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Him
“Women, of course, can not be sons of God.” In the village of Nazareth, virgin Maryam and the wife of Yosef barLevi gives birth to a miracle: a little girl. She is named Avigayil, after her grandmother. But as Avigayil grows, it’s clear she believes that she is destined to be someone greater than just the daughter of Maryam. From fighting with the village boys to challenging the priests in the temple, Avigayil is determined to find her way. And then comes the day when Avigayil declares that not only is she a boy, but she is also the Son of God. A gripping, thoughtful sci-fi novel, tackling family, the multiverse and the survival of love through immense change and crisis.
257 pages, ebook
First published December 5, 2023
45 people are currently reading
1096 people want to read
About the author
Geoff Ryman
99 books204 followersGeoffrey Charles Ryman (born 1951) is a writer of science fiction, fantasy and slipstream fiction. He was born in Canada, and has lived most of his life in England.
His science fiction and fantasy works include The Warrior Who Carried Life (1985), the novella The Unconquered Country (1986) (winner of the British Science Fiction Award and the World Fantasy Award), and The Child Garden (1989) (winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award and the Campbell Award). Subsequent fiction works include Was (1992), Lust (2001), and Air (2005) (winner of the James Tiptree, Jr. Award, the British Science Fiction Award and the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and on the short list for the Nebula Award).
His science fiction and fantasy works include The Warrior Who Carried Life (1985), the novella The Unconquered Country (1986) (winner of the British Science Fiction Award and the World Fantasy Award), and The Child Garden (1989) (winner of the Arthur C. Clarke Award and the Campbell Award). Subsequent fiction works include Was (1992), Lust (2001), and Air (2005) (winner of the James Tiptree, Jr. Award, the British Science Fiction Award and the Arthur C. Clarke Award, and on the short list for the Nebula Award).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 95 reviews
October 1, 2023
As a person of faith I thought that I would have problems reading this book and find it challenging or even offensive. Not at all, it was a sensitive book and made me think very much on the issues of gender, the meaning of faith and understanding God. It was a great read, very familiar in places (well it is a reimagining of the New Testament and the life of Jesus Christ) and the end was beautiful. A book that will stay with me for a long time.
Read
October 13, 2023Imagine an alternative history where Jesus was born female but identified as a man. That’s the central premise of Him, a remarkable novel infused with humanity and compassion that‘s not nearly as provocative as you think it might be (though I’m sure it will piss off the usual crowd). The story is told mainly from the perspective of Jesus’s Mum, Maryam, who does have a virgin birth (parthenogenesis, of course). When, at the age of five, her daughter identifies as a boy - following the death of a close friend - she refuses to accept the transition. Central to the narrative is this fraught relationship between mother and child (for a long while, Maryam will only refer to her son as “eldest”). Things change when he starts performing miracles and calls himself the Son of Adam (or the Son for short). Sadly, whatever renewed connection Maryam has with her son, it is now shared with his apostles and the eklesia, the caravan of people following the Son with the promise of entering the Kingdom of God (the miracles also help draw a crowd). With a great deal of intelligence and sensitivity, Ryman not only addresses some of the more pernicious aspects of Jesus’s story - such as the Wandering Jew and the Jewish people framed as Christ killers - but asks why a deity would need someone to suffer and die on its behalf. This is an extraordinary, brave, nuanced, beautiful novel. The last five pages are… breathtaking.
Read
November 5, 20241300 years before Jesus unleashed the Holy Spirit on Earth, Moses went to the desert to chat with a burning bush and then, set the World on fire. And the World still burns today.
Ryman's books are not only entertaining but also challenging. They are crafted with multiple layers of meanings and hints about legends, speculations of the future and the past, facts and supposed facts, rumours, and hidden secrets. "Him" has more than 2000 years of layers inside its pages.
It took me one week to read the book and a " couple of Centuries" to write this review. I have poor wits and I'm a slow thinker, sue me.
Imagine: You are a woman and you are a virgin. On a sunny happy day, while still a virgin, you give birth to... a God! How would you feel? How can you possibly understand what happened? In ancient Greece, gods usually impregnated mortals at their own will on a daily basis, so people were used to it, but to the rest of the world, especially for us who are definitely not "Chosen Ones", well that just sounds "weird", doesn't it? I can't recall any other legend, superstition or rumour of that kind anywhere else in the world among any society or emanating from any other religious belief. But, wasn't the bible originally written in Greek? I wonder...
Ryman's "Him" blends the religious myths of 2000 years ago with the gender-fading-changing frontier challenges of today. It is a retelling of the life of Jesus, nothing less. But don't be mistaken by my feeble thoughts, this is not a religious book or even one about religion, even though if it had been written, at any time, in the thousand years of the Dark Ages all its copies would have been used as fuel for the fire to burn the author at the stake, and with slow prejudice, would it have happened during the reign of the "Prostitute of Avignon".
Ryman imagines an alternate reality where Jesus Christ is born biologically female but identifies as male. This intriguing twist defines the narrative, exploring the profound implications of identity and faith in a world frozen by conventions. What would be the impact on the World, Beliefs, and History if the Messiah were to navigate life in a body and identity unlike any expected? This thought-provoking scenario made me rethink traditions, question gender roles, and wonder what the essence of spirituality is.
The story is told, not from Jesus' or the apostles' perspective, as it is almost traditional in other "retellings", but from his family's perspective, mostly His/Her/It mother Mary or, to use the Aramaic name Ryman chose, Maryam. For names and places, Ryman uses Aramaic, the “common tongue” of the area at the time, rather than Hebrew, Greek, or English.
The story starts with a little parthenogenesis trick. In other words, reproduction without fertilisation; an ovum developing into a new individual without exterior contribution.
What I find fascinating in Human memory is how easily and conveniently we forget embarrassing details when it is suitable to achieve some purpose. Long before Mary, Joseph and Jesus, the Osiris myth has been circulating for more than 2400 BC; According to several sources, Isis conceived his son, Horus, by being impregnated by a flash of lightning. Sounds familiar?
When reading the Bible (Old and New Testaments), it’s crucial to remember that it wasn’t just dropped from heaven onto our heads. It was written by several real individuals with unique backgrounds, personalities and personal interpretations of facts, or most of the time, rumours of deeds performed by someone, somewhere, sometimes far away, without any hard evidence. I believe that it was when "recycling" was invented.
But that is the problem with stories told throughout Time from mouth to mouth. When a message is passed around verbally in a chain train, without a physical record (to have several ones is better...), it comes out very different in the end; sometimes drastically different from the original version.
We’ve all, I believe, in one format or another, played the game “Telephone” or the "Chinese Whispers". The experiment involves a group of people, in a large circle and a message being whispered into the first player’s ears. Then, the first receiver whispers the same message into the next person’s ears and so on until the message reaches the end of the circle. We always found the final result hilarious, with the message completely distorted by the time it reached the final receiver. My point is: If a short message, passed from ear to ear among a small group of people enclosed in a small space for a small amount of time, is completely distorted, what could happen to a massive message (like the one in the Bible) passed on for centuries by an unknown number of individuals? Remember that only after Guttenberg we can start to relly that the Message is kept unchanged. And even so, take a peek at the ongoing theological battle that has been raging out there for centuries now and try to guess what the original message was. Good luck!
That is to say that taking the Bible as a reliable historical source is not, in my opinion, a secure option to defend or deny the existence of a "son of God" who was sacrificed on the cross to redeem mankind of a mysterious sin that we don't know we committed. And if we take as evidence the fragments of the cross where He was nailed that have been sold as relics, then we can conclude that Jesus was crucified over the entire Amazonic forest.
At some point in the book, it came to me to think (yes, that happens from time to time) that perhaps the search for the "Absolute" is a biological Universal imperative inscribed in Human DNA. We all, through time and space, search for the "Alpha" and "Omega" everywhere in the World by everyone; we just give Them different names and we believe, each of us, that "Ours" is the right and truly "Absolute One" and we are the "Chosen Ones" or any other BS you care to believe. But since we are humans, we don't search for sharing and communion with others because we are the only species that prey on itself. Where and when all started to go wrong? Your guess is as good as mine.
God doesn't demand anything from us. Other men, Rabis, Priests, Mulahs, or whatever fancy title they use, are the ones who demand it, supposedly in God's name, or that is what they want us to believe. If the parable of the coming and the sacrifice of Jesus meant anything at all, it was to tell us that if God truly exists It is inside all of us; we don't need intermediaries to commune with It. According to the Christian liturgy, demons can possess human bodies! Can't God do the same?
In the author's words, God has no idea what is going on or why. God is confused... Only I know...
All this mess presumably started with that bloke in Egipt, Akhenaten. He probably blamed Nefertiti after, but it was he who ignited the initial spark.
Before Akhenaton, there wasn't a Unique God. There were always loads of gods, each with a particular skill and an area of expertise, in any religion anywhere in the world.
There were already, at the time, rumours from Mesopotamia of one and unique Ahura Mazda (no, not the Japanese car) but, it is generally accepted that Akhenaton invented monotheism and imported the god Aten (tax-free) and the consequent GACP (Godly Absolute Centralisation of Power) to justify and give a little shine to his earthly ruling. None of that huge democratic assembly of gods with the crappy delegation of functions and dilution of Power associated. All those "sissy" ideas were fine for the Greeks but in early Egypt, hard-beardless men only needed one god.
