The three stories in this volume are derived from real-life experiences, mostly during Arieh Larkey s more than forty years of living out his dream in the Jewish Homeland.

The first story, An Improbable Zionist Recollections, is a light autobiographical sketch of life s twists and turns, which lead the author on adventures he could never have envisioned as a youth growing up in the Jewish neighborhood of Newark, New Jersey; adventures in a place that lies six thousand miles to the east of his hometown namely, the fledgling Jewish State of Israel.

To round out the trilogy, the two additional short stories in this volume, entitled Nazi Germany and the Sinai a Link to the Past and My First Time...under Katyusha Fire, show tantalizing glimpses of the author s extraordinary adventures in his adopted home. Sometimes he uses fictional characters to tell the story. Other times, he himself is the protagonist. But in either case, the readers will enjoy a full 360° panoramic view of the author s physical and emotional surroundings as the stories unfold.

Auteur
Arieh (Richard) Larkey was born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1935. A the age of eighteen, he volunteered to serve in the American Army and was sent to Occupied Germany as part of the NATO forces. It was there that his sense of Jewish identity intensified. Following the Six Day War in 1967, Arieh once again experienced a heightened awareness of his Jewish heritage, which eventually led to his aliya in 1971. After a 30 year architectural career, Larkey closed his Jerusalem office and began to write. His books include: A Townhouse in Jerusalem (1996), Ruth Revisited A Survivor's Journey (2001), Landscape of Conflict, Israel's Northern Frontier (2003) and Grandpa's Mountain Letters from a border Kibbutz in Israel (2007). The author divides his time between his home in the historical town of Zichron Yaacov, on the Mediterranean coast and the frontier town of Mitzpeh Ramon in the heart of the Negev Desert in Southern Israel.