In this memoir, the author casts a wry and self-deprecating look back on her childhood, with anecdotes about the chance events and comic ironies that make up a life. Rifke (Rosalie Wise Sharp) grew up in North Toronto, which felt to her like a foreign place because there were no other Jewish families there in the late 1930s. Yiddish was spoken in her household, and the food, dress, and customs of Ozarow—the Polish shtetl (small Jewish town) from which her parents emigrated—were all maintained. Rifke's peers took lessons in tap dancing, ice skating, the piano, and the flute—activities that didn't translate into the Yiddish vocabulary, where only hard work, no-nonsense, and book learning were permitted. Rifke secretly decided to pass as a gentile, joining a bible class and the Christmas choir, and she was guilty about her pursuit of these activities during the war, when her mother was frantic with fear that their family in Poland was being slaughtered by the Nazis. In high school, Rifke's life changed: it was there that she met and married her soul mate Isadore, who worked in the construction business, much to her parents' disappointment. Prosperity took time, however, and Isadore's audacious dream to build a world-class hotel chain, The Four Seasons, came to pass.

Rosalie Wise Sharp's profile page

Rosalie Wise Sharp was born and raised in North Toronto, where she currently lives. She is the coeditor of Growing Up Jewish and the author of Ceramics, Ethics and Scandal.

"Readers can expect humor, tragedy in this saga that spans seven decades."  —Sunday Star Ledger

"What makes Rifke so powerful [is] the no-holding-back drama and Rosalie’s winning humor."  —The Beverly Hills Courier

"Sharp's autobiography is brutally honest, and she's a terrific storyteller. . . . This is a five-star book."  —Winnipeg Free Press

"Mrs. Sharp . . . divulges secrets that would make most society matrons want to slip silently beneath the starched linen cloth of the luncheon table."  —Globe and Mail

"The clash of lifestyles between the one she enjoys today and the 'shteltl' existence she broke away from, the first in her family in 20 generations, gives the memoir its substance."  —National Post

"This vividly detailed memoir . . . catches both the drama and the comedy of the improbable journey."  —Toronto Star

"Rifke is a vivid insiders' view of a shteltl upbringing . . . [the author] takes the reader into her confidence." —Lilith Magazine

"In her tell-all autobiography . . . Sharp, the child of Polish immigrants, gives a behind-the-scenes account of the hotel world."  —Travel + Leisure Magazine