When Akhenaten fell, the Egyptians returned to their assembly of gods and started to persecute Aten adepts, probably giving origin to the Exodus and the first (known) persecution of Jews, if we can assume they were followers of Aten.
Freud proposed the idea that Moses was originally an Atenist priest. In his book "Moses and Monotheism," Freud suggests that Moses had to flee Egypt along with his followers following the death of Akhenaten. At this point, I'm really amused, because if Freud is involved we will find some sex complex soon ahead... or back in Time...whatever...
This extraordinary novel delves deep into themes of identity, divinity, and alternate realities. It intricately weaves the tale of God's son, exploring the nuances of faith, while reflecting on the belief that women cannot hold the title of "son of God" in a society intrinsically misogynist. Through a captivating narrative, Ryman's ideas challenge perceptions and invite readers to contemplate the complexities of gender and spirituality in a richly imagined universe.
To me, it is impressive how some accepted aspects of the life of Jesus are reinterpreted by Ryman, and given a deeper meaning. Besides, Ryman has created a world that we can easily believe, reflects the historical sources about Judea during the Roman occupation.
If you are any kind of religious fanatic and you are easily offended or if you don't like historical speculation and philosophical experimentation, then forget this book.
But, whether you are a believer or not, a religious person of any kind or not, this story, which has been going on for more than 3000 years, is fascinating because it changed the face of the Earth and continues to do so today, as well as the minds of trillions of individuals and whole societies around the world.
As for me, at a personal level, after being raised in a family where you can find, among my ancestors, an Anglican enthusiast, a Jew, a Monsignor of the Catholic Roman church and a father who used to quote Nietzsche regularly, my relation with religious beliefs is, at the very least, cautious and weary... Now that I think about it I realise that I missed Buddhism. I wonder if I would be more "complete" if I had been sprinkled with a little bit of Zen infusion.
Since my early awakening to religious conscience, I knew that I didn't want to belong to any of those three Abrahamic bloody #_"°&§* (fill with the curse of your preference, please) gangs that have been killing each other for more than 2000 years over differences in semantics. It's so damn stupid that I'm ashamed of being part of the same species.
That powerful spell that was cast in Mount Horeb to spread its poison globally throughout the millennia went horribly wrong, of that I'm sure, and Ryman just reassured me of my convictions with this wonderful book.
Ryman's books are not only entertaining but also challenging. They are crafted with multiple layers of meanings and hints about legends, speculations of the future and the past, facts and supposed facts, rumours, and hidden secrets. "Him" has more than 2000 years of layers inside its pages.
It took me one week to read the book and a " couple of Centuries" to write this review. I have poor wits and I'm a slow thinker, sue me.
Imagine: You are a woman and you are a virgin. On a sunny happy day, while still a virgin, you give birth to... a God! How would you feel? How can you possibly understand what happened? In ancient Greece, gods usually impregnated mortals at their own will on a daily basis, so people were used to it, but to the rest of the world, especially for us who are definitely not "Chosen Ones", well that just sounds "weird", doesn't it? I can't recall any other legend, superstition or rumour of that kind anywhere else in the world among any society or emanating from any other religious belief. But, wasn't the bible originally written in Greek? I wonder...
Ryman's "Him" blends the religious myths of 2000 years ago with the gender-fading-changing frontier challenges of today. It is a retelling of the life of Jesus, nothing less. But don't be mistaken by my feeble thoughts, this is not a religious book or even one about religion, even though if it had been written, at any time, in the thousand years of the Dark Ages all its copies would have been used as fuel for the fire to burn the author at the stake, and with slow prejudice, would it have happened during the reign of the "Prostitute of Avignon".
Ryman imagines an alternate reality where Jesus Christ is born biologically female but identifies as male. This intriguing twist defines the narrative, exploring the profound implications of identity and faith in a world frozen by conventions. What would be the impact on the World, Beliefs, and History if the Messiah were to navigate life in a body and identity unlike any expected? This thought-provoking scenario made me rethink traditions, question gender roles, and wonder what the essence of spirituality is.
The story is told, not from Jesus' or the apostles' perspective, as it is almost traditional in other "retellings", but from his family's perspective, mostly His/Her/It mother Mary or, to use the Aramaic name Ryman chose, Maryam. For names and places, Ryman uses Aramaic, the “common tongue” of the area at the time, rather than Hebrew, Greek, or English.
The story starts with a little parthenogenesis trick. In other words, reproduction without fertilisation; an ovum developing into a new individual without exterior contribution.
What I find fascinating in Human memory is how easily and conveniently we forget embarrassing details when it is suitable to achieve some purpose. Long before Mary, Joseph and Jesus, the Osiris myth has been circulating for more than 2400 BC; According to several sources, Isis conceived his son, Horus, by being impregnated by a flash of lightning. Sounds familiar?
When reading the Bible (Old and New Testaments), it’s crucial to remember that it wasn’t just dropped from heaven onto our heads. It was written by several real individuals with unique backgrounds, personalities and personal interpretations of facts, or most of the time, rumours of deeds performed by someone, somewhere, sometimes far away, without any hard evidence. I believe that it was when "recycling" was invented.
But that is the problem with stories told throughout Time from mouth to mouth. When a message is passed around verbally in a chain train, without a physical record (to have several ones is better...), it comes out very different in the end; sometimes drastically different from the original version.
We’ve all, I believe, in one format or another, played the game “Telephone” or the "Chinese Whispers". The experiment involves a group of people, in a large circle and a message being whispered into the first player’s ears. Then, the first receiver whispers the same message into the next person’s ears and so on until the message reaches the end of the circle. We always found the final result hilarious, with the message completely distorted by the time it reached the final receiver. My point is: If a short message, passed from ear to ear among a small group of people enclosed in a small space for a small amount of time, is completely distorted, what could happen to a massive message (like the one in the Bible) passed on for centuries by an unknown number of individuals? Remember that only after Guttenberg we can start to relly that the Message is kept unchanged. And even so, take a peek at the ongoing theological battle that has been raging out there for centuries now and try to guess what the original message was. Good luck!
That is to say that taking the Bible as a reliable historical source is not, in my opinion, a secure option to defend or deny the existence of a "son of God" who was sacrificed on the cross to redeem mankind of a mysterious sin that we don't know we committed. And if we take as evidence the fragments of the cross where He was nailed that have been sold as relics, then we can conclude that Jesus was crucified over the entire Amazonic forest.
At some point in the book, it came to me to think (yes, that happens from time to time) that perhaps the search for the "Absolute" is a biological Universal imperative inscribed in Human DNA. We all, through time and space, search for the "Alpha" and "Omega" everywhere in the World by everyone; we just give Them different names and we believe, each of us, that "Ours" is the right and truly "Absolute One" and we are the "Chosen Ones" or any other BS you care to believe. But since we are humans, we don't search for sharing and communion with others because we are the only species that prey on itself. Where and when all started to go wrong? Your guess is as good as mine.
God doesn't demand anything from us. Other men, Rabis, Priests, Mulahs, or whatever fancy title they use, are the ones who demand it, supposedly in God's name, or that is what they want us to believe. If the parable of the coming and the sacrifice of Jesus meant anything at all, it was to tell us that if God truly exists It is inside all of us; we don't need intermediaries to commune with It. According to the Christian liturgy, demons can possess human bodies! Can't God do the same?
In the author's words, God has no idea what is going on or why. God is confused... Only I know...
All this mess presumably started with that bloke in Egipt, Akhenaten. He probably blamed Nefertiti after, but it was he who ignited the initial spark.
Before Akhenaton, there wasn't a Unique God. There were always loads of gods, each with a particular skill and an area of expertise, in any religion anywhere in the world.
There were already, at the time, rumours from Mesopotamia of one and unique Ahura Mazda (no, not the Japanese car) but, it is generally accepted that Akhenaton invented monotheism and imported the god Aten (tax-free) and the consequent GACP (Godly Absolute Centralisation of Power) to justify and give a little shine to his earthly ruling. None of that huge democratic assembly of gods with the crappy delegation of functions and dilution of Power associated. All those "sissy" ideas were fine for the Greeks but in early Egypt, hard-beardless men only needed one god.
When Akhenaten fell, the Egyptians returned to their assembly of gods and started to persecute Aten adepts, probably giving origin to the Exodus and the first (known) persecution of Jews, if we can assume they were followers of Aten.
Freud proposed the idea that Moses was originally an Atenist priest. In his book "Moses and Monotheism," Freud suggests that Moses had to flee Egypt along with his followers following the death of Akhenaten. At this point, I'm really amused, because if Freud is involved we will find some sex complex soon ahead... or back in Time...whatever...
This extraordinary novel delves deep into themes of identity, divinity, and alternate realities. It intricately weaves the tale of God's son, exploring the nuances of faith, while reflecting on the belief that women cannot hold the title of "son of God" in a society intrinsically misogynist. Through a captivating narrative, Ryman's ideas challenge perceptions and invite readers to contemplate the complexities of gender and spirituality in a richly imagined universe.
To me, it is impressive how some accepted aspects of the life of Jesus are reinterpreted by Ryman, and given a deeper meaning. Besides, Ryman has created a world that we can easily believe, reflects the historical sources about Judea during the Roman occupation.
If you are any kind of religious fanatic and you are easily offended or if you don't like historical speculation and philosophical experimentation, then forget this book.
