The Hidden Palace - Book Review
- Fernanda Borges da Costa
- 2 de abr.
- 19 min de leitura
By Helene Wecker
“Of all the myriad races of thinking creatures in the world, the two that most delight in telling stories are the flesh-and-blood humans and the long-lived, fiery jinn.”
April 2nd, 2025
'The Hidden Palace: A novel of The Golem and the Jinni,' published by Harper Collins in 2021, continues the story of Chava the Golem and Ahmad the Jinni right from where it was left of in Helene Wecker's bestselling debut novel, 'The Golem and the Jinni,' 2013.
The narrative is a deeply engaging historical fantasy set in 19th century America that immerses the reader in the challenges of two magical creatures living among the Jewish and Syrian communities in New York City. Enriched by the heritage of Wecker and her husband, the novel is a remarkable blend of fantastical elements and historical setting.
'The Golem and the Jinni' and 'The Hidden Palace' revolve around the two title characters, the Golem and the Jinni. Through them, the author tells us a story full of contrasts that give way to unlikely connections in the budding communities formed in the very foundations of NYC. The historical setting is so concrete, so grounded in the actual events and characteristics of the period, that Wecker's readers are drawn into imagining themselves in the ordinary and extraordinary lives of her characters.
Would I recommend this book?
ABSOLUTELY!
These novels were a delight to read. They are great to reread as well. Not because they are too complicated to be grasped in a single reading, but because they invite us to sit down over a cup of spiced coffee and contemplate the very human experience of loss and belonging. It is a delightful read for those who enjoy well-written biographies or historical fiction, as well as for those who strive for that fantastical touch to their novels. It's a story of people struggling to find their place in the world, no matter what their culture and background, or whether they are made of clay, flesh or fire.
Oh. Thankfully, there's news of an upcoming third book!
A summary to 'The Golem and the Jinni'
I first read 'The Golem and the Jinni' years ago, before I had any intention of putting my impressions into writing. To make up for that, I'll give a brief summary of the first novel here, before we dive into the second. Light spoilers ahead.
The Golem is created by Yehudah Schaalman, a Polish kabbalist of great power, at the request of Otto Rotfeld, in exchange for an obscene amount of money to become his obedient and caring wife. Rotfeld had plans to move to America and establish his business in the New World, but falls ill on the journey from Poland to the United States. Rotfeld awakens the Golem shortly before his death, leaving her stranded and confused. Without a master, the Golem's mind becomes capable of connecting with the thoughts and desires of everyone around it. The unbearable weight of everyone's will threatens to overwhelm the Golem's newly awakened consciousness, leading her into a series of troubles until she is found by a rabbi after disembarking in New York. The rabbi, Avram Meyer, takes the Golem in, names her Chava, teaches her about her own dangerous nature, and instructs her on how to control her powers and integrate into human society.
In New York's growing Arab community, the Jinni is freed from a copper flask when a coffee shop owner, Maryam Fadoul, takes her ancient heirloom to Little Syria's finest tinsmith, Boutros Arbeely, to repair its dents and engravings. Once repaired, the scrollwork allows the imprisoned Jinni to escape his captivity. Only now he finds himself powerless and helpless, trapped in human form, with no memory of how he got into this predicament. Stranded a thousand years and an entire ocean away from his homeland, the Jinni is forced to forge a new life among the Arab migrants. Taking on the identity of Ahmad al Hadid, the Jinni must try his best, and against his own nature, to blend in with the humans, while struggling with all the restraints in his condition.
The novel features a rich cast of secondary characters, people whose lives are profoundly affected by the encounter with the Golem and the Jinni, cutting across different classes and communities. From a mentally bound, well-meaning ice-cream maker to an American heiress from a powerful family, the diverse cast successfully expands the historical grounding of 19th-century New York. The environment and its people provide the perfect contrast to the ultimate otherness of the Golem and the Jinni, bringing them together for their unlikely yet inevitable friendship.
