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The Golem and the Jinni
(The Golem and the Jinni #1)
by
Chava is a golem, a creature made of clay, brought to life by a disgraced rabbi who dabbles in dark Kabbalistic magic, created to be the wife of a man who dies at sea on the voyage from Poland. Chava is unmoored and adrift as the ship arrives in New York harbor in 1899.
Ahmad is a jinni, a being of fire born in the ancient Syrian desert, trapped in an old copper flask, and ...more
Ahmad is a jinni, a being of fire born in the ancient Syrian desert, trapped in an old copper flask, and ...more
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Hardcover, 486 pages
Published
April 23rd 2013
by Harper
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Start your review of The Golem and the Jinni (The Golem and the Jinni, #1)

I am trying something a little different here. I found The Golem and the Jinni to be a fun, magical fairy tale of a romance with a fair bit of excitement to it. But it is pretty clear that this is also a serious, literary work, raising meaningful philosophical questions, while using the folklore of two different cultures to inform the immigrant experience, offering a fascinating look at a place and time, and linking the experiences of the old and new worlds. These two takes seemed to call for di
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All of us are lonely at some point or another, no matter how many people surround us. And then, we meet someone who seems to understand. She smiles, and for a moment the loneliness disappears.
Unsure what to think as I finally took the plunge into this 19th-Century New York tale of friendship, different cultures and, of course, magic, I found myself completely transported to another world.
I understand why readers often call The Golem and the Jinni "fantasy" - it certainly has the depth, epic ...more

Just this once, I wish I could say 'The Golem and the Jinni is awesome. Trust me.' and just leave it at that. Not only because it is, but also because Helene Wecker's debut novel is a hard book to put into words, full of wonder and meaning, and an experience I don't think any review can fully do justice to. Still, even though I'll probably miss things, here goes...
Chava is a golem. Ahmad is a jinni. This is not a story of their chance encounter and subsequent whirlwind romance among century ago ...more
Chava is a golem. Ahmad is a jinni. This is not a story of their chance encounter and subsequent whirlwind romance among century ago ...more

This is a very good book. It's a gentle book, concerned with people, spiced by having both of the main point of view characters being supernatural creatures, namely a newly created golem and an ancient jinni. Both of these arrive in turn of the 19th/20th century New York and have to find their feet in the appropriate diaspora (i.e. Jewish and Syrian). The two cultures, as realised within New York at a time when Lady Liberty's arms really were wide open to immigrants, are expertly and accurately
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Oh man, the book was a little long but it was so worth it. The pacing was excellent and I really enjoyed the unique story line and the way everything comes together in the end. There is nothing better to me than a well executed story line where everything seems to have a purpose and ties into the larger arc of what's happening. Also I really enjoyed the way that Chava and Ahmed's relationship is developed because it never felt like the rest of what was going on every becomes secondary to it whic
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This is one of my favorite books of the year. I didn't know a ton about it going in, other than the gorgeous cover, and I'm very glad I didn't. It is a historical urban fantasy of sorts, about a Golem and a Djinn separately stranded in turn-of-the-century New York city. The two character's storylines intertwine beautifully, with themes of identity, religion and friendship weaving in and out of a wonderfully detailed world. If you liked The Night Circus, or Dr Strange and Mr. Norrell, you'll real
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Sorry it took me so long to write a review for this one but the past weeks have been hectic and not so fun. I still have little time but if I don’t write a few words now, I’ll never do it.
I added The Golem and The Jinni to my TBR in March 2014, yes, more than 6 years ago. This year I am planning to tackle all books added in February and March 2014 and this is one of them. Until now, I’ve been very pleasantly surprised by the books that I’ve read from that selection and this one is no exception. ...more
I added The Golem and The Jinni to my TBR in March 2014, yes, more than 6 years ago. This year I am planning to tackle all books added in February and March 2014 and this is one of them. Until now, I’ve been very pleasantly surprised by the books that I’ve read from that selection and this one is no exception. ...more

