Izzy's Secret Ingredient

About the Book

Izzy’s Secret Ingredient is a novella about the friendship between a 40-year old high school English teacher, Jonathan Fisher; and an ailing retired baker, Izzy Silk. Assigned by his rabbi to visit with Izzy, Jonathan attempts to kindle a relationship by bringing him the book Evenings with Eddie, which is a tale of an older mentor giving life-lessons to a younger man. Jonathan hopes the book will lift Izzy’s spirits. Izzy is ill, his wife recently died, and his two sons are estranged from each other and from Izzy.

To Jonathan’s astonishment, Izzy hates Evenings with Eddie. Izzy, a World War II veteran, resents Eddie’s observations that American culture is too materialistic, is lacking in compassion, and is spiritually empty. Izzy is especially incensed about Eddie’s views of the military, which Eddie sees as a tool of the wealthy to oppress average people. Eddie had granted phony draft deferments to his students during the Vietnam era while Izzy’s bread-bakers’s son, lacking connections, had been killed in the war. Jonathan tries to defend Evenings with Eddie, but Izzy skewers the book with Yiddish aphorisms, Bible stories, and common-sense dissections of Eddie’s pop-spiritual observations.

The book’s satirical elements gradually become secondary to the relationship between Jonathan and Izzy. Inspired by Izzy’s fighting spirit, the diffident Jonathan eventually stands up to his intrusive Department Chairman, who has insisted that Jonathan change his teaching style to conform to a trendy teaching technique. Jonathan also revisits a long-neglected, unfinished novel he’d been writing. Supporting characters include Izzy’s best friend and fellow Veteran Max ; his feuding sons; Jonathan’s practical wife; and their 12-year old son, who attempts to replicate Izzy’s famous eclairs for profit. By the book’s end, Jonathan has a new sense of himself and a new career, both inspired by Izzy.

About the Author

Allan Lehrman lives in Philadelphia. He is married and has two daughters. He teaches in the Behavioral Health Studies program at Alvernia College, and directs a treatment program for people with substance dependence and mental illness.