As it happens, the lives of the Golem and the Jinni had been linked all along. The corrupt Kabbalist who created the Golem was a reincarnation of the evil sorcerer who, in his quest for eternal life, had trapped the Jinni a thousand years earlier. You can read ‘The Golem and the Jinni’ on its own as a stand-alone. But by the time I got to the end, I was so hooked that I just had to keep reading about them. Thankfully, Helene Wecker has blessed us with a second book, the next in the series, 'The Hidden Palace'.
A summary to 'The Hidden Palace'
'The Hidden Palace', which came out in 2021, is the next in the story of Chava, Ahmad and their friends. It's a great follow-up to the last book, and it keeps the perfect balance between fantasy and historical realism that Helene Wecker nailed in the last one. As the years go by, Chava and Ahmad develop a steady routine of continued companionship as they support each other in their struggles, coexisting just under the surface of a New York City in the eventful years between the late 1800s and early 1900s. Mild spoilers for the first book ahead.
“His intuition was correct, to a point. The books had indeed hastened Rabbi Meyer's death, slowly draining his strength as he studied them—not out of a naive, hubristic desire for their knowledge, but in an attempt to control a dangerous creature, one that Rabbi Meyer had discovered and sheltered and grown to care for. The creature was a golem, a living being sculpted from clay and animated by holy magic. This particular golem had been made in the form of a human—one who was somewhat tall and awkward, but otherwise entirely ordinary to all appearances. The golem's name was Chava Levy. She worked at Radzin's Bakery at the corner of Allen and Delancey, not seven blocks from Altschul's own synagogue. To her colleagues, she was indefatigable Chava, who could braid an entire tray of challahs in under two minutes, and who sometimes seemed to reach for whatever a customer wanted before they'd even asked.”
While the events in 'The Golem and the Jinni' span a hectic single year, 'The Hidden Palace' unfolds slowly over 15 years. The first book ended with the evil sorcerer being defeated, and the start of the next book is defined by that fight. For the Golem, it had been a struggle against her creator, who threatened to bind and command her will. For the Jinni, it was a battle against his captor, who had imprisoned him in human form and taken away his life as a desert jinni. With the sorcerer locked up in the ancient copper flask, Ahmad heads back to the Syrian desert to lay his enemy to rest in jinn territory, coming face-to-face with his own kind for the first time in a millennium. And Chava's mind is now permanently connected to the evil man, and she has to deal with his perpetual scream at the back of her mind – a single note of rage and despair, a permanent reminder of their last fight and her shared experience with the Jinni.
"The man who wasn't a man approached the valley. The youngsters had seen the truth: he was indeed a jinni, a creature of living flame. Once, like them, he'd been free to take the shape of any animal, or fly invisible through the air, or even enter dreaming minds—but he'd lost these abilities long ago. The iron cuff at his wrist was the work of a powerful wizard who'd captured him, bound him to human form, and sealed him inside a copper flask for safekeeping. He'd languished in that flask for over a thousand years—which he'd felt only as a single, timeless moment—until, in a city on the other side of the world, an unsuspecting tinsmith had broken the seal and released him. (...) At last he reached the front of the line and handed the uniformed agent his ticket. "Name?" said the agent. "Ahmad al-Hadid." Not his true name, of course, but his nonetheless. He'd chosen it himself: hadid meaning "iron," and Ahmad simply because he liked how it sounded."
When Ahmad returns to NYC, he and Chava develop a steady routine of companionship over the course of a decade-long courtship. They work and live independently during the day and meet for walks in the city (and its parks and rooftops) at night. They get to know each other better and learn about the world around them. But they're both under constant threat of discovery, and their careers and lives can't remain as they are for much longer.
'The Hidden Palace' goes into more depth about assimilation, centring on the two main characters and the conflicts and fateful meetings of the other characters mirroring them.
Sophia Winston, one of my favourites in this series, was once a young, fiery girl before she was struck with a terrible affliction because of her relationship with Ahmad. Now she has grown into a determined and resourceful woman on a self-imposed exile, travelling across deserts in search of a cure. Meanwhile, Boutros Arbeely, Ahmad's business partner and best buddy, decides to dedicate his life to protecting the secret of the Jinni and, together with Myriam Fadoul, to prevent the inhabitants of Little Syria from learning anything about the extraordinary Beddou smith.