‘all of us are lonely at some point or another, no matter how any people surround us. and then, we meet someone who seems to understand. she smiles, and for a moment the loneliness disappears.’
a woman made of clay and a man made of fire.
she is steadfast and constant, where he is capricious and free spirited.
and yet, they both find themselves thrown into a world not of their choosing, bound by plans greater than themselves.
if you ever needed proof that opposites attract - its this story.
i ...more
a woman made of clay and a man made of fire.
she is steadfast and constant, where he is capricious and free spirited.
and yet, they both find themselves thrown into a world not of their choosing, bound by plans greater than themselves.
if you ever needed proof that opposites attract - its this story.
i ...more

Reread in April 2021 in preparation for The Hidden Palace - the ARC is sitting on my bookshelf waiting for me, yay!
Returning to this first book after six years, I’m even more impressed with it. Upping my rating to all 5 stars!
This thoughtful, original fantasy is about an unlikely friendship between a golem (an immensely strong animated being magically formed of clay) and a jinni (genie), set mostly in 1899 New York City. Chava, the golem woman, was secretly made by a rabbi using forbidden Kabb ...more
Returning to this first book after six years, I’m even more impressed with it. Upping my rating to all 5 stars!
This thoughtful, original fantasy is about an unlikely friendship between a golem (an immensely strong animated being magically formed of clay) and a jinni (genie), set mostly in 1899 New York City. Chava, the golem woman, was secretly made by a rabbi using forbidden Kabb ...more


This is a truly difficult book to rate, mostly because what faults I can find, I find them in myself as a reader.
The premise of the story in perfect, Chava is a golem created to become the wife of a creepy little man who dies soon after he brings her to life. So now we have Chava, a masterless golem, a creature of clay, newly arrived in turn of the century New York.
Ahmad was trapped in a bottle for over a thousand years by a wizard, and imagine his surprise to find himself in an unheard of ...more

I'm really quite amazed at the things this novel does right. It's a detailed and grand scaled historical romance as well as being a delightful hop in magical realism, but I couldn't help make direct connections to Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.
But not because many of the ideas are the same. They aren't. What is the same is the length and the attention to historicism and the depth of the real history and especially the depth of the magic. The length of the novel and beautiful prose also has a lot ...more
But not because many of the ideas are the same. They aren't. What is the same is the length and the attention to historicism and the depth of the real history and especially the depth of the magic. The length of the novel and beautiful prose also has a lot ...more

This is the story of a golem and a jinni, how they discover who they are, their strengths, their weaknesses, and how, even though they're composed of completely different elements, they may just be the best friend for each other in a human world where they will never truly belong.
As I was reading The Golem and the Jinni, enjoying their adventures and waiting to see how they would discover their origins, I didn't consider for a moment the idea that the tale could be a metaphor for something else. ...more
As I was reading The Golem and the Jinni, enjoying their adventures and waiting to see how they would discover their origins, I didn't consider for a moment the idea that the tale could be a metaphor for something else. ...more

How could I possibly review this in the most coherent way?
This book, a debut at that, is one of the best I've read this year. No, scratch that, it's THE best I've read in a long time, easily knocking over the ones I've gushed in the past few weeks to nothing. After turning the last page, I just knew it would be among my all-time favorites, together with A Monster Calls, Written in Red, and Blood Song. I've never felt this hypnotized, amazed, and captivated; the level of mesmerization is just so ...more
This book, a debut at that, is one of the best I've read this year. No, scratch that, it's THE best I've read in a long time, easily knocking over the ones I've gushed in the past few weeks to nothing. After turning the last page, I just knew it would be among my all-time favorites, together with A Monster Calls, Written in Red, and Blood Song. I've never felt this hypnotized, amazed, and captivated; the level of mesmerization is just so ...more