But, whether you are a believer or not, a religious person of any kind or not, this story, which has been going on for more than 3000 years, is fascinating because it changed the face of the Earth and continues to do so today, as well as the minds of trillions of individuals and whole societies around the world.
As for me, at a personal level, after being raised in a family where you can find, among my ancestors, an Anglican enthusiast, a Jew, a Monsignor of the Catholic Roman church and a father who used to quote Nietzsche regularly, my relation with religious beliefs is, at the very least, cautious and weary... Now that I think about it I realise that I missed Buddhism. I wonder if I would be more "complete" if I had been sprinkled with a little bit of Zen infusion.
Since my early awakening to religious conscience, I knew that I didn't want to belong to any of those three Abrahamic bloody #_"°&§* (fill with the curse of your preference, please) gangs that have been killing each other for more than 2000 years over differences in semantics. It's so damn stupid that I'm ashamed of being part of the same species.
That powerful spell that was cast in Mount Horeb to spread its poison globally throughout the millennia went horribly wrong, of that I'm sure, and Ryman just reassured me of my convictions with this wonderful book.
December 22, 2023
Review originally on
JamReads
Him is a really ambitious gender bent retelling with science fiction influences inspired by Jesus' life, written by Geoff Ryman, and published by Angry Robot. This particular niche of speculative fiction has always fascinated me, so I was really excited by the perspective of reading it; and Ryman nailed it, creating a thought-provoking story that stays with you and that landed directly in my top reads of the year.
Ryman takes a bold decision starting the novel at the end of our story, with Maryam receiving the news about her son condemn, quickly jumping back in time to the previous months to the miraculous conception that Maryam experiences; how to avoid the problems she's quickly married to Yosef barLevi, a good man whose unorthodox religious ideas ends provoking his exile from his natal town. Happiness soon comes to the marriage, as Maryam gives birth to a girl, who receives the name of Avigayil; Yosef accepts her as his own daughter.
However, nobody is really ready to understand the scope of Avigayil's existence, or even questions as the identity, when being five years old, Avigayil's starts identifying as Yeshu, a boy. Ryman chooses to portrait all the story from the perspective of Maryam, showing how she cannot grasp the implications of her son; the relationship between them suffers from it, not acknowledging Yeshu's identity until really late.
Mixed with this complicated story, Ryman continues exploring a rather unknown aspects of the character, taking an important focus on the childhood and the family, often overlooked in the official sources. With the pass of time, the break between Maryam and Yeshu becomes even bigger; Maryam decides to focus on the rest of her family, meanwhile the Son starts his predication.
Ryman gives an enormous amount of nuances to Maryam's character, as a mother and as the leader of the family after Yosef's death; she's protective of all her siblings. Even in the case of the Son, she deeply cares; when she finally understands the nature of Yeshu, she becomes one more of the Ekklesia, all until the end comes.
It's magnificent how some of the evangelical passages are recreated and, in some cases, given a deeper meaning. In conjunction with those fragments, Ryman has created a really faithful world to what the historical sources tell about the Judea under Roman's occupation.
I cannot recommend this book enough, because it's an excellent thought provoking piece, going deep into questions like identity, family, and acceptation. Ryman has nailed Him; do yourself a favour and read it.
Him is a really ambitious gender bent retelling with science fiction influences inspired by Jesus' life, written by Geoff Ryman, and published by Angry Robot. This particular niche of speculative fiction has always fascinated me, so I was really excited by the perspective of reading it; and Ryman nailed it, creating a thought-provoking story that stays with you and that landed directly in my top reads of the year.
Ryman takes a bold decision starting the novel at the end of our story, with Maryam receiving the news about her son condemn, quickly jumping back in time to the previous months to the miraculous conception that Maryam experiences; how to avoid the problems she's quickly married to Yosef barLevi, a good man whose unorthodox religious ideas ends provoking his exile from his natal town. Happiness soon comes to the marriage, as Maryam gives birth to a girl, who receives the name of Avigayil; Yosef accepts her as his own daughter.
However, nobody is really ready to understand the scope of Avigayil's existence, or even questions as the identity, when being five years old, Avigayil's starts identifying as Yeshu, a boy. Ryman chooses to portrait all the story from the perspective of Maryam, showing how she cannot grasp the implications of her son; the relationship between them suffers from it, not acknowledging Yeshu's identity until really late.
Mixed with this complicated story, Ryman continues exploring a rather unknown aspects of the character, taking an important focus on the childhood and the family, often overlooked in the official sources. With the pass of time, the break between Maryam and Yeshu becomes even bigger; Maryam decides to focus on the rest of her family, meanwhile the Son starts his predication.
Ryman gives an enormous amount of nuances to Maryam's character, as a mother and as the leader of the family after Yosef's death; she's protective of all her siblings. Even in the case of the Son, she deeply cares; when she finally understands the nature of Yeshu, she becomes one more of the Ekklesia, all until the end comes.
It's magnificent how some of the evangelical passages are recreated and, in some cases, given a deeper meaning. In conjunction with those fragments, Ryman has created a really faithful world to what the historical sources tell about the Judea under Roman's occupation.
I cannot recommend this book enough, because it's an excellent thought provoking piece, going deep into questions like identity, family, and acceptation. Ryman has nailed Him; do yourself a favour and read it.
December 18, 2023
This is...an astonishing book.
Geoff Ryman is an unusual writer whose stories often shine a different light on historical events. “Was” was a reframing of the Wizard of Oz story conflated with the true story of Dorothy Gale and Judy Garland, while being a story about gay relationships in the age of AIDS. If that sounds weird, it is, but it totally worked. “The King's Last Song” conflates the brutality of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge period with the ancient kingdom of Kampuchea.
“Him” is a reframing of the Christ story, of course. I hesitate to say it, but the regendering of Christ is almost the least of it. We follow the story through the 3rd person omniscient view of Christ's mother, called Maryam here. Her virgin birth, her marriage to Yosef, raising many children besides the one who decides to call himself Yeshu – it all leads up to the story we know. Here, however, it is stripped of the stilted prose of the translated New Testament and couched in language that we can believe these people actually spoke (although the dialect that sounds like English working-class accents don't work so well, but they make a point).
We see characters we recognize (although by slightly different spellings) and episodes we know (although presented differently than in the gospels). Yeshu's words sound familiar yet they're different, with ambiguous meanings that puzzle most listeners. It's all meant to feel familiar yet strange, to set us back and make us think how little of the details we actually know, and how little of these people's personalities we know.
And before anyone plays the blasphemy card – this is fiction. A novel. Made-up. Nobody believes Ryman knows the real story any more than the rest of us do. His purpose, however, is to make you think about what it would have been like to have been a family member of this person, a friend, a neighbor in Nazareth. How would they have seen Yeshu? We don't have first-person accounts from most of them, so we can speculate.
OK, this is where the spoiler warning comes in.
Christ does miracles in this book. They actually happen. Maryam experiences them as a lurching of the world, a type of resetting, and then things have changed. It takes a great physical toll on Yeshu to do this, so it's rare. Yeshu also talks about the future in ways that we recognize but confuses the locals (“there will be pictures that move”). He also talks about many worlds, infinite worlds.
Ryman is known as a fantasy writer, although his stories are not what one thinks of when one says “fantasy”. He's not afraid to incorporate exotic elements into his work. So, a possible reading of this story is that Yeshu's miracles are a shifting between worlds in physicist Hugh Everett's “many worlds” hypothesis. Yeshu also can range freely in time, of course, so can see the future (or many possible futures – including his own, which may explain why he forces the Romans to kill him by goading them).
So, is this science fiction? It could be read that way. It's published by a science fiction press. Or it could be read as historical fiction, simply filling in the gaps in the New Testament. Plenty of fictions set in biblical times have been written. This one is different, though. It feels different. It's as much about the people around Yeshu as about him. We don't see Yeshu after he is taken away by the Romans, because Maryam doesn't, but she has a bittersweet resolution in the last line.
Geoff Ryman is an unusual writer whose stories often shine a different light on historical events. “Was” was a reframing of the Wizard of Oz story conflated with the true story of Dorothy Gale and Judy Garland, while being a story about gay relationships in the age of AIDS. If that sounds weird, it is, but it totally worked. “The King's Last Song” conflates the brutality of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge period with the ancient kingdom of Kampuchea.
“Him” is a reframing of the Christ story, of course. I hesitate to say it, but the regendering of Christ is almost the least of it. We follow the story through the 3rd person omniscient view of Christ's mother, called Maryam here. Her virgin birth, her marriage to Yosef, raising many children besides the one who decides to call himself Yeshu – it all leads up to the story we know. Here, however, it is stripped of the stilted prose of the translated New Testament and couched in language that we can believe these people actually spoke (although the dialect that sounds like English working-class accents don't work so well, but they make a point).
We see characters we recognize (although by slightly different spellings) and episodes we know (although presented differently than in the gospels). Yeshu's words sound familiar yet they're different, with ambiguous meanings that puzzle most listeners. It's all meant to feel familiar yet strange, to set us back and make us think how little of the details we actually know, and how little of these people's personalities we know.
And before anyone plays the blasphemy card – this is fiction. A novel. Made-up. Nobody believes Ryman knows the real story any more than the rest of us do. His purpose, however, is to make you think about what it would have been like to have been a family member of this person, a friend, a neighbor in Nazareth. How would they have seen Yeshu? We don't have first-person accounts from most of them, so we can speculate.
OK, this is where the spoiler warning comes in.
