An exciting, mythical book, mixing together magical creatures and New York city as it grew and developed into the city it is today, The Golem and the Jinni combines characters from both Jewish and Arabic tales and places them in an environment anyone can relate to, takes mythical creatures and levels the playing field by making them immigrants just like so many others.
The biggest surprise comes toward the end of the story (which I won’t spoil) as we learn how these two creatures are connected and begin to see them as surprisingly human despite their challenges to fit into the world around them. We also see the power the everyday man and woman can have in believe the mystical, in protecting the mystical, even to their detriment.
Two things about this book piqued my interest and made the read very exciting and interesting. Firstly, it was seeing how the author had these characters live. Chava, the Golem, loses her master on the passage to America and is left to assimilate into bustling city of New York only a few days old, missing an essential part of her being. She luckily befriends a Rabbi who helps her along and finds her place despite the challenge of keeping her emotions in check. Ahmad, the Jinni, emerges from 1,000 years imprisoned with no memory of how he got there. His talents working with metals gets him a job and secures him a place, but he’s restless and struggles with accepting the people around him and his equals rather than inferior beings.
Then, the two creatures meet and realize they aren’t alone in the world as being “special.” It changes everything and a relationship forms, binding them together because they are the only ones who understand the other, truly. When the villain arises to challenge their ways of life and their feelings for each other, they must react against the natures imposed on them, battling between who they’ve become in this new world and what they were created for/turned into. It’s an exciting battle between self and others that ends in an optimistic and satisfying way. You know that Chava and Ahmad have more than one lifetime to get it right anf figure out how to find happiness, and you’re rooting for them.
The second aspect of this book that was so exciting was the mysticism. It’s what drew me to the book before I even started reading it. How could a Jinni and a Golem actually live, undetected, in a bustling city like New York? There are eyes everywhere, people watching from all corners, noticing what’s usual and different and drawing it out. The very idea was so unique and unusual. Beyond that, how would the author bring together a desert-dwelling genie and a mud-made protector? Of course, they’d come together as any human couple, to talk and get to know each other. To share their own feelings, fears, and hopes for their lives. To find a soul mate to be brutally honest with. It’s the ideal of a relationship and proof that two like-minded beings can find solace in each other if they’re willing to build a real friendship. I love the way the author brings together her two characters and keeps them fighting for each other throughout the whole story. I love the way the people they befriend throughout the story stay connected to them. These are two powerful creatures, scary to most who hear the tales of others like them, yet genuine enough to be trusted and cared for by the people who meet them. The dynamic is so powerful.
Books that combine the mythic with the real can struggle at times to keep things in perspective. Getting caught up in the magic can make the real backdrop it all takes place in feel artificial, but not here. You finish the book feeling like you could run into these characters, now, after all this time, living their lives in New York, simply blending in. And you feel hope, which is a wonderful way to wrap up a great read.
It has been a 10-book journey with Percy Jackson, the demigods of modern time, and the gods of Olympus. I've been with them the whole way, first as they saved the world from Kronos and then as they defeated Gaea. It has been a long ride, but so much fun. The good thing about it being a 10-book experience is that I feel satiated with the series ending. I don't need another book to add any more to the shape of the characters. This ending feels right and I can let everyone go on to live the rest of their (fictional) lives without intruding further.
The final book in Riordan's second series involving mythological Greek goods puts Roman and Greek demigods on the brink of civil war as Gaea rises to destroy everything. The gods aren't any help as each wars within themselves between their Greek persona and their Roman. As long as the demigods are against each other, Gaea will rise unopposed and win. It's up to two groups of demigods who were able to look past their heritage to come together - to become a family. One team sails to Athens to try and stop Gaea from rising even though it has been prophesied that their blood will aid in her ascension. The other rushes to the front lines of battle at Camp Half Blood, a gigantic statue of Athena in tow, the only thing that can stop war from breaking out. It takes the skills and talents of both Greeks and Romans working together to win the day.
As big as the story is on one level - the world ending, large groups of people going to war, traveling around the world, etc. You're only following a few main characters so you really feel like you're a part of the action. And although I sometimes had trouble remembering who was who as far as back-story went, Riordan does a great job of jogging the reader's memory as he goes along with the story. There wasn't anyone I didn't like as far as the good guys go and they were all very different in personality. I hated the bad guys, cheered for the good, and was properly annoyed by the gods' inability to get themselves together. The action-packed final chapter definitely delivered, and after such a long investment, it was a refreshing change to not be disappointed at the end (see Hunger Games.)
Action-packed as all these books are, there's never really a dull moment in the story. Even when a character is taking a minute to reflect or process some new knowledge, there is so much coming on the horizon, you, the reader, don't really get to take a breath. I like that in a book. I appreciate how hard it really is to come up with so much and not make it feel forced. It doesn't feel forced in this book. Things have to happen fast, time is running out.