A wonderful tale I hated to put down, couldn’t wait to resume whenever I did, and felt sad when it was over. A great blend of fantasy and historical fiction that explores what it means to be human amid the multicultural blend of immigrants trying to achieve their dreams in New York City at the end of the 19th century.
We follow the lives of two mythic creatures trying to pass as human, living parallel lives and slowly drawn into a common path. Chava appears as a woman and was recently made as a ...more
We follow the lives of two mythic creatures trying to pass as human, living parallel lives and slowly drawn into a common path. Chava appears as a woman and was recently made as a ...more

Huh. Well, this was deeply... okay. Wecker set up an interesting and fairly straightforward concept: Two supernatural beings in the turn of the century New York, trying to make their way in the New World, an exaggerated metaphor for the immigrant experience and the human condition. Fair enough. And there was some lovely atmospheric writing at the start that both helped to build the historical world and the supernatural feeling while she built her world and info-dumped all the information we need
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"And if she was meant to be curious, did that mean she could take no credit for her own discoveries, her accomplishments? Had she nothing of her own, only what Joseph Schall decreed she should have?"
This is a book that works its magic in silence. You don't expect it to be what it is, to give you what it gives you. This is a subtle book; a book that sneaks up on you when you least expect it, and that, for all that it gives, expects something in return. The breath that more than once you couldn't ...more
This is a book that works its magic in silence. You don't expect it to be what it is, to give you what it gives you. This is a subtle book; a book that sneaks up on you when you least expect it, and that, for all that it gives, expects something in return. The breath that more than once you couldn't ...more

This was a story that I couldn't wait to get back to, especially when "life" called me away from it. I was riveted right from the start!
An intriguing story of a friendship, a love story, unlike any other, intertwining Jewish and Arabic folkloric beliefs. I loved how the stories of the Golem and the Jinni, two mystical creatures, were parallel in nature and how they interacted once they met. For a debut novel, I was impressed with the maturity level of the plot and character developments. I was ...more
An intriguing story of a friendship, a love story, unlike any other, intertwining Jewish and Arabic folkloric beliefs. I loved how the stories of the Golem and the Jinni, two mystical creatures, were parallel in nature and how they interacted once they met. For a debut novel, I was impressed with the maturity level of the plot and character developments. I was ...more

Despite the obvious suggestion from the title and despite the supernatural nature of the main characters, for me this is not a novel about a golem and a jinni. It is the story of two ordinary people, immigrants like millions others coming to New York in the year 1899, there to learn how to deal with being uprooted from their birth lands, with being alone and lost in an alien culture, with how to slowly emerge from their hard protective shells and how to rely on each other. Maybe even to learn ho
...more

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_________
This book has been one of those ones that hung out on my TBR list far longer than it should.
I would catch a glimpse of this book in bookstores and debate picking up a copy, only to pass over it when another book caught my eye. I ...more
_________
“All of us are lonely at some point or another, no matter how any people surround us. And then, we meet someone who seems to understand. She smiles, and for a moment the loneliness disappears.”
This book has been one of those ones that hung out on my TBR list far longer than it should.
I would catch a glimpse of this book in bookstores and debate picking up a copy, only to pass over it when another book caught my eye. I ...more

May 14, 2018
Celeste
rated it
it was amazing
·
review of another edition
Recommended to Celeste by:
Mary ~Ravager of Tomes~
Full review now posted!
Actual rating: 4.5 stars
Wecker crafted one of the most beautiful books I’ve read in a long time in The Golem and the Jinni, and I’m so glad that I finally took time to read it.
I’ve had this book sitting on my shelf for four years. You read that right. Four. YEARS. I’m ashamed, I tell you. I bought it because it was cheap and the cover was pretty and I promptly returned to my regular reading. The premise sounded interesting, it really did, but it was just strange enough for ...more
Actual rating: 4.5 stars
Wecker crafted one of the most beautiful books I’ve read in a long time in The Golem and the Jinni, and I’m so glad that I finally took time to read it.
I’ve had this book sitting on my shelf for four years. You read that right. Four. YEARS. I’m ashamed, I tell you. I bought it because it was cheap and the cover was pretty and I promptly returned to my regular reading. The premise sounded interesting, it really did, but it was just strange enough for ...more

