Jean Ende is a native New Yorker who is trying to exorcise her background by writing fiction largely based on her immigrant Jewish family.
Her work resonates with all immigrant groups and people from insular societies who have had to adapt to a wider world.
About two dozen of Jean’s short stories have been published in print and online magazines and anthologies and recognized by major literary competitions in the US and England. Although the shadow of the Holocaust is present in many of these pieces, they’re frequently humorous— dancing Cossacks entertain at bar mitzvahs, the heresy of chocolate chip bagels is condemned, daughters are warned of the dire consequences of sex with uncircumcised men, a mother protects her son-the-doctor from unscrupulous shiksas and an elderly aunt wearing a gown from La Traviata outwits a girdle thief.
In the past year, Jean has started writing speculative/fantasy fiction. Not sure why.
Formerly a newspaper reporter in Westchester, NY and Jersey City, NJ, Jean was also a press secretary for the City of New York and various political candidates. After years of doing communications for non-profit organizations, she decided to go over to the dark side and got an MBA from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business. Jean became a VP at Citibank, and then a management professor at St. Francis College in Brooklyn, NY.
She has attended the Bread Loaf and Tin House Writers Conferences, Women Reading Aloud, taken MFA classes at Stony Brook College and is part of author Kaylie Jones’ master class.
Jean recently completed her first novel, Houses of Detention, published in April, 2025 by Apprentice House Press, Loyola University. The story of three generations of a family that fled the Nazis and settled in NY, this book focuses on the American-born teenager who pushes boundaries too far, winds up in reform school and exposes the family to a new definition of the American experience. Houses of Detention also examines conflicts within immigrant groups, such as the loss of status faced by a former Talmudic scholar who must cope with a money grubbing society . When a woman from a more orthodox group marries into the family, the religious schism almost tears them apart.
Jean and her dog currently live in Brooklyn which is a foreign country to anyone born in the Bronx.