This is the longest I've stayed with one character in a series that I can recall. I more often go for the trilogy - keeping it short and sweet, but this has been worth the investment. I know these are YA novels and I know the movies of the first two Percy Jackson books may leave something to be desired, but the books are just great reads overall. They're fun and powerful at the same time, focusing on bigger issues of friendship, finding your place in the world, figuring out who you are as a person and being okay with that person, accepting differences in others, and finding strength when life throws you those crazy curve balls. I would definitely recommend these books to the YA reader's out there, regardless of your actual age. It may take some time to get through them all, but it's worth it.
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man was on the reading list in 12th grade. It is the only book I've ever been assigned to read for school that I couldn't finish. I mean I was such a snob about my reading back then that I scoffed at students who used Cliff's Notes or any other device to cheat through reading the complete book. It never made sense to me to not read the book until old James Joyce came around. I got two-thirds of the way through and just stopped cold turkey, and it showed on my test. My teacher at the time even wrote directly on my test asking if I'd actually finished the book.
To this day I've yet to finish the book or pick up another James Joyce title to try. There are very few books or authors I've tried out and totally disliked right from the start, but he's one of them.
Thankfully, I've found another Joyce to read that is James' complete opposite. These books are remarkably creative with the most beautiful illustrations. The stories are unique, even taking popular tales and putting a new spin on them to appeal to a wider audience. It took having kids (and a few animated movies) to fully discover this author, but I've managed to find a readable Joyce, and his name is William.
Most widely known are William Joyce's Guardians series which follows the adventures of Santa, the Tooth Fairy, the Man in the Moon, Jack Frost, and the Easter Bunny and Epic. Both were made into movies. Guardians is actually really good. If my daughter wasn't so afraid of the bad guy, Pitch, this movie would be a staple of our house. Epic is okay. But, it's the books for the younger kids that really just blow me away. My daughter got two of them for the holidays this year and we've loved reading both; A Day with Wilbur Robinson (which is also a movie that's pretty good now that I think of it) and A Bean, A Stalk, and A Boy Named Jack. They are both imaginative and adventurous and hopefully inspiring to my amazing four-year-old who is beginning to pretend more and more as she plays.
William Joyce makes the unusual exciting and weaves in such simple moral lessons like the importance of family, being careful what you wish for, the value of an individual, the importance of laughter, and realizing that even big problems can have a simple answer. These are the types of stories I hope stay with my kids as they grow up and move away from picture books to the more involved chapter books. While I can't wait to watch then discover Harry Potter, His Dark Materials, A Wrinkle in Time, etc. I feel like these books are where all that creative imagination that you can pull from a book is starting. I feel honored to be watching this process really begin with my daughter and can't wait for my son to be old enough to experience this same thing too.
Another William Joyce book that I really love that my family is still getting into is The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore. I think it might also be a short film, but the book is such a great story about the value of your own life as you live it, the things you accomplish for yourself, and the people you care about. It's about your personal story and how much it really matters. And, there are flying books!
I feel like we're just scratching the surface of the large library of books William has penned and I'm looking forward to reading more as my kids grow. I'm just thankful there's a Joyce out there writing that I can enjoy since my first encounter with a literary Joyce was so totally disappointing.
It takes 300 pages for something to happen in this book and where it ends up is so far from where you think it's going, that I'm not sure the trip is worth it. I'm also not sure the person who wrote the synopsis of the book actually read it.
I picked up this book because it is set in Boston, my favorite town, and it's a period piece, taking place on the eve of U.S. involvement in WWI. It features the Allston Family who is recovering from the tragedy of losing two of its members on the Titanic. The synopsis of the book cites "mysterious circumstances" and a "harrowing mystery" to be solved as the family copes with their loss, or at least that's what I thought and what intrigued me about the book. Taking the position of the survivors who were left ashore while family members drowned on the Titanic is a unique perspective that I wanted to read about, but instead I was given Harlan, a rule-breaking college kid with a gambling problem and Sybil, a young woman who discovers through the use of opium that she has a very special, very depressing gift. Both characters are affected by the loss of their family members (a sister and their mom,) but what takes main stage is coping with these other issues. Must be what the synopsis meant by "mystery."
Even thinking about the flow of the book now, I'm confused. The book jumps between the present (1915,) the day the Titanic sank, and 1868 where you learn more about the father in the family. Initially, it made sense to pair the present in the book with scenes from the Titanic, but then things shifted and you see a connection between the present and the father's flashback. There's only a tiny point where the three story lines connect in any way and it was anticlimactic. It would have been a more compelling story without the flashes back to the Titanic, if you ask me. The story would have felt more cohesive to shift the focus on the "gift" Sybil discovers and how it affects her life and the lives of her family. The conclusions she reaches about destiny and fate as a result of coping with her "gift" are the most interesting piece of the entire story, but they get tangled up with the reader's incorrect expectations that this is a book about the aftermath of the Titanic.
Howe likes to infuse her stories with a lot of history and a little bit of the fantastical and I think she got it right with her previous book, but this one definitely fell short.