All the books on Talmudic esoterica collected by Rabbi Meyer were donated after his death by his nephew, Michael Levy. The donated volumes are examined and sorted by Rabbi Lev Altschul, who ends up with five ancient books of Kabbalah relating to the creation of golems. Rabbi Altschul is a widower with deeply Orthodox views, and lives alone with his daughter, Kreindel Altschul. When unrest erupts in Europe, Rabbi Altschul decides to use this secret knowledge to build a golem for himself and his daughter, with the intention of moving to Lithuania once his work is complete.
After losing contact with the father of her child, Anna Blumberg is left to raise her son alone. As a single mother, she loses her job at the Radzins' bakery and is shunned by most of her friends and relatives. Except for Chava, who looks after her and young Toby Blumberg. A boy who grows up mysteriously, haunted by the same nightmare of an old, evil man, who makes him unable to move...
Then there's jinniyeh, who lives in the Syrian desert. She's about to find out that she has a rare condition that makes her immune to iron, and all she has left are the strange stories of an iron-bound jinni living far away.
What is the main theme of 'The Hidden Palace'?
Helene Wecker's writing is masterfully grounded in its historical period, drawing everything it needs from the experiences of immigrants from the Old World to America, especially those who arrived in New York City during the transition to the 20th century. It became my benchmark for defining a narrative that was perfectly balanced between historical realism and urban fantasy. These peoples form diverse communities, each united by the common experience of displacement and the need to find and build a new home for themselves. In this view, the Golem and the Jinni become the ultimate 'otherness' to embody such an experience.
The first book focuses on what Chava and Ahmad have in common and the ways their uniqueness sets them apart from everyone else. They are under the constant threat of being discovered, while they try to redefine their own selves under the limits of their circumstances. 'The Golem and the Jinni' is a thrilling tale that captures a year in the lives of these fascinating characters as they navigate the challenges of hiding, adapting and forging a place for themselves among humans. It's an incredible journey of self-discovery, where they learn about human society and the bright and dark sides of their own nature reflected in those around them.
The second book, 'The Hidden Palace', has an entirely different pacing. It covers fifteen years as the story explores everything that makes Chava and Ahmad different from each other and from the world around them. As time goes on, they face all kinds of challenges, big and small, that push them to further understand each other's deepest natures and learn to deal with these opposing forces that are deeply affected by their coexistence. I'd say the main theme of the second book is about the challenges of assimilation, at the individual, communal and cultural levels.
From here on, the spoilers will be on the heavy side. Enjoy with caution, and feel free to come back later, if you want to try reading those books first before coming to our commentary and talking about your reading experience. Otherwise, if you have read the books or doesn't mind going forward knowing a bit more about them, let's dive in!
Day and Night
During the day, Chava and Ahmad keep to themselves, concentrating on their work in the bakery and the forge, and doing their best to blend in with the communities around them. Their relationship is known only to a handful of their closest friends, who also know the secret of their nature. It is at night that the pair stroll through the city, visiting its landmarks, parks and rooftops, daring to be a little more than just human.
"Each winter brought distress, each spring its relief."
If the first book brings the Golem and the Jinni together, as it were, through what they have in common (though not without a bit of a struggle), the second book pushes them further apart because of their clashing natures – Fire and Air, Water and Earth. As they grow closer, their similarities and differences become more apparent.
They complement each other in their relation to their interests and circumstances. Whether it's creation and art, age and novelty, or helplessness and power (or the lack of it or its excess), they seem to fit perfectly, filling the gaps of the other. But their personalities clash far too often: The Jinni is explosive, spontaneous and carefree, while the Golem is steady, deeply empathetic and helpful. But despite, or maybe because of, their differences, their bond changes them both. Chava grows into her own individuality and learns to be herself, not just to please others. At the same time, Ahmad learns to care for others.