Christ does miracles in this book. They actually happen. Maryam experiences them as a lurching of the world, a type of resetting, and then things have changed. It takes a great physical toll on Yeshu to do this, so it's rare. Yeshu also talks about the future in ways that we recognize but confuses the locals (“there will be pictures that move”). He also talks about many worlds, infinite worlds.
Ryman is known as a fantasy writer, although his stories are not what one thinks of when one says “fantasy”. He's not afraid to incorporate exotic elements into his work. So, a possible reading of this story is that Yeshu's miracles are a shifting between worlds in physicist Hugh Everett's “many worlds” hypothesis. Yeshu also can range freely in time, of course, so can see the future (or many possible futures – including his own, which may explain why he forces the Romans to kill him by goading them).
So, is this science fiction? It could be read that way. It's published by a science fiction press. Or it could be read as historical fiction, simply filling in the gaps in the New Testament. Plenty of fictions set in biblical times have been written. This one is different, though. It feels different. It's as much about the people around Yeshu as about him. We don't see Yeshu after he is taken away by the Romans, because Maryam doesn't, but she has a bittersweet resolution in the last line.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 9, 2025
I really struggled with this book and still do not understand the point of it, if it has one and found Ryman’s writing dull and plodding.
It is a “multiverse” story where Jesus was born a woman. I presume this was supposed to cause shock and outrage and bring Ryman notoriety.
I’m afraid that did not work for me: identity politics might be a big thing for some right now but “blasphemy fiction”, especially that which attacks the Christian faith is not so much very last week as very last century.
In addition there are a lot of us atheists around who are unlikely to be offended by an attack on something we don’t believe in anyway. And forgive me if I have missed anything, not being religious and no theologian, but I thought that God was “the supreme being” not some bloke with a beard or woman in a blue dress. As such God is not a human and cannot have a gender. Therefore if God ever came to live amongst us the gender chosen would be a matter of taste and therefore not a subject to outrage.
Let’s add to that that the sort of people who go puce at “the woke” are not likely to have read or even have heard of this book which to the best of my knowledge has not provoked the wrath of the usual subjects.
The story is quite well known too so the notion of a review somehow spoiling the plot seems ridiculous.
And it has been retold and re-imagined by much, much better writers. For example the opening passage of Mikhail Bulgakov’s “The Master and Magarita”, where the devil recounts Pilate’s encounter with Christ, is so haunting and chilling that I will never forget it.
In contrast I battled to finish Him and look forward to the experience fading from my memory.
It is a “multiverse” story where Jesus was born a woman. I presume this was supposed to cause shock and outrage and bring Ryman notoriety.
I’m afraid that did not work for me: identity politics might be a big thing for some right now but “blasphemy fiction”, especially that which attacks the Christian faith is not so much very last week as very last century.
In addition there are a lot of us atheists around who are unlikely to be offended by an attack on something we don’t believe in anyway. And forgive me if I have missed anything, not being religious and no theologian, but I thought that God was “the supreme being” not some bloke with a beard or woman in a blue dress. As such God is not a human and cannot have a gender. Therefore if God ever came to live amongst us the gender chosen would be a matter of taste and therefore not a subject to outrage.
Let’s add to that that the sort of people who go puce at “the woke” are not likely to have read or even have heard of this book which to the best of my knowledge has not provoked the wrath of the usual subjects.
The story is quite well known too so the notion of a review somehow spoiling the plot seems ridiculous.
And it has been retold and re-imagined by much, much better writers. For example the opening passage of Mikhail Bulgakov’s “The Master and Magarita”, where the devil recounts Pilate’s encounter with Christ, is so haunting and chilling that I will never forget it.
In contrast I battled to finish Him and look forward to the experience fading from my memory.
December 26, 2024
2.5 stars rounded down. Cool concept but SEVERELY underedited. There are obvious typos and an entire paragraph that is printed twice. About two thirds of the way through the author started occasionally using British slang which honestly felt like he was running out of steam and trying to finish up faster. I did think the final chapter was well done.
November 21, 2023
There’s a lot of good here, but so much of it drags and the writing was just a tad too sparse and cold for me to really engage with it. It’s provocative, clever, thoughtful and will spark intriguing conversation amongst those who read it. I wanted to love it but just left me feeling a bit cold.
May 31, 2025
I found this surprisingly interesting and moving. I thought it would really raise my hackles but instead I stayed intrigued. It managed to stay in a space of evocative imagination and never felt like it moved into “this is how it actually went down.”
I found the depiction of Jesus’ early ministry, the “Calling Out” especially cool. The multiverse hint at the end was interesting too. Not sure I understood the ending.
I found the depiction of Jesus’ early ministry, the “Calling Out” especially cool. The multiverse hint at the end was interesting too. Not sure I understood the ending.
Want to read
December 13, 2023A provocative novel, no doubt.
We shall see...
We shall see...
January 19, 2024
second half MORE THAN made up for the first half. yehush i love you. maryam i love you. HAPPY ARE THOSE!!! <3
March 5, 2024
This was an unusual but enjoyable read. A thought provoking alternative telling of the story of Jesus; a Jesus born female and named Abigayil, but who identifies as male at the age of five to become Yeshu.
Told mainly from the viewpoint of his family and friends, particularly his mother Maryam, the story is both familiar but yet almost otherworldly; this is categorised as Sci-fi after all.
Avigayil believes she is destined to be someone special, the Son of God, and soon attracts a devout following, eventually coming to the attention of the Roman Empire and facing the possibility of a familiar end.
Geoff Ryman is a very clever writer (I loved his previous book ‘Was’, a parallel to the tale of ‘The Wizard of Oz’) with wonderful characters, descriptive storytelling and at times challenging ideas.
Rob D
Told mainly from the viewpoint of his family and friends, particularly his mother Maryam, the story is both familiar but yet almost otherworldly; this is categorised as Sci-fi after all.
Avigayil believes she is destined to be someone special, the Son of God, and soon attracts a devout following, eventually coming to the attention of the Roman Empire and facing the possibility of a familiar end.
Geoff Ryman is a very clever writer (I loved his previous book ‘Was’, a parallel to the tale of ‘The Wizard of Oz’) with wonderful characters, descriptive storytelling and at times challenging ideas.
Rob D
November 19, 2023
The concept of the multiverse has been around for a while but has absolutely burst into the popular science fiction consciousness in the last few years. Geoff Ryman takes this concept and runs with it to attempt something that some will see as miraculous and some may see as blasphemous. And that is, the idea of an alternative reality in which Jesus was born as a girl. That aside, Him plays very much along the lines of the New Testament version of Jesus from our reality.
Him opens with Maryam, who has become pregnant, she says by God. She is exiled along with Yosef, a scholar and relative of the high priest, to the small Northern town of Nazareth. There Maryam gives birth to a girl, who she names Avigail. Avigail even at a very young age seems preternaturally incisive and learned and at six, following the death of a friend, determines that she will be a boy. Despite her mother’s opposition, Avigail becomes Yeshu and goes out into the village with his brother Yakob, to apprentice as a builder. But Yeshu does not stay a builder for long, finding a calling to preach, he gathers a following around him, demonstrates his ability to perform miracles and determines to take on the authorities in Jerusalam (as it is called here).
While readers do not need to know the detailed story of Jesus, his life and miracles, it helps if only to understand what Ryman is riffing on. He mainly stays within the broad stories of the New Testament – “blessed are the meek”, the curing of the lepers, the raising of the dead – all the way through to the crucifixion. But given his starting premise and by providing the story through Maryam’s perspective, gives a different angle to well known tales. On the other hand, by telling the story in this way and keeping it within these guardrails, it is hard to know whether Ryman has really brought enough new to the story to justify this retelling. All of which serves to make Him an interesting thought experiment but not entirely successful as a novel.
Him opens with Maryam, who has become pregnant, she says by God. She is exiled along with Yosef, a scholar and relative of the high priest, to the small Northern town of Nazareth. There Maryam gives birth to a girl, who she names Avigail. Avigail even at a very young age seems preternaturally incisive and learned and at six, following the death of a friend, determines that she will be a boy. Despite her mother’s opposition, Avigail becomes Yeshu and goes out into the village with his brother Yakob, to apprentice as a builder. But Yeshu does not stay a builder for long, finding a calling to preach, he gathers a following around him, demonstrates his ability to perform miracles and determines to take on the authorities in Jerusalam (as it is called here).
While readers do not need to know the detailed story of Jesus, his life and miracles, it helps if only to understand what Ryman is riffing on. He mainly stays within the broad stories of the New Testament – “blessed are the meek”, the curing of the lepers, the raising of the dead – all the way through to the crucifixion. But given his starting premise and by providing the story through Maryam’s perspective, gives a different angle to well known tales. On the other hand, by telling the story in this way and keeping it within these guardrails, it is hard to know whether Ryman has really brought enough new to the story to justify this retelling. All of which serves to make Him an interesting thought experiment but not entirely successful as a novel.
Read
February 15, 2024Review copy from Netgalley.
This is mostly a fairly straightforward retelling of the Christian Incarnation with Jesus as a transgender man, if by "straightforward" you mean almost anything but straight. I had been expecting, I suppose, something more like James Morrow's Only Begotten Daughter, which combines an agonizing Christ retelling with extreme satire; but there is no satire here, and no winking at the audience.
