also it’s not your life so it’s not really giving you any dopamine. For this reason, I would not recommend this book to someone seeking a normal genre romance reading experience. That’s not what you’re going to get.

There is a really beautiful love story in this book, and that’s between Goldie and her deceased husband. As I mentioned, the story is entirely non-linear, but the snapshots we get of Goldie and Mordy’s life over time are really beautiful. The relationship is out of time, with Goldie’s reminiscences reflecting a way of loving and being married that we might now deem old-fashioned (and in some ways very unhealthy), but for two people who were already older children during the Holocaust, it’s just how they found love and happiness and family together.

There’s a moment during what would have been Goldie’s anniversary, but is on that night just a talent show at the Assisted Living facility, when Henry and Maxie sing a duet for Goldie, and she thinks:

"If only Mordy was here, to hear how his granddaughter sings. How Mordy always sang. Not Frank Sinatra, not his style. But this, this song, how Mordy and I loved this song. I let myself go there, back to Mordy singing to me, me with my terrible voice a tzherbrocher toph singing back. What twenty-five years, fifty, sixty, an eternity, always I love him.

"I look up, don’t even hide my tears, and Maxie is smiling through all the applause, and after that silly song about taking chances to fall in love this Harry, he sings to me, about Mordy, with Mordy’s granddaughter, Harry bows to everyone. Bows to me.

"In one lifetime, lots of different ways to love."

And that’s the sum of the book, really, and the reason I cried buckets. Lots of different ways to love. The final component of the ways to love involves Goldie’s love for her daughters and granddaughter. Interestingly, the reader can see at once Goldie’s perspective, her feelings about being infantilized and not always prioritized by her remaining family, the burden of her cultural and social expectations throughout her life, the pride she has in her family. The result of this is that we can see Goldie as a whole person who isn’t a bad person but who handles (or handled in the past) some things very poorly. Goldie and Maxie’s mother have a very strained relationship, and Goldie honestly has no idea why, but we the readers do. I thought Monheit executed this three-dimensionality of Goldie exceptionally well. She’s so many different things, and at the end of the day, she’s just a person who’s lived a very big life.

Finally, I got really behind on my ARCs and am struggling to pay attention to books I have to read with my eyes, so I got this audiobook from my library, and let me tell you, listening to Dina Pearlman read this stream-of-consciousness style story was really fun. Much more fun than I’ve ever experienced reading stream-of-consciousness with my eyes. Pearlman did a great job, and I’m sure was another contributing factor to my crying buckets.

I’m really glad I finished this book. It was a great read. But the marketing for it might not be as great. As I mentioned, I found the book in NetGalley’s romance section, which was not the right tag, but also the blurb calls the book “hilarious” (also unapologetically Jewish, which it absolutely is, so if you aren’t Jewish and can’t handle looking up words and cultural references or reading for context, it’s not for you). There are humorous moments in the book, absolutely, and fundamentally the premise of the story is absurd and humorous; however, there’s far, far too much unpacking of traumas and other emotional weights to constitute “hilarious.” The marketing department should do better for this book.

I voluntarily read and reviewed a complimentary copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. We disclose this in accordance with 16 CFR §255.

This review is also available at The Smut Report.

This was warm, touching, and poignant. Also funny! Goldie was a memorable character and her relationship with her granddaughter, though strained at times, was loving.

This is a family drama - featuring grandma Goldie and her granddaughter Maxie - with really nice Jewish representation as well. Goldie lives in an assisted living community, Maxie with her science career and single (much to the chagrin of Goldie). In typical Jewish grandma fashion, she decides to interfere and do everything she can to set up Maxie with a cute Jewish doctor. Its all told through alternating chapters, which did make things tricky at times but I also felt added to the story. There is also a romance that brews for Grandma, which was amusing. The book is not a romance overall though, it focuses much more on the differences between generations. There is a real depth to the story, exploring struggle of feeling like you have to carry on Judaism because of what your parents and/or grandparents went through. I would definitely recommend this book, and also want to highlight the publisher. Sibylline Press is a woman-owned indie publishing company that features the work of women authors who are over the age of 50. How cool is that! I look forward to reading more from this author.

The Goldie Standard: A Novel was a cute and endearing story that had some bittersweet moments to balance out the humor. I enjoyed getting to know Goldie and Maxie throughout the novel. I especially loved how Goldie would fabricate illnesses to get Maxie to take her to the doctor's office, where she had the chance of setting Maxie up with a nice Jewish doctor. Such chutzpah!

I also appreciated getting a glimpse into Goldie's past and learning about why she made the decisions in the present day and how she managed to harm her relationship with her daughter.

The writing style is not what I'm used to and I had to reread sentences and paragraphs a lot. It would have been helpful to have the Yiddish phrases translated on the page or as an annotation instead of in a glossary. There was also a time jump from summer to February, which seemed too big for the current action taking place.

