New research has conspired to unsettle many established ideas about the Jewish past, challenging how historians have thought about and described it, and sometimes making it appear less accessible than it was thought to be in earlier generations.  While these recent developments would appear to make a history of the Jewish people more difficult, the authors of The Jews: A History believe it has deepened and broadened our understanding.  Though the reader will find in The Jews many familiar names, in its pages will also be found a broader spectrum of people: mothers, children, workers, students, artists, and radicals whose perspectives greatly expands the story of Jewish life from ancient times to the present.