Chava and Ahmad slowly become the person each other can rely on the most, but soon it becomes clear they are also each one’s sharpest contrast. Every problem they face brings them closer together and changes how they see the world. But the strain of always being each other's safe port starts to pull them apart. Through facing each other’s experiences, the Golem and the Jinni grown into understanding themselves and their circumstances in this human world. In time, their closeness reveals the limits of their self-awareness. Their darkest aspects, the self-destructive tendencies each one shows the other, cut deep resentment and fester hurt, eventually breaking them apart.
"He'd given her his silences, and she'd filled them with her fears."
Mirrors
In the first two thirds of ‘The Hidden Palace’, Chava and Ahmad pose as each other’s inverted mirror. The fire that empowers him, breaks her, the humid clay that nourishes her can destroy him. Curiously, among the reasons that brings them together is how they feel unable to hurt the other, and for that, they are correspondently able to stop each other from hurting people.
Hurting others become their deepest fear. After what happened in 'The Golem and the Jinni', Chava is afraid of losing control of herself and hurting someone like she did to Anna Blumberg's ex-boyfriend. Ahmad is afraid of hurting someone like he did to Sophia Winson, even though he doesn't know how he made her chronically ill. So, they become each other's emergency breaks, their most reliable allies. They never turn into enemies, even at the hight of their dissent. But when they stand facing each other, they see their own weaknesses, their biggest fears, their greatest losses, and even their shame and pride. It redefines their characters and renew their conflicts with each other, with themselves and with the world around them.
You, too, would be free, if it were not for the work of men's hands.
Chava is a deep empath. Her kind and steady personality keeps both of them grounded, preserved from being perceived by those around them. She can show Ahmad how to care for others, something he had never done before when living among the jinn. And he finds that he does care, especially for her—quite deeply. But the Golem’s traditionalist tendencies and obsession with keeping the stifling patterns of their living conditions leaves little space for new experiences and for enjoying the novelties surging in that human society. Not to mention, her empathy comes from her ability to connect with everyone’s thoughts and desires, something she cannot do with Ahmad. Ahmad is immune to her power, and this makes him both a welcome silence and a confusing puzzle for her.
Ahmad brings passion and spontaneity to their relationship. He can easily connect with the new technologies and impressive innovations that humans come up with at the turn of the century and shows Chava the beauty and joy of these experiences. He also helps the Golem to discover her own individuality, showing her own value, not from what she can do for others, but for herself. But the Jinni is unhappy with his circumstances and the limits he faces, including the limits he has set against himself, such as his secrecy over his past life as a free jinni. When hurt or concerned, Ahmad tends to withdraw from the world, focusing on his creative projects as his only outlet. When prone to isolation, he loses perspective of his surroundings and of those around him.
All the other characters and their problems are like this standoff between opposites, which creates a mix of contrasts. Sophia, in particular, reflects a lot of Ahmad's own story. Her personality grows even more similar to his, and it is like they switch places as she becomes an Outsider entity wandering through the Syrian desert. Then there's Kreindel Altschul, the very clever, resourceful and self-sufficient girl who cannot accept change. Prone to bursts of anger, her ultimate loneliness is broken by just one exception, the empathetic link with the golem her father has left to her.
"There was something strange about the woman’s face. He peered at her as though compelled, not knowing why Some hidden instinct made his marble eyes shift their focus past her appearance, into her essence. The perfectly molded face. The unblinking eyes, the unmoving chest. She was— Golem —the same as him."
Chava and Ahmad find their mirrors in Yossele and Dima. Even though they only meet in the last third of the book, their stories are full of contrasts and similarities from start to finish. By finding others like themselves, the Golem and the Jinni become better at understanding themselves, their personalities, their challenges, their fears, and their ideas and desires.
Chava realises the danger Yossele poses, but through him she finally can see how precious her life is. How, despite the danger, there really is a deeply caring nature within the golems. Chava’s Empathy is finally aimed at herself as she sees herself how Yossele sees her, as his mind is completely open to her in a way Ahmad’s mind had never been.