Maryam, knowing she is pregnant, maneuvers her aristocratic uncle into arranging her marriage to the political dissident Yosef, a sweet-natured and asexual radical; she is open about the nature of her pregnancy but unsurprised when her uncle concludes she is delusional or lying. (Ryman does not leave the reader in any doubt; the novel is clear throughout about the reality of divine intervention in this world. Though "intervention" is too mild a world: Miracles are deformations, not discrete changes but profound and disturbing reorganizations of the entire universe.)
Maryam and Yosef retreat to backwater Nazareth, where Maryam gives birth to a child she assumes is a daughter; the child, from the very beginning, has an adult or even supernatural awareness and understanding of the world. There is a lot about the internecine politics of Roman-occupied Judaea, but very scanty exposition; maybe it makes more sense to Christians, or maybe just to historians of the period.
Yosef preaches the equality of the sexes and the desirability of abstinence (the latter, honestly, is probably much more troubling by the tenets of traditional Judaism); when he and Maryam conceive more children later, it is through primitive artificial insemination rather than intercourse. Maryam, meanwhile, wants a daughter who will give women access to religious participation and all the power and glory that entails; she is infuriated to the point of abuse by the child's insistence that he is male, that he has taken the name of Yehushua after a dead friend, that he
will be a carpenter instead of a scholar or preacher. Even once Yosef intervenes to save the child, Maryam struggles against Yehush and dehumanizes him; for decades she thinks of him as "it" rather than "he".
What reconciles them is time and a shared rejection of the earthly concerns of Nazareth social climbers. Maryam and Yehush are indeed alike: passionate, obdurate, and single-minded to the point of tunnel vision. God, Yehush eventually attempts to explain, needs to "learn about pain":
Death is the impetus for change: the original Yehushua's death prompts Yehush to claim his new name and true gender; Yosef's death prompts Yehush to leave Nazareth and become a prophet; Yehush's death prompts God to create souls. It is perhaps inevitable that the book ends in the moment of a pieta, wrought however strange: not Yehush but God Itself seeking a mother's consolation.
There was one cure for grief. You see the body; you mourn.
This is mostly a fairly straightforward retelling of the Christian Incarnation with Jesus as a transgender man, if by "straightforward" you mean almost anything but straight. I had been expecting, I suppose, something more like James Morrow's Only Begotten Daughter, which combines an agonizing Christ retelling with extreme satire; but there is no satire here, and no winking at the audience.
Maryam, knowing she is pregnant, maneuvers her aristocratic uncle into arranging her marriage to the political dissident Yosef, a sweet-natured and asexual radical; she is open about the nature of her pregnancy but unsurprised when her uncle concludes she is delusional or lying. (Ryman does not leave the reader in any doubt; the novel is clear throughout about the reality of divine intervention in this world. Though "intervention" is too mild a world: Miracles are deformations, not discrete changes but profound and disturbing reorganizations of the entire universe.)
Maryam and Yosef retreat to backwater Nazareth, where Maryam gives birth to a child she assumes is a daughter; the child, from the very beginning, has an adult or even supernatural awareness and understanding of the world. There is a lot about the internecine politics of Roman-occupied Judaea, but very scanty exposition; maybe it makes more sense to Christians, or maybe just to historians of the period.
Yosef preaches the equality of the sexes and the desirability of abstinence (the latter, honestly, is probably much more troubling by the tenets of traditional Judaism); when he and Maryam conceive more children later, it is through primitive artificial insemination rather than intercourse. Maryam, meanwhile, wants a daughter who will give women access to religious participation and all the power and glory that entails; she is infuriated to the point of abuse by the child's insistence that he is male, that he has taken the name of Yehushua after a dead friend, that he
will be a carpenter instead of a scholar or preacher. Even once Yosef intervenes to save the child, Maryam struggles against Yehush and dehumanizes him; for decades she thinks of him as "it" rather than "he".
What reconciles them is time and a shared rejection of the earthly concerns of Nazareth social climbers. Maryam and Yehush are indeed alike: passionate, obdurate, and single-minded to the point of tunnel vision. God, Yehush eventually attempts to explain, needs to "learn about pain":
He paused. “I need to change God.”
Maryam felt a calm, but a calm that restrained something that swelled within her. “God cannot be changed.”
“It’s people who can’t be changed. They live lives like dragonflies, all planned for them and over with before they can think. No. It’s God who must change. God must learn.”
“God.” Maryam was not at all bewildered. She almost felt as though the words had come out of his mouth only moments before they would have come from hers. “God is perfect.”
“Seen as a whole, outside of time, yes. But trapped here, God is in time. Do you think a being
can be perfect if it cannot learn? Learn how to pity? Learn how to forgive?”
The Son whispered. “I can’t understand it all. But God does not have to do things in order. Here, my dying and its dying with me creates the sympathy. The forgiveness. The understanding that it is horrible to die. And what’s horrible about it is. Is that each time someone dies a part of the universe dies too. And so over time, whole peoples go – their songs, stories, wisdoms.”
“I must die. So that God lives through the death and so changes. And so God will let you all live in the spirit.”
Death is the impetus for change: the original Yehushua's death prompts Yehush to claim his new name and true gender; Yosef's death prompts Yehush to leave Nazareth and become a prophet; Yehush's death prompts God to create souls. It is perhaps inevitable that the book ends in the moment of a pieta, wrought however strange: not Yehush but God Itself seeking a mother's consolation.
February 2, 2024
I don't think Him is without worth or merit - I'll be thinking about it for some time, for sure. The thing for me was I picked it up because the concept of Jesus being trans was immediately engaging, and I was curious as to how it would be handled. I always love trans perspectives in fiction, and the backdrop of being the son of God sounded like I was in for some fascinating stuff.
Geoff Ryman is not trans. Not that you have to be trans to write a trans character - and I think it would have been weirder if he HAD tried to write about the trans experience, without any himself. But Yehush's transness has very little to do with the plot at all; only Maryam and Babatha ever react as if it's not to be expected, and Babatha more parrots her mother's language than anything. I guess the tekton is a bit mean but Yehush did take the name of the guy's dead son so I don't know how much you could scorn him for that.
I'm glad this didn't go for full rage-bait, but I don't really understand the relevance of Yehush's transness in this narrative except to drive intrigue. It's a difficult thing to navigate as a cisgendered author, I'm sure; writing a trans main character without it being too exploitative of marginalised lived experiences. I just wish more had been done with the concept.
Geoff Ryman is not trans. Not that you have to be trans to write a trans character - and I think it would have been weirder if he HAD tried to write about the trans experience, without any himself. But Yehush's transness has very little to do with the plot at all; only Maryam and Babatha ever react as if it's not to be expected, and Babatha more parrots her mother's language than anything. I guess the tekton is a bit mean but Yehush did take the name of the guy's dead son so I don't know how much you could scorn him for that.
I'm glad this didn't go for full rage-bait, but I don't really understand the relevance of Yehush's transness in this narrative except to drive intrigue. It's a difficult thing to navigate as a cisgendered author, I'm sure; writing a trans main character without it being too exploitative of marginalised lived experiences. I just wish more had been done with the concept.
December 11, 2023
This book has been resonating in my head for a long while now as I received an advance copy nine months ago. By the end of it, I was speechless before penning my review which I now share with you in redacted form.
One thing I am exceedingly glad of is having had this as a raw manuscript, with no blurb or tagline or anything to hint at spoilerish content. Hence I had no idea that this was going to be about The historical fiction aspect dawned on me gradually, and was all the more delightful for this gradual dawning. Once I had cottoned on, I greeted every new hint and reference with enormous pleasure, puzzling out names, locations, events (some so subtle!). For the first time, I understood the intricate political relationships among the
Going back to the gradually dawning: things were sort of dawning and then the baby was born: a girl. And all I had thought was overturned and I was prepared to go off in a different direction after all. Only to be slowly brought back to the original path in a new way. And it all made so much sense! I kept thinking, but the So satisfying! And the whole girl-thing clicked into place so many things for me: the mildness of the followers ever after. The reveal of the
There are so many beautiful lines in this book, and so much profound truth. And such sadness, too. Having it all focalised through was great in allowing us to dwell on the 30 years before the beginning of the and the following, on the family minutiae, the sister, the other sister, the brothers. Some of this even reminded me of C.S. Lewis The Horse and His BoyThe Horse and His Boy (where my favourite character is Nasaraleen, if I remember her name correctly, the air-headed wealthy girl who is being carried around in a litter).
When I got to , I had tears in my eyes. And a tingling as I realised what was coming.
This is an amazing book and one of this year's highlights.
One thing I am exceedingly glad of is having had this as a raw manuscript, with no blurb or tagline or anything to hint at spoilerish content. Hence I had no idea that this was going to be about The historical fiction aspect dawned on me gradually, and was all the more delightful for this gradual dawning. Once I had cottoned on, I greeted every new hint and reference with enormous pleasure, puzzling out names, locations, events (some so subtle!). For the first time, I understood the intricate political relationships among the
Going back to the gradually dawning: things were sort of dawning and then the baby was born: a girl. And all I had thought was overturned and I was prepared to go off in a different direction after all. Only to be slowly brought back to the original path in a new way. And it all made so much sense! I kept thinking, but the So satisfying! And the whole girl-thing clicked into place so many things for me: the mildness of the followers ever after. The reveal of the
There are so many beautiful lines in this book, and so much profound truth. And such sadness, too. Having it all focalised through was great in allowing us to dwell on the 30 years before the beginning of the and the following, on the family minutiae, the sister, the other sister, the brothers. Some of this even reminded me of C.S. Lewis The Horse and His BoyThe Horse and His Boy (where my favourite character is Nasaraleen, if I remember her name correctly, the air-headed wealthy girl who is being carried around in a litter).
