His book "In the Shadow of Zion: Promised Lands before Israel" was published in 2014 by New York University Press. "In the Shadow of Zion" brings to life the amazing true stories of six exotic visions of a Jewish national home outside the biblical land of Israel. One of the fascinating tales examines the pioneering work of American playwright and editor Mordecai Manuel Noah, who attempted to establish a Jewish city-state in upstate New York during the first decades of the nineteenth ce ntury. Noah is often acknowledged as the first Jew in the modern era to plot the creation of a Jewish state. He originally hoped to establish a sanctuary within the United States, but later argued for the restoration of Jewry to the biblical land of Israel. Noah’s importance lies in the fact that he recognized that Jewish power needed to be vested in a particular place.