"The Jinni sat with his back to the forge, his head in his hands. A jinniyeh. Here, impossibly here, in the Amherst. And she’d flown from him, in—fear? Horror? He’d seen both, in her features. He wished that he could believe he’d imagined it all, that he hadn’t driven away the only one of his kind he’d seen in fifteen years—"
Ahmad is not used to share his deepest thoughts and feelings and has been avoiding mourning the loss of his identity and of his best friend. Once, he would simply change, move away, seek anyplace else to live as if the past had never happened. Yet, now he cannot do it as easily. His isolation started way before, when he could not admit to himself his loss and change of nature. Ahmad, isolated, suppressing his grief for his lost friend and estranged lover, meets again that which he had been missing all along when he is visited by Dima.
When they meet their perfect reflections, they realise that their natures do not define them. Ahmad learns to accept the partial loss of his jinn nature and the changes he's been through. Chava learns to appreciate her own beauty and the value of her life, and she finds the strength to control her power and not turn into a mindless monster.
This latest step of their journey brings the Golem and the Jinni closer together, even though by the end they go their separate ways. The challenges they faced made them think about what they want from life and what their own goals are. Now they can do more than just exist among humans, as they set out to find their true place in the world.
Assimilation
‘The Hidden Palace’ addresses many themes around war and conflict, friendship, loss and love, all within self-discovery journeys. Underlying all of those it’s the many challenges of assimilation, or the many ways in which displaced people coexisting changes and pushes them forward to better understand themselves and their world—it brings people together or pull them apart. It is through their bond that Chava and Ahmad become more of themselves, measuring in each other their growing humanity as they learn individually and empathy, community, acceptance, transformation, solidarity, love and loss, as they try to survive and co-exist in a new, ever-changing world.
"It made little sense, and yet it was the truth."
Chava realises the danger Yossele poses, but through him she finally can see how precious her life is. How, despite the danger, there really is a deeply caring nature within the golems. Chava’s Empathy is finally aimed at herself as she sees herself how Yossele sees her, as his mind is completely open to her in a way Ahmad’s mind had never been.
Ahmad is not used to share his deepest thoughts and feelings and has been avoiding mourning the loss of his identity and of his best friend. Once, he would simply change, move away, seek anyplace else to live as if the past had never happened. Yet, now he cannot do it as easily. His isolation started way before, when he could not admit to himself his loss and change of nature. Ahmad, isolated, suppressing his grief for his lost friend and estranged lover, meets again that which he had been missing all along when he is visited by Dima.
The ultimate assimilation in these novels is told through the narrative of the Golem and the Jinni as they became more human-like. Or rather, they experienced certain aspects of living among a community of humans that gradually changed them to become more than just their exceptional nature. Helene Wecker expertly wovens the threads of migrant Syrian and Jewish communities through this same theme. Through the side-characters, we can testify how each and every one of them experiment a type of Otherness—irreversible and oppressive, but also the very trait that brings them together and tightens their bonds.
Sophia Winston, once an American heiress, becomes, as we mentioned before, a foreigner who travelled into the Old World. She’s not only stranded from her land, but also from her family. Her personal experience, the loss and the unexplainable illness, sets her apart from her family and the life she once knew. In such a clever fashion, Anna Blumberg’s story goes in quite a similar way, though for the bottom half of the class division. Anna finds herself isolated within the very society she once had strived in. Punished by the misogynistic views of her time and facing the worst conditions of urban work allowed to low-income women, she represents the ostracism society imposes on their own, even when they aren’t in exile. The impossibility of Sophia’s and Anna’s reintegration into their previous lives and social circles exposes how one can acquire the foreign status beyond culture and class.
And then, we have characters like Lev and Kreindel Altschul, and Dima the jinniyeh. They each represent a form of unwavering stubbornness in their refusal to adapt, assimilate and connect with any reality entirely different from one’s expectations and demands. Their suffering comes from the tragedy of their stories; still, their pain is enhanced by their unwavering denial against the world and anything that does not fit into their understanding of themselves and of how things ought to be.