I really enjoyed this novel that blended historical fiction with some fantasy. It's the story of a young woman made of clay (the golem), and a male genie who had been trapped in a copper flask for centuries (the jinni).
But really, this is the story of immigrants in America. The book is set in New York in 1899, and we see how difficult it was to be a "stranger in a strange land." The golem came to life because a businessman wanted a wife he could control, and the jinni was accidentally released b ...more
But really, this is the story of immigrants in America. The book is set in New York in 1899, and we see how difficult it was to be a "stranger in a strange land." The golem came to life because a businessman wanted a wife he could control, and the jinni was accidentally released b ...more

EDIT: Actually, after a lot of thought, I'm bumping this down to a t ...more

Jul 02, 2013
David
rated it
it was amazing
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Fans of "Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell"
If you claim you like fantasy but you don't like this book, then what you like is silly wizards and hot werewolf-on-chick action, or else secondary world fantasy with elves and dragons and lost swords and shit, which is all well and good but I'm gonna be totally judgmental about any so-called fantasy fan who doesn't like this book because it's "too long" or too "slow-moving" or whatever stupid reason it failed to score with you. The Golem and the Jinni is a carefully constructed modern fable wri
...more

Click here to watch a video featuring this book on my channel, From Beginning to Bookend.
Cataloged as historical fiction, this book divulges the story of several immigrants living in New York at the turn-of-the-century, but the author subtly weaves two unique immigrant characters into the narrative, a golem and a jinni, giving the book an element of fantasy. Maybe it was the jinni's mysterious origin story unfolding, or the golem's emotional plight, or perhaps it was just fun to look through a p ...more
Cataloged as historical fiction, this book divulges the story of several immigrants living in New York at the turn-of-the-century, but the author subtly weaves two unique immigrant characters into the narrative, a golem and a jinni, giving the book an element of fantasy. Maybe it was the jinni's mysterious origin story unfolding, or the golem's emotional plight, or perhaps it was just fun to look through a p ...more

May 10, 2013
colleen the convivial curmudgeon
rated it
it was ok
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
historical-fantasy
2.5
I first heard about this book recently when a friend read it and said he was very impressed with it - he said it was much better than what he was expecting. Then it kept popping up in a couple of groups I'm in, and between everyone seeming to be well impressed with it, and it seeming to be a sort of thing I would like, being a fan of historical fantasy in general, and various cultural mythos in particular, I figured I'd give it a go.
So I'm a bit sad to say that I wasn't really all that wowed ...more
I first heard about this book recently when a friend read it and said he was very impressed with it - he said it was much better than what he was expecting. Then it kept popping up in a couple of groups I'm in, and between everyone seeming to be well impressed with it, and it seeming to be a sort of thing I would like, being a fan of historical fantasy in general, and various cultural mythos in particular, I figured I'd give it a go.
So I'm a bit sad to say that I wasn't really all that wowed ...more

A golem and a jinni walk into a NY City bar.
“I am a down to earth kind of girl,” says the golem.
“Nice,” says the jinni. “Can I offer you a light?”
When Wecker contrives to have a golem (a creature fashioned of clay) meet a jinni (a creature of fire) in New York City, it could have become a parody or resulted in a series of tropes. That isn’t the case.
Wecker carefully crafts her context for this encounter and gives us a “marvelous” series of insights into what might have happened in the Manhattan ...more
“I am a down to earth kind of girl,” says the golem.
“Nice,” says the jinni. “Can I offer you a light?”
When Wecker contrives to have a golem (a creature fashioned of clay) meet a jinni (a creature of fire) in New York City, it could have become a parody or resulted in a series of tropes. That isn’t the case.
Wecker carefully crafts her context for this encounter and gives us a “marvelous” series of insights into what might have happened in the Manhattan ...more

