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ghostyreader's review
adventurous
emotional
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
The coming-of-age element of Alter growing into himself and learning to accept his queerness was a really lovely B-plot alongside the main effort to get rid of his dybbuk. I found Alter a compelling and believable protagonist, and appreciated that by the end of the book he had learned he had others around himself to rely on. It was a joy to read such a fully Jewish book, depicting different struggles and various approaches to assimilation, and I liked that it was set in Chicago!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Antisemitism and Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Death, Homophobia, and Death of parent
Minor: Sexual assault
sashahc's review
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I am loving the current renaissance of Jewish fantasy, especially queer Jewish fantasy. It’s so fun and rich and weird. Aden Polydoros’ #book “The City Beautiful” is about a queer Jewish immigrant teenage boy in 1893 Chicago. Haunted by a dybbuk and his own past, he’s trying to solve the disappearances of other Jewish youths. It’s sweet and funny and deeply sad at points. It’s about PTSD and resilience and fighting back. And there are worker’s strikes and the World’s Fair and Yiddish Newspapers. A truly rich tapestry. Highly recommend.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent
Moderate: Homophobia, Antisemitism, and Murder
tangleroot_eli's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
H.H. Holmes/White City + dybbuk + queer Jewish immigrants + anarchist + right up my alley! Gorier than I usually go for but well worth handling the "ick factor."
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Death, Gore, Pedophilia, Violence, Antisemitism, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Animal death, Gun violence, Homophobia, Racial slurs, Rape, and Classism
Minor: Body shaming
toopunkrockforshul's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Loved this book! Its definitely not "feel good" in the cozy and soft sense but it made me really happy to have so many Jewish and Yiddish references. The mystery was also very compelling, and I loved the development of Frankie and Alter's relationship
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Genocide, Hate crime, Racial slurs, Torture, Violence, Xenophobia, Antisemitism, Grief, Murder, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Pedophilia, Rape, Self harm, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence
Minor: Homophobia
This book deals heavily with antisemitism and revolves around a serial killer who targets Jewish boys and men. There is also heavily implied pedophilia and assault/rape of minors. Lots of violence and murder and the main character often mildly self harms to ground himself.spookily's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Genocide, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Violence, Blood, Antisemitism, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Pedophilia, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual assault, Terminal illness, Vomit, Alcohol, and Classism
Minor: Bullying, Child death, Misogyny, Suicide, Excrement, and Police brutality
midnightcomets's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Filled me with countless inspiration, taught me a million things, made my heart beat with a thousand emotions. Forever cherished.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Hate crime, Antisemitism, and Death of parent
Moderate: Rape, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
Minor: Homophobia
novella42's review
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Body horror, Child abuse, Child death, Death, Gore, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Racism, Sexual violence, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Antisemitism, Grief, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Injury/Injury detail
leahkarge's review against another edition
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Genocide, Gun violence, Hate crime, Homophobia, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Racial slurs, Racism, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Violence, Xenophobia, Blood, Police brutality, Antisemitism, Grief, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail, and Classism
jessthepiratess's review
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Rape, Pedophilia, Sexual assault
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death, Gore, Racism, Violence, Antisemitism, Death of parent, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
Moderate: Genocide, Pedophilia, Racial slurs, Sexual assault, Grief, and Religious bigotry
Minor: Homophobia, Suicide, and Police brutality
thecriticalreader's review
dark
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
I bought The City Beautiful by Aden Polydoros because I am obsessed with everything related to the 1893 Columbian Exposition, which happens to be surprisingly underrepresented in historical fiction. Thus, I was intrigued by this book because of its historical setting.
Blurb:
Alter Rosen is a seventeen-year-old Jewish immigrant who turned his back on a life of crime and wants nothing more than to keep his head down and work to buy his family’s passage from Romania to the United States. When his friend Yakov dies in a mysterious “accident,” Alter recognizes an ominous pattern of Jewish boys who go missing. Alter is spurred to avenge Yakov’s killer after he is possessed by Yakov’s dybbuk, or spirit, and he unwillingly ends up working with an old friend from his criminal days, Frankie. Alter struggles between his forbidden desire for Frankie, his need to avenge Yakov, and his resolution to be a law-abiding member of his religious and civic community as he finds himself confronting the wealthy and powerful who control Chicago.