Kreindel is far too brilliant a girl to be satisfied with the limitations of her gender as it is imposed by her father’s extremist views. Still, she cannot let go of it.
Dear Headmistress: I'm not really running away, because I should have left already. I'm eighteen, not fifteen, which means I'm no longer a ward of the state. My mother's death certificate will tell you that Malke Altschul died after childbirth in January of 1897. I shouldn't have lied to you, but then the lie grew too big to correct. You warned me recently that the world will fail to meet my standards. You're probably right. Still, I hope to find a small corner of it where I can be myself.
Dima is inherently different from every jinni and jinniyeh she’s ever known. Still, she struggles to adapt to any circumstances allowed by her otherness. Instead, she chooses to fight everyone and anyone who challenges her worldview.
I ought to come in there, the jinniyeh said, and tear myself out of you. For a moment Sophia was afraid that she might—but then she shook her head. You'd still have my knowledge. My words, my memories. You can't unlearn what you've learned. Stop gloating! the jinniyeh cried. I'm not, Dima. I'm only saying what's true. A hitch in the air, like a sob. You've destroyed my life. I'm' sorry. I truly am. But you did this to yourself.
This ultimately drives them towards violence and isolation.
On another side, there’s Maryam Fadoul, the proud owner of Little Syria's best coffee house. At a first glance, she is far from exceptional. As the story progresses, though, it is clear that she’s anything but. Maryam has a sharp sense and a profound understanding of people, talents she smartly puts to use to bring her community together, tying people’s needs and interests into constructive projects. She is a master matchmaker, from setting up couples to arranging the right circumstances for the best businesses to thrive. Brick by brick, she builds a whole village.
"I am no saint, and he is no monster for me to slay."
Another great representative of the bonds that circle the characters is shown in Toby Bloomberg. The child who grows into a restless youngster works precisely as a cable boy. Toby is kind and understanding and is born right into the limits of the extraordinary world shared by few. As he grows, he moves into the others’ stories, until he becomes the needle that is capable of stitching every story back together. He is the messenger and the message at once, bringing recognition, understanding, forgiveness and a promise towards the future.
The Golem and the Jinni, grown to become more of themselves, end the story moving forward with their own projects. Chava’s plans are deeply rooted in the will to help those who need her the most. She will look for anyone like her and the Jinni who may need a hand, guidance or a place in the world. Much like the kind-hearted Rabbi Meyer who once took Chava in and taught her the will to do good. In this, I suppose Chava’s biggest challenge eems to be on how she could handle those who won’t want her help at all, despite clearly needing it.
Ahmad’s path is driven by his will to understand and the desire to create, a proper intellectual and creative pursuit in line with his interests and talents. He does not only wants to witness how far and ahead human technology may grow, he wants to take part in it. Learn it himself and influence whatever he can through his own ingenious nature. Will he ever be able to open himself up to another friendship among humans? I am expecting some developments in his personal relationships, despite his loss. Ahmad definitely needs a new partner, workmates, or some other person who’ll be his ally once he arrives in Chicago. And he needs a second chance to be a better friend he could not be be to Arbeely.
They need to complete their personal growths before they can try to be what they wanted to be to each other.
"I love you," she told him. "And I always will." He went still in surprise. Then he closed his eyes, and gathered her close. "I love you," he whispered. "And I always will."
May the third book brings us the joy of a reunion!
Helene Wecker is working on the third book of the series, which is to be set in 1930, 15 years after the end of 'The Hidden Palace,' at the beginning of the Great Depression and the end of Prohibition.
Until next time!
TL:DR
'The Golem and the Jinni' and 'The Hidden Palace' are marvellous examples when historical realism meets fantasy.
'The Golem and the Jinni' is a great novel to introduce the title characters and the world they are set into existence.
'The Hidden Palace' deepens the preexisting conflicts and themes within Chava's and Ahmad's stories, opening the reader to an even broader horizon of otherness.
Have you read any of those novels? What are your thoughts on it?
If you were a fantastical creature living through the centuries in an entirely human society, what kind of food you would like best?
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