Book Review: The Golem and the Jinni

The Golem and the Jinni

by Helene Wecker

This is a literary fantasy novel of the very highest caliber.

The Golem is created by a man at the request of another.

The man who created the golem was once a promising Rabbianic student but then, “Yehudah Schaalman awoke to darkness and the certain knowledge that he was somehow damned.”

The man who purchased the Golem’s life brings her to America, waking her on the ship over, but he is ill. He dies and she is left to fend for herself.

She sees the Statue of Liberty for the first time – “ . . . those on deck were waving and shouting at her with jubilation, crying even as they smiled. This, too, the Golem thought, was a constructed woman. Whatever she meant to the others, she was loved and respected for it. For the first time since Rotfeld’s death, the Golem felt something like hope.”

That is, until a wise man sees her and realizes what she is. He takes her in and helps her cope with her own existence. The golem hears and feels people’s thoughts and desires, it is overwhelming at times. The Rabbi tells her -

“A man might desire something for a moment, while a larger part of him rejects it. You’ll need to learn to judge people by their actions, not their thoughts.”

The golem knows what she is.

She looked back down to her fingertips. Nails, teeth, hair: none of these features were made of clay.

“I hope,” she said, watching her own mouth move, “that no one was harmed in my making.”

The Rabbi’s response is one of my favorite lines in the book -

The Rabbi smiled sadly. “So do I. But what’s done is done, and you are not to be blamed for your own creation, whatever the circumstances.”

The Jinni is very old and his existence has been whimsical, spying on travelers near the desert where he grew up in Syria, building his own invisible palace in the desert of glass and gold. But there is a huge lapse of time when he does not know what happened, he simply wakes when a metal smith in New York City breaks the words binding him into a tea kettle that came from Syria by rubbing out some words. The metal smith kindly helps him find his footing, gives him a home and employment. The Jinni is still bound by a metal cuff on his wrist, to keep him from doing any magic.

This story brings the Golem and Jinni together in a version of New York City very long ago. Their lives before they meet and during the time they know each other are beautifully wrought.

The descriptions are detailed and the story is thought provoking. It goes into the back story of each character quite deeply.

I cannot emphasize enough how beautifully constructed and told this story is. This is one of those stories that you wish you could wipe from your mind in order to have the pleasure of discovering it all over again. It deserves far more than five stars. I cannot recommend it highly enough.