Strangers in the Land of Egypt, by Stephen March (2009)

Strangers in the Land of Egypt is a fascinating story of the rural south and the anti-Semitism that is still very prevalent there.

Jesse Terrill is a young teen-aged boy, whose mother left the family and whose father was seriously brain-damaged by an act of violence. In addition, Jesse's older brother was killed in a terrorist attack while serving abroad. Jesse is now living with his uncle.

One evening, Jesse and some of his wild buddies go out and vandalize the local synagogue. He is arrested and tried. Because he refuses to name is friends, he takes the fall for the crime. The judge seeing some goodness in Jesse, places him on a 2 year probation and requires him to do community service. He is assigned to assist Mendal Ebban, an elderly Jewish Holocaust survivor living in a nursing home.

Ebban is a religious Jew who is still very tortured by the events he survived in the concentration camp. He is wheelchair bound and his eyesight does not permit him to read. He has Jesse read Torah to him. Slowly they form a friendship in which Ebban teaches Jesse the ethics of living a good life.

While Jesse struggles to behave, so as not to be sent to the brutal detention center, he is faced with dealing with some not-so-gentle people. He wants to take revenge on the man whom he thinks injured his father. Jesse comes up with what he thinks is the perfect plan, and he fantasizes about how he will carry out his plan.

One of his friends is LaFay, who has an abusive boyfriend. Jesse gets into a fight with the boyfriend, seriously injuring him. When Jesse is later beaten and left for dead, he refuses to tell the police the details of his attack for fear that he will be sent to the detention center for his own prior attack on LaFay's boyfriend.

This was a beautifully written book about a young boy's struggle to be good in a terrifying world.