Join BookBrowse today and get access to free books, our twice monthly digital magazine, and more.

Rich Cohen biography

Author Biography  | Interview  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Rich Cohen
Photo: Jeremy Medoff

Rich Cohen

Rich Cohen Biography

Rich Cohen is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Tough Jews, The Avengers, Monsters, and (with Jerry Weintraub) When I Stop Talking, You'll Know I'm Dead. He is a co-creator of the HBO series Vinyl and a contributing editor at Vanity Fair and Rolling Stone and has written for The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and Harper's Magazine, among others. Cohen has won the Great Lakes Book Award, the Chicago Public Library's 21st Century Award, and the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for outstanding coverage of music. His stories have been included in The Best American Essays and The Best American Travel Writing. He lives in Connecticut.

Rich Cohen's website

This bio was last updated on 12/11/2016. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Interview

Rich Cohen offers in-depth answers for The Avengers: A Jewish War Story. Who were the Avengers? Why was the story of the Avengers kept a secret? Which key player in the story is Cohen related? Are the Avengers heroes or murderers? Cohen also discusses the criticism received for writing Tough Jews.

Who were the Avengers?
The Avengers were a group of young Jews, some still in their teens, who found themselves caught in the Holocaust; who, given a choice to get on the trains or to go underground, to die or to fight, chose to fight. Abba Kovner, who was the leader of the group, phrased the dilemma this way: "If we act cowardly, we die; if we act courageously, we die. So we might as well act courageously." The story centers around Abba Kovner, Vitka Kempner and Ruzka Korczak. Vitka and Ruzka, who were from towns in Western Poland, had fled the German invasion on foot, walking clear to Vilna, which later became the capital of Lithuania, where they met Abba, a young Zionist leader. From then on, the lives of these three young people were entangled -- in love and in war. When the Jews of the city were locked in a ghetto, they formed an underground, smuggling and stealing weapons, spreading the call to revolt, going on raids. At nineteen, Vitka led a mission to the forest, where she blew up an enemy troop train -- the first sabotage in Occupied Europe. When the Germans liquidated the ghetto, Abba led the group through the sewers and into the forest, where they waged a guerrilla war. Joining with the Red Army, the Avengers fought ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Books by this Author

Books by Rich Cohen at BookBrowse
Sweet and Low jacket The Avengers jacket
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Rich Cohen but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
How we choose read-alikes

  • Peter Duffy

    Peter Duffy

    Peter Duffy was born and raised in Syracuse, N.Y., the son of a television newscaster and a martial arts instructor. After attending Niagara University and the University of Pittsburgh, he was a journalist in New York City. ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Avengers

    Try:
    The Bielski Brothers
    by Peter Duffy

  • Jack Fairweather

    Jack Fairweather

    Jack Fairweather is a former war reporter in Iraq and Afghanistan. He has been a correspondent for the Washington Post and the Daily Telegraph, where he served as the Baghdad and Persian Gulf bureau chief. His reporting ... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    The Avengers

    Try:
    The Volunteer
    by Jack Fairweather

We recommend 7 similar authors

View all 7 Read-Alikes

Non-members can see 2 results. Become a member
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Support BookBrowse

Join our inner reading circle, go ad-free and get way more!

Find out more


Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Fruit of the Dead
    Fruit of the Dead
    by Rachel Lyon
    In Rachel Lyon's Fruit of the Dead, Cory Ansel, a directionless high school graduate, has had all ...
  • Book Jacket: The Wide Wide Sea
    The Wide Wide Sea
    by Hampton Sides
    By 1775, 48-year-old Captain James Cook had completed two highly successful voyages of discovery and...
  • Book Jacket
    Flight of the Wild Swan
    by Melissa Pritchard
    Florence Nightingale (1820–1910), known variously as the "Lady with the Lamp" or the...
  • Book Jacket: Says Who?
    Says Who?
    by Anne Curzan
    Ordinarily, upon sitting down to write a review of a guide to English language usage, I'd get myself...

BookBrowse Book Club

Book Jacket
The Familiar
by Leigh Bardugo
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Leigh Bardugo comes a spellbinding novel set in the Spanish Golden Age.

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    The Flower Sisters
    by Michelle Collins Anderson

    From the new Fannie Flagg of the Ozarks, a richly-woven story of family, forgiveness, and reinvention.

  • Book Jacket

    The Stolen Child
    by Ann Hood

    An unlikely duo ventures through France and Italy to solve the mystery of a child’s fate.

Who Said...

Life is the garment we continually alter, but which never seems to fit.

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

P t T R

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.