J. D. Salinger be a prequel to "The Catcher in the Rye". Jerome David Salinger was born in Manhattan, New York on January 1, 1919. His father, Sol Salinger, sold kosher cheese, and was from a Jewish family of Lithuanian descent, his own father having been the rabbi for the Adath Jeshurun Congregation in Louisville, Kentucky. Salinger's mother, Marie ("née" Jillich), was born in Atlantic, Iowa, of German, Irish, and Scottish descent, but changed her name to Miriam and considered herself Jewish after marrying Salinger's father. Salinger did not learn that his mother was not of Jewish ancestry until just after he celebrated
Salinger (book) Simon wrote in "Buffalo News" that this is a "now-irreplaceable book about the greatest enigma of modern American literature... "Salinger" can't tell 'all' about its subject but it tells more than we've ever known before... a complex but well-constructed narrative composed of fragments of history, anecdote and commentary." Tucker Shaw in "The Denver Post" called the book "an exhaustively detailed portrait of the famously reclusive novelist J. D. Salinger." Carl Rollyson in "The Wall Street Journal" wrote that while the book was "engrossing," it "is biography as scrapbook, chock-full of well-known figures and well-worn stories." Rollyson said that "Salinger" "would