In a freak accident during the filming of a TV remake of “A Christmas Carol,” workaholic producer Evelyn Schwartz runs into a piano. When she comes to, she gets a surprise: The network’s doctor is away, and his replacement happens to be Evelyn’s ex-husband, David Adler. Evelyn is furious at the way David ended their marriage by walking out on her. Is it a coincidence that he comes back into her life just before Hanukkah?
So begins “The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah,” the latest novel by Jewish-American author Jean Meltzer. Set in New York City, with plenty of Jewish references, the novel shows that in this season of Christmas romance stories, there’s room for a Hanukkah romance, too.
“I really believe in the idea of connecting with your beshert,” Meltzer told The Times of Israel, using the Yiddish word for soulmate. “This is a story about even when a couple falls apart, you can fall back together again.”
After a TV career in which she won a daytime Emmy award, followed by five years at a rabbinical school in Israel, which she ultimately left due to chronic illness, Meltzer has made a career out of writing Jewish-themed romance novels, starting with her 2021 debut, “The Matzah Ball.”
Meltzer recalled going into stores before her first book was published and seeing “all the Christmas books, a sea of red and green … Five books later, Target, about two weeks ago, had ‘The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah’ on a shelf next to all the red and green.”
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“It’s an amazing cultural change,” Meltzer said, adding that the amount of titles about “Hanukkah love, Jewish love, Jewish joy is more than it was 10 years ago. It’s a huge advance — Jews get the happy ending.”
This Hanukkah will be especially busy for Meltzer, who is going to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, to plan an initiative she heads, the Jewish Joy Con. The three-day event, which will take place in March 2026, represents her latest venture toward groups or gatherings with a literary bent.
“In the wake of October 7, there was an influx of women telling me they no longer felt safe in their own book clubs or communities,” Meltzer said of the bloody Hamas-led invasion of southern Israel in October 2023. “They could not be authentic themselves.”
In the wake of the onslaught that sparked Israel’s two-year war against Hamas in Gaza, and as carnage continued to devastate the coastal enclave, Jewish authors have faced extensive blacklisting and boycotting initiatives for “infractions” as slight as expressing concern for victims of the October 7 atrocities.
In response, Meltzer founded the Jewish Joy Book Club, which has “one rule — nobody Jewish dies at the end.”
“Authors are being trolled, doxxed, [put on] do-not-buy lists,” she said. “I really had to do something.”
Illustrative: A customer shops at a bookstore in Portland, Maine, August 7, 2025. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
That includes the book club; the Jewish Joy Box, a subscription service that backs Jewish authors and Jewish books; and now the Jewish Joy Con, where guests, including authors, filmmakers and entrepreneurs, will convene.
“There will be lots of good food, some sunshine,” Meltzer said of her plans for Hanukkah. “I’ll definitely bring books and a menorah. We’ll light and celebrate all week long.”
As for “The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah,” it is a complex story. Start with its homage to Dickens’s holiday classic. The miserly Ebenezer Scrooge is successively visited by the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present and Yet to Come, who collectively seek to persuade him to change his ways. Evelyn, after the mishap during filming, is visited by eight ghosts addressing eight separate heartbreaks — one for each night of Hanukkah.
“I decided to do a retelling of ‘A Christmas Carol,’” Meltzer said, adding that her mother, a psychologist, “always used ‘A Christmas Carol’ in therapy with her patients … She said to me, ‘Most people think [it] is about past acts [causing] change. Really, what it’s about is seeing your own life experiences through the lens of another person.’ The moment she said that, it’s what this book is about. I wanted to write this book.”
A Hanukkah menorah and latkes are seen with a Christmas tree in the background. (500/iStock)
Jewish themes are intricately woven into the plot, especially with regard to the Festival of Lights. Evelyn and David were childhood friends who bonded when David gifted her a menorah he made. In the present, Evelyn is too busy to light the menorah on her office desk, but David loves celebrating the holiday. Even though he’s relocated to rural Pennsylvania, where he keeps a farm with chickens, dogs and alpacas in addition to his medical practice, he’s decided to spend Hanukkah with his sister and niece in New York City. He goes with them to a menorah lighting at Wollman Rink, where — in a plot complication — he meets a cute veterinarian. They go out to dinner, and subsequently move to a second date: A Hanukkah trivia contest. Do you know how many times Hanukkah is mentioned in the Bible?
David is not able to answer this question and secure the coveted menorah-emblazoned hat prize for the winning team. That’s because he gets a late-night call from Evelyn. As the plot progresses, she finds many reasons to call him — ostensibly because he is still filling in for the network’s regular doctor, and Evelyn needs his help managing Jared Sparks, the pampered star whom she’s recruited to play Scrooge. All the while, she finds herself thinking about his forearms or his scent.
As readers learn more about Evelyn and David, it is revealed that during their marriage, the couple suffered a tragic loss, one hinted at in the book’s dedication and in its trigger warning. It reflects a real-life tragedy. Meltzer’s sister lost her unborn baby boy in a Termination for Medical Reasons, or TFMR.
“It was very traumatic,” Meltzer said. “She actually changed her entire life to focus on her career advocating for women and men [who have experienced] TFMR.”
“For me, I’ve always written about things that are not seen,” Meltzer said. “The greatest honor and privilege in the world is to be able to give voice to the voiceless. Two years ago, I knew I wanted to write a book about it, tell the story. I’m grateful my sister said yes.”
In the book, Evelyn and David each grapple with their loss in their own personal way, with each memorializing their unborn daughter in their respective homes.
“Many people pick up a romance and expect a very light, fluffy read,” Meltzer said. “My books are not just fluffy. There are subjects I try to tackle.”
As the book shows, its author is able to balance fluff and depth, love and loss, humor and heartbreak. There’s even a larger meaning to the Hanukkah trivia scene.
“I always try to provide access points for people who want to know more about our faith — Jews and non-Jews,” Meltzer said. “I spent several years in rabbinical school. You can take the girl out of rabbinical school, but you cannot really take a would-be rabbi out of the girl. I love Judaism, I love Jewish life and identity, I love sharing.”