Raised in Cleveland, Ohio, I have been living in Israel since 1967. I teach short fiction and creative nonfiction at the David Yellin College in Jerusalem and privately. I mentor writers in Israel and around the world online.
Over my years in Israel I’ve worked for the former mayor of Jerusalem Teddy Kollek, treated soldiers with shellshock after the Yom Kippur War, translated poetry from Hebrew to English, helped establish Kol Haneshama, a Reform synagogue in Jerusalem, guided tourists down cisterns, organized events for hundreds at threshing floors and life-cycle celebrations for families in caves at Neot Kedumim, the Biblical Landscape Reserve in Israel. I’ve stomped on grapes with a Benedictine monk, survived several wars, two intifadas and multiple terrorist attacks, mothered three Sabras, grandmothered two, grown organic broccoli, starred in The Sisiters Rosensweig, written a personal essay column for The Jerusalem Post, mentored incredible people, discovered my love of teaching, and celebrated my bat-mitzvah at 65, after which I became a rapper (short-lived) and a Torah reader. 
I’ve earned the following degrees, in chronological order: Bachelor of Arts in American Culture from the University of Michigan; Bachelor of Social Work from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem; Certificate in Psychotherapy from the Israel Institute of Psychoanalysis in Jerusalem; Master of Fine Arts in creative nonfiction from Goucher College in Maryland; Master of Arts in English (fiction) from Bar-Ilan University in Israel.
For twenty years I have been teaching creative writing in English in Israel, encouraging and supporting Anglo-Israelis to write in their native tongue.
Since February 2007, I have served as Coordinator of the Shaindy Rudoff Graduate Program in Creative Writing at Bar-Ilan University.
