Zaidy’s War: Author Talk with Martin Bodek

How does a man serve 4 armies in a single war? Benzion Malik’s grandson will tell his grandfather’s unreal WWII story, as chronicled in his memoir, Zaidy’s War.

Benzion’s story involves serving four armies under wildly unique circumstances, being present for both the largest land invasion in human history and the final battle of WWII, avoiding cannibalism under pain of death, eluding poisoning, surviving to walk 1,600 miles to his Romania home, emigrating to Israel, enduring the pummeling of his new community of Haifa during the Six Day War, finally settling in peace in the U.S. where he served as a chef for 40 years, and finished Shas (Talmud) 14 times while he was doing all that. He passed away 11 years ago at the age of 95.

Martin Bodek is the author of 14 books, but this might be the most important one. Born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, Martin currently lives in NJ with his wife and three children. He is an avid marathoner, Daf Yomi participant, Wordler, vexillologist, and halvah aficionado. He is a technologist by day, and a writer by night.

He is the co-creator of TheKnish.com, a popular Jewish news satire site, the beat reporter for JRunners, the surname columnist for jewishworldreview, the cufflink columnist for The Jewish Link of NJ, and is part of the Word Prompt rotation in The Jewish Press.