Aug 28, 2018
Jo (The Book Geek)
rated it
really liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
fantasy,
i-believe-in-magic
This book was beautiful. It was written incredibly well, I loved the plot and the characters and it was really quite unique in comparison to other books I've read. There were a few things that irritated me, though, and I feel these things let the book down, and my final rating for it.
Firstly, the front cover. THE FRONT COVER! I just have so much love for a beautiful book cover, and this one is no exception. This one is that mesmerising, I'd purchase the book without reading the blurb. Madness y ...more
Firstly, the front cover. THE FRONT COVER! I just have so much love for a beautiful book cover, and this one is no exception. This one is that mesmerising, I'd purchase the book without reading the blurb. Madness y ...more

There just are not enough stars - I just finished this fantastic book! The Golem and the Jinni was crafted like a fine weaving of well phrased words. I admit I do not know much about Jewish or Arab cultures, 1890 New York is also a new subject for me. I was enthralled by the magic that is so artfully presented in this lovely story! Even things that are frightening have such an empathetic edge, they are softened to be quite palatable. The research seems thorough, very believable, I learned about
...more

What attracted me to this story was the creativity of blending two mystical figures Golem with Jinni and what comes out of it.
The story begins very strong with introducing both mystical figures and how they arrived to be in NYC. But then I kept waiting and waiting for them to meet and for some poignant story to come out of this. But before they met, I lost interest in the story.
The book is almost 500 pages with a fine print, meaning with regular print it’d be probably 600 pages. I found it too ...more
The story begins very strong with introducing both mystical figures and how they arrived to be in NYC. But then I kept waiting and waiting for them to meet and for some poignant story to come out of this. But before they met, I lost interest in the story.
The book is almost 500 pages with a fine print, meaning with regular print it’d be probably 600 pages. I found it too ...more

"Passover stretched on, and Lower East Side turned into one giant craving: for a pastry, a bagel, anything really, as long as it wasn't matzo". SOME THINGS NEVER CHANGE!!!!
Its Passover over week right 'now' ---(Jews all over the world are celebrating Freedom this week --(suffering? ---giving up their BREAD) ---- me! me! me!!!!!
Yet, a few things HAVE change: With many people on gluten-free diets today ---SOME Jews are passing on 'bagels' all year long! (we're use to suffering anyway...having rec ...more
Its Passover over week right 'now' ---(Jews all over the world are celebrating Freedom this week --(suffering? ---giving up their BREAD) ---- me! me! me!!!!!
Yet, a few things HAVE change: With many people on gluten-free diets today ---SOME Jews are passing on 'bagels' all year long! (we're use to suffering anyway...having rec ...more
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You'll love this ...: May 2022 - The Golem and the Jinni | 47 | 23 | May 31, 2022 04:40AM | |
Play Book Tag: The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker-4.5 Stars | 2 | 11 | Mar 02, 2022 05:44AM | |
SPOILERS - The Golem and The Jinni | 1 | 2 | Feb 10, 2022 01:58PM | |
SciFi and Fantasy...: "The Golem and the Jinni' - First Thoughts *No Spoilers* | 106 | 598 | Oct 31, 2021 06:52AM | |
Play Book Tag: Golem and the Jinni, by Helene Wecker, 5 stars | 4 | 15 | Jul 17, 2021 11:34PM | |
Hugo & Nebula Awa...: March 2020 -- The Golem and the Jinni (No Spoilers) | 29 | 43 | Jun 14, 2021 05:40PM |
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Helene Wecker’s first novel, The Golem and the Jinni, was awarded the Mythopoeic Award for Adult Literature, the VCU Cabell Award for First Novel, and the Harold U. Ribalow Prize, and was nominated for a Nebula Award and a World Fantasy Award. Its sequel, The Hidden Palace, was published in June 2021. A Midwest native, she holds a B.A. in English from Carleton College and an M.F.A. in Fiction Writ
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“All of us are lonely at some point or another, no matter how any people surround us. And then, we meet someone who seems to understand. She smiles, and for a moment the loneliness disappears.”
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