Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love

A bar mitzvah is a coming of age ritual for 13-year old Jewish boys. Shapiro offered Jacob two family heirlooms for his bar mitzvah, notably, his grandfather’s tallis and his great-grandfather’s tallis clips.

Confirmation bias is a term used in the field of psychology. It refers to the process by which the mind seeks to confirm what it already believes. Shapiro spent her life ignoring the signs that she was not her father’s daughter. Comments about not looking Jewish did not shake her sense of self, nor did learning she was conceived by artificial insemination. She held on to her beliefs, even when presented with contradictory evidence.

The term halacha refers to Jewish law. Shapiro worries about the religious implications of not being Paul’s biological daughter, but Rabbi Lookstein and Shirley set her mind at ease.