Gabrielle Sher begins her debut novel, Odessa, with a scene in a mikveh on the outskirts of the city, just before a pogrom erupts in the Jewish quarter. Best friends Frieda and Miriam sneak away to enjoy this ritual cleansing, but upon returning to the shtetl, they spot their husbands hurrying away, seemingly involved in a secret gathering. Sher opens her atmospheric novel with a sense of impending doom that doesn’t let up until the very end. The novel is set in the Russian Empire, 1905.
The story is told through three perspectives: Freida, her husband Mordechai, and their daughter Yetta. All three characters must navigate the outbreak of the pogrom, where the Gentile townspeople shout slogans like “The Jews will not replace us.” Despite Mordechai’s efforts to protect his family, Yetta is abducted and murdered by one of the violent instigators, a man who had been friendly with her. Mordechai can’t bear to lose his only daughter, so he resorts to Jewish mysticism. With the help of a rabbi and other local men, he turns Yetta into a golem.
Legends about the golem date back to the time of the Torah, although in modern lore the golem is attributed to late sixteenth century Rabbi Loewe of Prague. Sher does a marvelous job crafting her golem story, and this scene of Yetta’s transformation is one of the most evocative:
“Mordechai knew what to do; he remembered everything as though they were movements in a dance. He walked in a clockwise circle around the table, and then again, and again — seven times, until he was back where he began. The rabbi then began to dig Yetta out of the clay. Mordechai dug frantically, wiping clay from her eyes and her lips. They lifted her from the clay and placed her back onto the table. Her skin and hair were covered in a thin layer of red clay.”
Mordechai believes that the golem facsimile of Yetta can both preserve his daughter’s spirit and take revenge on the perpetrators of the pogrom. But as the story progresses, Mordechai starts to doubt, wondering if Jews in the Russian Empire will ever be safe.
Although this story takes place a century ago, the zeitgeist of the moment is prime for a strong female character such as Yetta, examining her battle against antisemitism and other injustices. While there has been a resurgence of golem stories in recent years, Odessa stands on its own as a compelling and introspective Jewish gothic novel.
Susan Blumberg-Kason is a memoirist and biographer and co-editor of an anthology set in Hong Kong. She is a regular contributor to the Asian Review of Books and World Literature Today. She became interested in 1930s Shanghai when she was in the city in the mid-1990s for her thesis research. Susan now lives with her family in the Chicago suburbs.
