Books Set in North America: New York City

The Hidden Palace, by Helene Wecker (2021)

 

The Hidden Palace picks up the characters from The Golem and the Jenni, but the reader need not have read the first book to enjoy this one.  This novel takes place eight years after the first novel has ended and begins around 1900.  There are several threads plots in this novel.  Chava, the Jewish golem, and Ahmad, the Arabian jinni, have gone their separate ways haven’t seen each other in years.  Sophia Winston, who became chilled following her affair with the jinni, has traveled to a desert Middle East to find a cure.  Anne is working as a laundress and raising her young son.  Interwoven into the lives of the characters, is a fair amount of history, as the world is on the brink of World War I.

 

Cheva realizes that as a golem, she never ages, while the people around her do.  She realized that she could no longer work in the bakery, so attends a nearby college and gets a degree in that allows her to teach cooking.  She reinvented herself as Charlotte Levy and landed a job at an orphanage academy.  After the jinni’s partner died, he holed up in the building and cut himself off from the rest of the community and spent his time constructing with steel.  Anne’s son landed a job as a Western Union messenger, which takes him around New York City.

 

While searching for a cure to her illness, Sophia encounteres a female jinni, whom she calls Dima.  Dima has been banished from her tribe and is searching for the jinni who can touch steel (Ahmad).  She promises Sophia a cure if she can bring her to Ahmad.  Meanwhile, back in New York, the reader meets Kreindel, a young girl who studies Hebrew with her rabbi and assists him in making Yessele, another golem to be her protector.

 

In addition to a beautiful story, the author also gives us a glimpse of life in the New York tenements at the turn of the last century.  I loved this book and look forward to other writings from this author.

 

Read:  May 3, 2023

 

4 Stars

 

 

Books Set in the United States: New York City

The Golem and the Jinni, by Helene Wecker (2013)

The Golem and the Jinni, by Helene Wecker, is a debut novel, and what a debut it is!  As implied by the title, it is about a Golem, a creature in Jewish folklore, and a Jinni, a mythical creature in the Arab world.  The most famous golem was created by Rabbi Loew of Prague in the 1500s to protect the Jews of the city from attacks by their neighbors.  In Jewish folklore, a golem is made of clay, becomes animated and has supreme strength.

This novel is set at the beginning of the 1900s and is mostly set in New York City.  Otto Rotfeld is a failed Polish businessman who wishes to seek his fortune in the New World.  He approaches a man he believes to be a mystic and asks him to create an obedient, but curious wife to accompany him in New York.  The mystic complies, but warns Otto not to utter the words to awaken the woman until after he arrives in the New World.  Otto, of course, cannot wait that long and utters the word to bring his golem-wife to life while about the ship crossing the Atlantic.  Otto then promptly dies, leaving the Golem to fend for herself in New York.

The Golem has the ability to hear the thoughts of the people around her.  Shortly after arriving in New York, she encounters a rabbi who recognizes her for what she is.  He takes her under his wing in an attempt to protect her.

Around the same time, a tinsmith working in New York is repairing a flask, when suddenly the Jinni, who had been trapped in the flask for centuries is suddenly freed.

Eventually the two meet.  Both appear to be human, but have powers beyond human capability.  The golem is made of clay and is cold.  The jinni is of a spark of fire and knows that water can destroy him.  Both have to constantly remind themselves to behave as humans ~ the golem must remember to appear to breathe; the jinni must remember that he can cause burns with his touch.

The two lead separate, but intwined, lives.  Each interact with the people of New York.  The jinni meets the beautiful and rich Sarah Winston and sneaks into her house at night.  The golem gets restless at night and wanders the streets, even though for a mortal woman, such wanderings would be dangerous.  The jinni is sly with little moral guidance; the golem must obey her nature, although she has no master.

We meet the real people who encounter the Golem and the Jinni.  All these characters truly come to life.

This is one of my all time favorite books.  It held up upon a second reading several years after the first time I read it.

5 Stars

Read: December 27, 2018; June 8, 2013