Overall, it was an enjoyable story that held my attention throughout. I hope it will be chosen for The Jewish Joy Book Club!

(Trigger warnings below.)

Movie casting ideas:
Goldie: Renee Taylor
Maxie: Sarah Yarkin

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TW: Cancer, Alzheimer's, Holocaust

I enjoyed this story of a meddling grandmother trying to find a man for her granddaughter by making appointments to see drs and then discovering she is very I’ll. A few laughs, some flashbacks to her early life, the relationships with family made this a good read.

Maybe I'm the wrong audience, but I did not find this book to be hilarious. It was sad in a lot of places, and serves as another reminder of the struggles of Jewish people throughout history. I liked Goldie's quest to find a husband for her granddaughter, but I'm also of the opinion that not everyone has to get married. Perhaps this is more of a Jewish cultural topic and I just don't have the understanding to fully comment on it.

A pleasant story of many personalities in one family. This multi generational tale was quite thoughtful. While not very original, this tale held my interest. Very thoughtful when comparing a very traditional route to marriage and then a third generation taking another route.
While certainly, this could be the story of my own family, I believe other religions and ethnicities could certainly relate to this family.
A very easy read.

This one is a somewhat fun book to read and one that will make you smile but also has plenty of seriousness and reality to it. . For me it was a light-hearted read that is told in different chapters by Goldie (the grandmother) and Maxie (who apparently needs a husband). But I must say the Jewish terms sometimes got me and it wasn't as easy to read as other similar books due to the confusing nature and terms in the story.

But all in all I found it a good and entertaining book to read. 3 1/2 stars from me.

Thank you NetGalley and Sybilline Press for giving me the opportunity to read and review this book.

A grandmother (Goldie) is determined to find her granddaughter mr. right

I liked the overall plot here, but the narrative structure took away from my enjoyment. The biggest problem I had was the switching between year perspectives (1940s and the present, 2017) within chapters. I wish there had been separate "the past" chapters to help truly separate these out. Or if it was more clearly set up as Goldie reminiscing.

3.5/5 stars

This book is women's fiction/general fiction. It's about a Jewish grandmother named Goldie.

Goldie lives in an assisted living home in New York. Her husband is dead. But she has two daughters and a granddaughter.

I wanted to read this book because of the Jewish rep. And there is a lot of it. However this book is not what I was expecting. It's not a light funny read. Instead it deals with some serious issues. Yes Goldie does want to find her granddaughter Maxie a husband who is a doctor. But I was expecting a romcom or something much lighter.

The story goes back and forth in time. We see the 1940s, the 1970s and 2017 (the present). The book is full of lots of Yiddish words and references.

I enjoyed Harry, an older man who wants to date Goldie. That part was fun. And I did enjoy Goldie trying to find Maxie a husband. I liked T-Jam as Goldie's driver and Maxie's love interest.

The Goldie Standard looks at different generations. It is a very Jewish book featuring a wonderful and strong Jewish heroine. But the book was a difficult read. I definitely would have preferred a funnier lighter take on things.

jewish romcoms are some of my favorites. i liked goldie telling the backstory and the yiddishisms she sprinkled, moreso than maxine's telling. the dialogue was confusing at times but not enough to dislike it.

The Goldie Standard is an intense, often bittersweet read. Author Simi Monheit’s debut novel follows grandmother Goldie Mandell throughout her life in a mix of present-day scenes and flashbacks while also featuring Goldie’s granddaughter, Maxie, who finds herself at a crossroads of her own.

The description of the book doesn’t truly capture what the story is like. Yes, Goldie is determined to find her granddaughter a Jewish doctor to marry and yes, Maxie ends up falling for artist/driver/adjunct professor T-Jam Bin Naumann instead. But it’s not a romcom or even a comedic novel like I expected. Rather Goldie is switching back and forth between past and present. She was a child in Nazi Germany and we see what happened to her there, her escape, and her immigration to America. We follow her marriage, children, love and loss woven throughout, and now as a somewhat crotchety grandmother in an assisted living facility. Goldie isn’t the sweet and endearing type, but she is interesting. Maxie, in turn, is a modern Jewish girl getting her Ph.D. and one who doesn’t always understand her grandmother. The two learn about each other over the course of the book and both grow in ways they probably didn’t expect.

The Goldie Standard wasn’t an easy read for me and some of what was touched on reminded me of my relatives. It also isn’t generally the kind of story I read for fun. I didn’t love the characters exactly, but I found them honest and realistic. Goldie in particular was a layered, complex character. I wished for some more of that for Maxie and the supporting cast. I’m glad I read The Goldie Standard. It’s not my usual fare but Monheit did draw me in and delivered a strong, emotionally charged tale.