When I got to , I had tears in my eyes. And a tingling as I realised what was coming.
This is an amazing book and one of this year's highlights.
March 23, 2024
I tore through this book in two days. The only reason I couldn't in one was because I started late into the night.
To me, its pacing was perfect. Things were happening on every page, every chapter, nothing seemed like a waste of words. It could be argued I was the exact type of reader this was for, but I strongly believe the author did a great job at characterization and storytelling. The prose is direct, less flowery. It didn't read like a fantasy book (which was the genre I found this book under), more like litfic. I personally found it appropriate for the story it was retelling.
I especially loved the themes it explored. Honestly, it is probably less a story of Jesus (Yehush) and more of a story about Mary (Maryam), motherhood, and gender. The narrator is omniscient, you get to live through both Maryam and Yehush, and feel everything they do.
This book does no disgrace to the Bible. In fact, as an ex-Christian it reignited a sort of enthusiasm of it. It's written beautifully, and a lot of research and love must have been put into this book. It's definitely not entirely faithful and there were many things removed and changed to serve the story, but not once did it make any of our main characters look objectively bad. They are all loveable, dimensional, well-written with amazing growth.
One thing I would bring up is the ending. It may have felt too brief, but I could see that it was sweet. After rereading I realized the point was made a few pages ago, so this choice of ending was just to tie it up in a nice way. I don't mind it but maybe I expected something garish and emotional.
All-in-all however, it was an amazing book. I would always recommend it to everyone, especially to believers of Christian faith.
To me, its pacing was perfect. Things were happening on every page, every chapter, nothing seemed like a waste of words. It could be argued I was the exact type of reader this was for, but I strongly believe the author did a great job at characterization and storytelling. The prose is direct, less flowery. It didn't read like a fantasy book (which was the genre I found this book under), more like litfic. I personally found it appropriate for the story it was retelling.
I especially loved the themes it explored. Honestly, it is probably less a story of Jesus (Yehush) and more of a story about Mary (Maryam), motherhood, and gender. The narrator is omniscient, you get to live through both Maryam and Yehush, and feel everything they do.
This book does no disgrace to the Bible. In fact, as an ex-Christian it reignited a sort of enthusiasm of it. It's written beautifully, and a lot of research and love must have been put into this book. It's definitely not entirely faithful and there were many things removed and changed to serve the story, but not once did it make any of our main characters look objectively bad. They are all loveable, dimensional, well-written with amazing growth.
One thing I would bring up is the ending. It may have felt too brief, but I could see that it was sweet. After rereading I realized the point was made a few pages ago, so this choice of ending was just to tie it up in a nice way. I don't mind it but maybe I expected something garish and emotional.
All-in-all however, it was an amazing book. I would always recommend it to everyone, especially to believers of Christian faith.
March 1, 2024
Multiversal trans Jesus is my favourite Jesus
April 9, 2024
What a breathtaking reimagining of an old story! This is the ‘what if...?’ story of a world like our own, one in which the Son of Adam was a trans man. What stands out most, though, is how well Him tells the tale.
It feels alien because so few names are rendered in modern forms, because the realities of exile and desert survival are so far from what most readers would know, because the text flows between prose and poetry. Worldbuilding is the specialty of the science fiction author, and Geoff Ryman is certainly that, but here it becomes essential to making the story startling enough to be unfamiliar.
It feels immediate because our characters are immersed in the human business of relating to each other, finding shelter and water and food, making each other new with new names, creating new songs while upholding traditions. It feels immediate because some of his own family insist on calling him ‘her’, calling him Avigayil after he has already explained to them repeatedly that he’s Yehush.
I’ve heard and read stories like this many times, but I felt Him more deeply because of the worldbuilding and the personal element of gender. I would never suggest this as a substitute for any Scripture, but it was an excellent adjunct that I’d recommend to anyone who wants to see the Christian Bible in a fresh way.
It feels alien because so few names are rendered in modern forms, because the realities of exile and desert survival are so far from what most readers would know, because the text flows between prose and poetry. Worldbuilding is the specialty of the science fiction author, and Geoff Ryman is certainly that, but here it becomes essential to making the story startling enough to be unfamiliar.
It feels immediate because our characters are immersed in the human business of relating to each other, finding shelter and water and food, making each other new with new names, creating new songs while upholding traditions. It feels immediate because some of his own family insist on calling him ‘her’, calling him Avigayil after he has already explained to them repeatedly that he’s Yehush.
I’ve heard and read stories like this many times, but I felt Him more deeply because of the worldbuilding and the personal element of gender. I would never suggest this as a substitute for any Scripture, but it was an excellent adjunct that I’d recommend to anyone who wants to see the Christian Bible in a fresh way.
December 20, 2023
Maryam tells her uncle, the High Priest, that God has made her the mother of His child. Avigayil is her daughter, born in Nazareth and identifies not only as a boy, but the Son of God, from an early age.
This is a startling novel, which questions religion without being openly disrespectful. Ryman's novels are often seen as shocking, but I prefer to think of them as challenging. This novel challenges received wisdom and questions ritual and organised religion where there is no faith.
This is not an easy novel for people of faith to read. Like Kazantzakis' 'The Last Temptation', it will probably be reviled not for what it is, but what people would prefer it to be.
This is a startling novel, which questions religion without being openly disrespectful. Ryman's novels are often seen as shocking, but I prefer to think of them as challenging. This novel challenges received wisdom and questions ritual and organised religion where there is no faith.
This is not an easy novel for people of faith to read. Like Kazantzakis' 'The Last Temptation', it will probably be reviled not for what it is, but what people would prefer it to be.
October 17, 2024
Read by the author, the audiobook is awful. I don't even know if the story is any good, if read with eyes. I didn't understand it, didn't care what happened, found no enlightenment. The last few minutes were mildly interesting. Just not for me. But if you want half a chance of enjoying the book, avoid the audiobook like the plague.
May 14, 2024
Come for the gender-bent Jesus hook, stay for the detailed depiction of life in first century Galilee.
A weird premise (and probably quite provocative/profane to some), but at its core it’s about a mother struggling to come to terms with her child’s gender dysphoria, and the complex family dynamics that arise as a result. Bonus crash course in early Jewish religion and culture/life in Roman-controlled Palestine - some googling involved if not up to date with the above, and am sure there were other references I missed without being hot on the gospels, Hebrew, etc. Deeply moving, yet accessible to the agnostic reader.
Loved it 5 stars.
A weird premise (and probably quite provocative/profane to some), but at its core it’s about a mother struggling to come to terms with her child’s gender dysphoria, and the complex family dynamics that arise as a result. Bonus crash course in early Jewish religion and culture/life in Roman-controlled Palestine - some googling involved if not up to date with the above, and am sure there were other references I missed without being hot on the gospels, Hebrew, etc. Deeply moving, yet accessible to the agnostic reader.
Loved it 5 stars.
September 9, 2024
Extraordinary
October 9, 2023
God, if you're a believer, is all seeing and all knowing. So, the idea of there being a multiverse, God being aware of it and sending versions of his child to each of the Earths within is an interesting concept. Why shouldn't everyone have a God, or Earthly representative, who reflects them whether that be male, female, gay, trans or other? I'm not religious myself (I was brought up Christian, but outgrew it.), but I can see how this idea and this version in particular, a trans child of God, could cause offence to some of faith. While it's an interesting idea it ultimately didn't work for me. I found it hard to relate to and care about Avigayil/Yehush, the journey they take and its inevitable end. I found their mother, Maryam, and their struggle with their child's sexual identity a more compelling character, but it's a big problem when you don't find yourself caring about the focal character.
Thanks to Angry Robot and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced copy.
Thanks to Angry Robot and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advanced copy.
November 8, 2023
This is a book that took some big swings, but didn’t connect for me. There was so much fertile ground in the premise here, and it all largely felt wasted to me. But it still gets 3 stars because there’s still enough that worked well for it not to be bad.
January 20, 2024
I don’t know where to start with this review because Him has so much going on and even a few days after finishing the book I don’t know how I actually feel about it. There was a lot to love, but there was also a lot that was muddled and brackish to the point where I can say that I’m not sure that Him fully works as a novel or philosophical treatise, but it is definitely engaging and thought-provoking enough that it is worth a read if it at all seems interesting to you.
Him is a multi-versal, AU retelling of the events of the New Testament from the birth of Jesus to his execution. The main difference here is that Jesus (Yeshua here) is assigned female at birth and is a trans man. From there Geoff Ryman examines the role of gender and Jesus’s death in Christian philosophy and morality.
What results is a book that asks some fascinating questions about the role of gender identity, biological sex, marriage, and family in Christianity. Ryman challenges many preconceived notions about the gendered and patriarchal social structures in which Christianity was birthed and continues to persist until today. The questions and issues that Him raises are interesting, and I had a great time reflecting on my upbringing in a conservative Russian Orthodox household, and the discomfort that I often felt surrounding issues of gender and sexuality through my childhood and adolescent years (before, admittedly, eventually leaving religion behind in my past). The biggest issue with Him is that I am not sure I completely understand what Ryman was trying to say in Him regarding Yeshuah’s trans identity. He sets up all of these amazing pieces and then doesn’t quite know what to do with them. After the first few pages there is no real commentary on the intersection between gender identity and theology, and Yeshuah’s transness becomes a simple plot point that is only handled in the most superficial of manners.
