Many years after making his way to America from Odessa in Soviet Ukraine, Emil Draitser made a startling discovery: every time he uttered the word \"Jewish\"-even in casual conversation-he lowered his voice.This behavior was a natural by-product, he realized, of growing up in the anti-Semitic, post-Holocaust Soviet Union, when \"Shush!\" was the most frequent word he heard: \"Don\'t use your Jewish name in public.Don\'t speak a word of Yiddish. And don\'t cry over your murdered relatives.\" This compelling memoir conveys the reader back to Draitser\'s childhood and provides a unique account of midtwentieth-century life in Russia as the young Draitser struggles to reconcile the harsh values of Soviet society with the values of his working-class Jewish family.Lively, evocative, and rich with humor, this unforgettable story ends with the death of Stalin and, through life stories of the author\'s ancestors, presents a sweeping panorama of two centuries of Jewish history in Russia.