A very Jewish book, and as I am Jewish, I must say Goldie reminded me of my own grandmother. I also live in an area with many old people and assisted living facilities, so I appreciated the viewpoints.
In alternating chapters, we hear Goldie and her opinions, full of Yiddishisms and insights. We learn her background in escaping Germany, her marriage, her daughters, and now her granddaughter Maxie.
Maxie is a wonderful character, smart and caring. Her grandmother worries about her, so she sets upon a scheme to go to many doctors,with the hope that Maxie will fall for one.
That is the basic outline, but doesn't really give a clue to how involved the reader becomes in the outcome. I laughed and I cried, and really enjoyed Goldie.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the EARC of this book.
This is my honest review and I hope you will read it.

This is a book that you may not want to judge by its cover nor by its description. I definitely did not find it "hilarious," but I did find it " unapologetically Jewish." This will be a difficult read for anyone who is born of Jews who lived through the horror of WWII. It may feel a bit more depressing, considering the troubles in the Middle East lately.

This was an intense, sometimes depressing read that was oftentimes confusing. The language on the grandmother's (Goldies) side is a deep mix of English and Hebrew, and it was difficult for a goy like me to understand. I felt like I wasn't getting the full impact of the story. However, it is perfect for those who speak the language!

The story was captivating, although I had to re-read many pages to fully grasp its direction and intent.

*ARC was supplied by the publisher Sibylline Press, the author, and NetGalley.

This was so good I was absolutely hooked from the beginning. It was an absolute delight to read. I couldn't get enough of this book. I thought that this was a great book. I enjoyed this so much.
I just reviewed The Goldie Standard by Simi Monheit. #TheGoldieStandard #NetGalley
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I hear my grandmother speaking! Those of us with Jewish grandmothers and mothers will be smiling from the opening sentences. A book like this, your daughter should write. Kudos to the author for keeping up the Yiddish dialog and vocabulary throughout the book. It really does add flavor.
Due to the cover, I was expecting a cutesy chicklit story. And, I guess you could take it that way, except that the author brings up some difficult issues and the characters are slightly more pointed in their personalities. Some readers may have difficulty with keeping track of the storyline as it hops back and forth, but those of us who are older will probably get it. That begs the question of just who this book was written for and if Monheit has managed to capture readership from three generations.

It has great readability; I found myself unable to put it down until I reached the very end. This would be an excellent choice for a Jewish intergenerational book group, or any book group that enjoys a meaty discussion. I'd definitely serve blintzes and bagels for that!

Thank you to NetGalley for an advance copy of this book. I'll be happy to sing its praises!

Goldie Mandel, octogenarian and widow, resides in a New York Jewish assisted living facility. She is a woman who has definite views on things, including the other residents (old and trying too hard,) her daughters (Esti fusses too much, Tamar moved across country to California-God forbid,) and Tamar's daughter Maxi, a research PHD candidate who moved back to New York for a job at the hospital. Maxi is the light of Goldie's life-she's beautiful, brainy, and dearly loves her bubbe. She's also unlucky in love. But Goldie knows how to remedy that-she cooks up a plot with Harry, another resident who is starting to pay attention to her, to find as many unmarried Jewish doctors as she can, make appointments for herself accompanied by Maxi as her "advocate" and see if sparks fly. She likes the cute young driver of the assisted living van but not the van itself, so she hires the driver to get her and Maxi to the doctor's offices, and as the saying goes, "Man plans, God laughs."
The stories are told in alternating chapters by Goldie and Maxi. While Maxi navigates her successful work life and her rocky love life, she begins to deviate from the path that her Jewish heritage sets her on. Goldie and her beloved late husband Mordy were holocaust survivors and saw too closely the results of assimilation and the false sense of belonging to countries that turn on you. Goldie wants to make sure that before she dies and rejoins her husband, that Maxi's future is secure-and that her great-grandchildren remain Jews.
This is a beautifully written book, that while very humorous, also digs into issues of life, death, mourning, and carrying on. Monheit is definitely one to watch.

This is one of those books that I wish would let me rate 6 stars instead of one! What a wild ride. This book had me LOLing all the way through. You won’t regret reading it!

Liked how this has a dual pov: both of Goldie's and Maxie's. This made me feel a bunch of emotions that I needed a hug after reading this.

The definitive HEA is interesting as well as the whole character of Goldie.

Thank you, NetGalley and author, Simi Monheit for the ARC!

The Goldie Standard
Author : Simi Monheit

This amusing tale revolves around a grandmother’s quest to locate an appropriate Jewish doctor spouse for her PDH granddaughter.
Residing in an assisted living facility, she cherishes nostalgic recollections of her blissful married life, firmly believing that a compatible life partner is the key to navigating life smoothly.
The narrative takes a humorous turn when her granddaughter assumes the role of medical advocate for Goldie and now she can secretly work on her quest to find the perfect husband but also she also has to control an amusing romantic interest for herself from her past assisted living facility..

However her granddaughter has other plans and falls for Goldie’s long haired driver.
Will Goldie be successful?? This is a modern take on the concept of finding the life partner from a grandmother’s perspective..it shows the difference in generations and their take on love and life.