(I should also note a trigger warning here: while the book is in no way transphobic, Yeshuah does deal a lot with transphobia throughout the book, including being called “it” by his mother and having his clothes ripped off in public to prove his gender identity).
Ultimately, I’m not sure if Ryman was the correct person to write this particular story. He doesn’t fumble the ball as we’ve seen many authors trying to do while writing minority characters (I believe based on some quick Google searching that Ryman is a cis man), but it is clear he is writing this story from a perspective that is not fully embodied or experienced. The trans elements of Him are not clearly focused and lack perspective because this is a story that really needed to be explored by someone who lived and experienced what it is like to be a trans person.
Thus, the gendered elements to Him come across as a bit provocative for the sake of being provocative. Ryman never crosses a line, and I believe the book is much less sacrilegious than you would think once you start reading, but “Jesus is a trans man!” sometimes reads as more of a way to sell books without having a clear perspective on what that actually means in regards to the story.
However, having said all of that, there is actually a lot to enjoy with Him!
This book is beautifully written in a way that both evokes Biblical prose and poetry while also imbuing these figures with more emotion, humanity, and humanness than you get in Biblical passages. Ryman’s characters are imperfect, sometimes irrational, and feeling people who are more than just placeholders in a parable. No characters exemplify Ryman’s knowledge of the craft more than Yeshuah and his mother Maryam.
Yeshuah is the Messiah, the Son of God and is struggling to grapple with this role. He has a relatively troubled upbringing; his parents are social exiles, his mother does not accept his trans identity, and he is quickly growing in popularity and authority. There is a lot of political weight on his shoulders, and on top of it all he knows that his end is a painful and brutal death at the hand of the Romans. Yeshuah’s journey here reminded me a lot of Jesus’ portrayal in the musical Jesus Christ Superstar – a powerful figure who is intimately human. Yeshuah is imperfect and emotional, and he cannot eliminate those parts of himself just because of his religious powers.
As readers we get to know Yeshuah mostly from the POV of his mother, Maryam. Maryam is the most fascinating character in the book and her arc over the course of the 250ish pages of Him is the number one reason I would recommend this book to someone. Ryman absolutely nails the hardships that Maryam must endure as the mother of the Son of God. As a young woman she relishes the chance to give birth to God’s child; she agrees to marry the village’s religious exile (Joseph) and travel to Nazareth. As she grows, however, she starts to feel the strain of being the mother to what will become the world’s most famous figure. She cannot accept her son’s trans identity and she doesn’t know how to be a mother to someone who is so independent, intelligent, and powerful. She continues to have other children to distract herself, to find children she can be a more “traditional” mother to, and yet her oldest child is still constantly in her orbit. Maryam is a fully realized version of the “Virgin Mary” of the Christian Bible; not always likable but someone you can understand and empathize with (outside of some of her most ardent transphobia).
Maryam’s journey throughout Him is remarkable, and leads to an emotional ending that really explores the nature of the universe, who Jesus was as both a historical and religious figure, and the possible existence of a multiverse.
I’m not sure how big of an audience will be interested in a book like Him, but if you go into it with an open mind and see it as a book that has questions to pose, rather than questions to answer, you’ll definitely find the journey a thought-provoking one. Him works best if you have at least a more-than-passing-knowledge of the New Testament so that you can see where Ryman is twisting and turning the narrative, but otherwise this is a book to promote thinking and discussion.
Concluding Thoughts: The main tagline of Him, “What is Jesus was a trans man”, doesn’t really land because of some muddled ideas and perspectives, but the beautiful prose and character arcs of Ryman’s versions of Jesus and his mother Mary are fascinating. This is a book that is big on asking questions about the nature of Christian theology and worldviews that is sure to promote readers thinking about their own perspectives. So while the gender discussions and sci-fi elements are shallow, the characters and alternative universe Ryman created here are brimming with life. Give it at least a chance if it at all sounds interesting to you.
Him is a multi-versal, AU retelling of the events of the New Testament from the birth of Jesus to his execution. The main difference here is that Jesus (Yeshua here) is assigned female at birth and is a trans man. From there Geoff Ryman examines the role of gender and Jesus’s death in Christian philosophy and morality.
What results is a book that asks some fascinating questions about the role of gender identity, biological sex, marriage, and family in Christianity. Ryman challenges many preconceived notions about the gendered and patriarchal social structures in which Christianity was birthed and continues to persist until today. The questions and issues that Him raises are interesting, and I had a great time reflecting on my upbringing in a conservative Russian Orthodox household, and the discomfort that I often felt surrounding issues of gender and sexuality through my childhood and adolescent years (before, admittedly, eventually leaving religion behind in my past). The biggest issue with Him is that I am not sure I completely understand what Ryman was trying to say in Him regarding Yeshuah’s trans identity. He sets up all of these amazing pieces and then doesn’t quite know what to do with them. After the first few pages there is no real commentary on the intersection between gender identity and theology, and Yeshuah’s transness becomes a simple plot point that is only handled in the most superficial of manners.
(I should also note a trigger warning here: while the book is in no way transphobic, Yeshuah does deal a lot with transphobia throughout the book, including being called “it” by his mother and having his clothes ripped off in public to prove his gender identity).
Ultimately, I’m not sure if Ryman was the correct person to write this particular story. He doesn’t fumble the ball as we’ve seen many authors trying to do while writing minority characters (I believe based on some quick Google searching that Ryman is a cis man), but it is clear he is writing this story from a perspective that is not fully embodied or experienced. The trans elements of Him are not clearly focused and lack perspective because this is a story that really needed to be explored by someone who lived and experienced what it is like to be a trans person.
Thus, the gendered elements to Him come across as a bit provocative for the sake of being provocative. Ryman never crosses a line, and I believe the book is much less sacrilegious than you would think once you start reading, but “Jesus is a trans man!” sometimes reads as more of a way to sell books without having a clear perspective on what that actually means in regards to the story.
However, having said all of that, there is actually a lot to enjoy with Him!
This book is beautifully written in a way that both evokes Biblical prose and poetry while also imbuing these figures with more emotion, humanity, and humanness than you get in Biblical passages. Ryman’s characters are imperfect, sometimes irrational, and feeling people who are more than just placeholders in a parable. No characters exemplify Ryman’s knowledge of the craft more than Yeshuah and his mother Maryam.
Yeshuah is the Messiah, the Son of God and is struggling to grapple with this role. He has a relatively troubled upbringing; his parents are social exiles, his mother does not accept his trans identity, and he is quickly growing in popularity and authority. There is a lot of political weight on his shoulders, and on top of it all he knows that his end is a painful and brutal death at the hand of the Romans. Yeshuah’s journey here reminded me a lot of Jesus’ portrayal in the musical Jesus Christ Superstar – a powerful figure who is intimately human. Yeshuah is imperfect and emotional, and he cannot eliminate those parts of himself just because of his religious powers.
As readers we get to know Yeshuah mostly from the POV of his mother, Maryam. Maryam is the most fascinating character in the book and her arc over the course of the 250ish pages of Him is the number one reason I would recommend this book to someone. Ryman absolutely nails the hardships that Maryam must endure as the mother of the Son of God. As a young woman she relishes the chance to give birth to God’s child; she agrees to marry the village’s religious exile (Joseph) and travel to Nazareth. As she grows, however, she starts to feel the strain of being the mother to what will become the world’s most famous figure. She cannot accept her son’s trans identity and she doesn’t know how to be a mother to someone who is so independent, intelligent, and powerful. She continues to have other children to distract herself, to find children she can be a more “traditional” mother to, and yet her oldest child is still constantly in her orbit. Maryam is a fully realized version of the “Virgin Mary” of the Christian Bible; not always likable but someone you can understand and empathize with (outside of some of her most ardent transphobia).
Maryam’s journey throughout Him is remarkable, and leads to an emotional ending that really explores the nature of the universe, who Jesus was as both a historical and religious figure, and the possible existence of a multiverse.
I’m not sure how big of an audience will be interested in a book like Him, but if you go into it with an open mind and see it as a book that has questions to pose, rather than questions to answer, you’ll definitely find the journey a thought-provoking one. Him works best if you have at least a more-than-passing-knowledge of the New Testament so that you can see where Ryman is twisting and turning the narrative, but otherwise this is a book to promote thinking and discussion.
Concluding Thoughts: The main tagline of Him, “What is Jesus was a trans man”, doesn’t really land because of some muddled ideas and perspectives, but the beautiful prose and character arcs of Ryman’s versions of Jesus and his mother Mary are fascinating. This is a book that is big on asking questions about the nature of Christian theology and worldviews that is sure to promote readers thinking about their own perspectives. So while the gender discussions and sci-fi elements are shallow, the characters and alternative universe Ryman created here are brimming with life. Give it at least a chance if it at all sounds interesting to you.
January 17, 2025
This will stay with me for a long time. The Jesus thing is almost secondary to the family dynamics. Very powerful.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 22, 2023
In HIM, Geoff Ryman presents a daring and thought-provoking reimagining of the life of Jesus Christ. Set in a first-century Palestine where miracles are commonplace, the novel tells the story of Avigayil, a girl born into a humble family in Nazareth. From a young age, Avigayil exhibits extraordinary abilities, and as she grows older, she comes to believe that she is destined for a greater purpose.
Ryman's depiction of Avigayil is both nuanced and compelling. She is a complex and conflicted character, struggling to reconcile her own identity with the expectations placed upon her by society and by her own faith. As she embraces her role as Yeshua, a man who can heal the sick and perform other miracles, Avigayil must also contend with the political and religious forces that seek to control her.
HIM is a novel that challenges readers to reconsider their assumptions about the nature of faith, divinity, and the human condition. Ryman's prose is both lyrical and evocative, and his characters are richly drawn. The novel is sure to spark debate and discussion, and it will stay with readers long after they have finished the last page.
Ryman's depiction of Avigayil is both nuanced and compelling. She is a complex and conflicted character, struggling to reconcile her own identity with the expectations placed upon her by society and by her own faith. As she embraces her role as Yeshua, a man who can heal the sick and perform other miracles, Avigayil must also contend with the political and religious forces that seek to control her.
HIM is a novel that challenges readers to reconsider their assumptions about the nature of faith, divinity, and the human condition. Ryman's prose is both lyrical and evocative, and his characters are richly drawn. The novel is sure to spark debate and discussion, and it will stay with readers long after they have finished the last page.
February 12, 2024
I would give this three and a half stars if I could. There is much to like- why not a trans Jesus? Why not multiverses where the Jesus story happens differently?
In some ways though this does not seem different enough - too much a re-telling of the gospel. At times it seems little more than an attempt at midrash. And Maryam the Christ figure’s mother is not drawn with enough sympathy to engage me.
That said some of the language especially around the ideas of miracle is sometimes truly beautiful. So 3.5 - just not convincing enough for 4.
In some ways though this does not seem different enough - too much a re-telling of the gospel. At times it seems little more than an attempt at midrash. And Maryam the Christ figure’s mother is not drawn with enough sympathy to engage me.
That said some of the language especially around the ideas of miracle is sometimes truly beautiful. So 3.5 - just not convincing enough for 4.
December 31, 2023
This is very weird. I read this and am not sure how I feel about this book. (I read Ryman's WAS years ago and knew well what I thought about that - I absolutely hated it.)
I was interested in this book to see how it compared to James Morrow's Only Begotten Daughter, as they are thematically linked - God comes to earth as a woman.
My assumption is that the author looked at the story of the virgin birth (I assume everyone knows this is a take on the Christian Jesus narrative) and said, hmmm, there was no Y chromosome involved. She could only have given birth to another female. And so it goes.
Maryam informs her family that she is pregnant, having been told so by an angel. Her uncle, the high priest, thinks she's gotten "religious mania" and decides the best way to deal with it is to marry her off to another problem person, Yosef, a scholar whose ideas have led to his being exiled. So Maryam and Yosef go off to Nazareth.
The names here are close enough analogs of the Biblical names that you know who is meant. The place names and sects are a little farther from the familiar. I suppose this is meant to clue us into that this is an alternate history, another dimension, another place in the multiverse, whatever. (Towards the end of the book this is really spelled out as Yehush ponders this sort of thing.)
This is an interesting experiment, but it doesn't really work for me. Disclaimer: I am a practicing Catholic and I know my Bible, but Catholics don't tend to be biblical fundamentalists - we recognize that parts of it are clearly fiction (Job, Tobit, etc.).
I accept that Yehush could be trans. In Ryman's story, Maryam gives birth to a perfect copy of herself, a little girl she names Avigayil after her own mother. (Catholic tradition says that Mary's mother was named Anne.) Little Avi is fascinated by an older boy, the tekton's son, following him around.
Upon the death of her beloved friend, Avi declares that she is now a boy and takes her friend's name. (Yehush is a shortened form that comes up later in the book. It's shorter and easier to type so I'm using it.)
Here is where I start losing my willingness to go along with it. Ryman's "Jesus" is a feral child who grows into a feral adult. He lacks self-control. Foster father Yosef spend all his time reading Scripture so little Yehush is believable in his depth of knowledge. But he's an incredible brat.
Yehush runs wild with the older boys, who don't seem to have a problem with the girl now deciding she's a boy. They're all the local juvenile delinquents. Yehush is a trial to his family, to say the least.
Ah, his family. Yosef doesn't want sex. It's not clear if he's gay or asexual, but it comes into the story several times that he and Maryam are not having sex. Yet they manage to create 6 more children, presumably by turkey baster. Uh-huh. I'm not quite sure how the technology available at that time could facilitate that. (I'm sure someone here knows for sure. Someone always does.)
As Yosef is impractical, they have been surviving by Maryam's uncle, the rich high priest, sending them monthly supplies. Eventually he dies and the supplies stop. Yehush and a brother apprentice with the tekton and supply the family as best they can.
At some point, if you're going to stick with the Jesus narrative, he has to leave Nazareth. He does, along with his adoring little brother. There goes the family income, but fortunately the oldest daughter is a looker and snags a rich husband.
Yehush is charismatic and collects a large group of followers with his sayings. Again, sometimes he comes off more as having a mental illness rather than being the Son of God. He is abrupt and wild. His relationship with his mother is not the close loving one seen in the Gospels. Ryman includes many of the miracles, but he noticeably excludes the first public miracle, changing water into wine at the wedding feast in Cana, the one where he is there with his mother and she asks him to perform the miracle.
As Yehush becomes more and more manic and set in his path, it becomes clear that this is not God-becomes-man-to-save-us-all but God-becomes-man-because-he-doesn't-have-a-clue-what-it's-like. Yehush is doing these things because God wants to know what things feel like. Of course, that includes pain and dying.
This book ultimately didn't work for me because it treats God as a lesser Star Trek villain - think Q or Squire of Gothos. If God would just listen to women, he wouldn't have to go all through this.
I was interested in this book to see how it compared to James Morrow's Only Begotten Daughter, as they are thematically linked - God comes to earth as a woman.
My assumption is that the author looked at the story of the virgin birth (I assume everyone knows this is a take on the Christian Jesus narrative) and said, hmmm, there was no Y chromosome involved. She could only have given birth to another female. And so it goes.
Maryam informs her family that she is pregnant, having been told so by an angel. Her uncle, the high priest, thinks she's gotten "religious mania" and decides the best way to deal with it is to marry her off to another problem person, Yosef, a scholar whose ideas have led to his being exiled. So Maryam and Yosef go off to Nazareth.
The names here are close enough analogs of the Biblical names that you know who is meant. The place names and sects are a little farther from the familiar. I suppose this is meant to clue us into that this is an alternate history, another dimension, another place in the multiverse, whatever. (Towards the end of the book this is really spelled out as Yehush ponders this sort of thing.)
This is an interesting experiment, but it doesn't really work for me. Disclaimer: I am a practicing Catholic and I know my Bible, but Catholics don't tend to be biblical fundamentalists - we recognize that parts of it are clearly fiction (Job, Tobit, etc.).
I accept that Yehush could be trans. In Ryman's story, Maryam gives birth to a perfect copy of herself, a little girl she names Avigayil after her own mother. (Catholic tradition says that Mary's mother was named Anne.) Little Avi is fascinated by an older boy, the tekton's son, following him around.
Upon the death of her beloved friend, Avi declares that she is now a boy and takes her friend's name. (Yehush is a shortened form that comes up later in the book. It's shorter and easier to type so I'm using it.)
Here is where I start losing my willingness to go along with it. Ryman's "Jesus" is a feral child who grows into a feral adult. He lacks self-control. Foster father Yosef spend all his time reading Scripture so little Yehush is believable in his depth of knowledge. But he's an incredible brat.
Yehush runs wild with the older boys, who don't seem to have a problem with the girl now deciding she's a boy. They're all the local juvenile delinquents. Yehush is a trial to his family, to say the least.
Ah, his family. Yosef doesn't want sex. It's not clear if he's gay or asexual, but it comes into the story several times that he and Maryam are not having sex. Yet they manage to create 6 more children, presumably by turkey baster. Uh-huh. I'm not quite sure how the technology available at that time could facilitate that. (I'm sure someone here knows for sure. Someone always does.)
As Yosef is impractical, they have been surviving by Maryam's uncle, the rich high priest, sending them monthly supplies. Eventually he dies and the supplies stop. Yehush and a brother apprentice with the tekton and supply the family as best they can.
At some point, if you're going to stick with the Jesus narrative, he has to leave Nazareth. He does, along with his adoring little brother. There goes the family income, but fortunately the oldest daughter is a looker and snags a rich husband.
Yehush is charismatic and collects a large group of followers with his sayings. Again, sometimes he comes off more as having a mental illness rather than being the Son of God. He is abrupt and wild. His relationship with his mother is not the close loving one seen in the Gospels. Ryman includes many of the miracles, but he noticeably excludes the first public miracle, changing water into wine at the wedding feast in Cana, the one where he is there with his mother and she asks him to perform the miracle.
As Yehush becomes more and more manic and set in his path, it becomes clear that this is not God-becomes-man-to-save-us-all but God-becomes-man-because-he-doesn't-have-a-clue-what-it's-like. Yehush is doing these things because God wants to know what things feel like. Of course, that includes pain and dying.
This book ultimately didn't work for me because it treats God as a lesser Star Trek villain - think Q or Squire of Gothos. If God would just listen to women, he wouldn't have to go all through this.
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