Helpful Note:
If you are anything like me and do not recognize the many Yiddish words and phrases used in this book, the glossary is at the back of the book!
If you are anything like me and do not recognize the many Yiddish words and phrases used in this book, the glossary is at the back of the book!
Review:
The strongest parts of The City Beautiful rest heavily on Polydoros’s strong character work, especially with the protagonist, Alter. Alter, despite being a little pathetic, is a believable and likable character and his voice shines through on every page. His motivations and development are easy to track as the plot escalates. Side characters such as Raizel and Frankie, although significantly less developed than Alter, are similarly likable and fun to read about.
The prose in the book is adequate most of the time, although Polydoros has an annoying habit of repeating certain phrases too often. Some of these phrases stuck out to me as particularly amateurish or fan-fictiony, such as “purred” or “my knees weakened.” The most annoying offense is that he describes one character’s eyes as being “sepia-colored” at least four times. Whenever he used these words or phrases, I was pulled out of the story.
The biggest flaw of this book is that Polydoros tries to do too much all at once, resulting in a story that feels claustrophobic and underdeveloped. Each individual element captured my interest—the backstories of the characters, the Jewish mythology, the dybbuk possession, the Chicagoan history, the queer love story, the mystery of the missing boys—but none was addressed with enough detail or complexity to sustain my attention. The book felt especially bogged down by the complicated plot in the last quarter, and I had to push myself to keep reading at times. The villains, in contrast with the main characters, came across as flat and one-dimensional. The City Beautiful could be significantly improved if the author either cut certain elements to focus on others or if he had expanded the book to address everything adequately.
As a history major who specializes in this time period, my expectations for historical accuracy are far more stringent than the average reader’s. I am pleased to say that the author gets the big details right. There were no glaring errors or inaccuracies that I picked up on, although I am not well-versed in Jewish immigration history. He captured the most important trends of the time and place, especially when it came to America’s class divide and industrialization.
***The rest of this review lies more in the realm of personal taste rather than objective criticism***
Modern historical fiction authors inevitably bring their biases and agendas into their stories, which can create tension when they want to create stories that are set in the past, yet at the same time champion certain contemporary ideas about identity and class. They especially face this tension when writing about queer relationships, because although queer people (at least how we think of them today) certainly existed in the past, people in the nineteenth century navigated gender in ways that can substantially deviate from the twenty-first-century paradigm. Authors can either research nineteenth-century gender and sexuality and attempt to create queer characters who accurately reflect how someone in that time period would think about gender and sexuality—even if that means writing about things that make modern readers uncomfortable or confused—or they can mold their characters in a way that appeals to current gender ideology. Either choice is completely valid, although I personally find the latter more interesting, and I find it difficult to suspend my disbelief when certain historical characters act anachronistically. Polydoros attempts to keep the historical situation in mind when he writes the queer relationship within The City Beautiful, yet for the most part, it feels quite modern.
I cannot speak to the historical portrayal of Jewishness, but my guess would be that it shares similarities in historical accuracy to the portrayals of queerness. At times, the author inserts what are clearly modern academic arguments about race, religion, and gender into the text, hitting the reader over the head with his viewpoint. To be clear, I do not mind historical fiction stories that have an agenda or something to say that pertains to modern society. However, I appreciate it when the issues are tackled with subtlety and sensitivity for the historical time period.
The Run-Down:
You will probably like The City Beautiful if you love the idea of a queer Jewish historical fiction fantasy/mystery, enjoy books in the Young Adult category of literature, and want to learn more about Chicago and Jewish culture/immigration in the 1890s.
You might not like The City Beautiful if you are uncomfortable with any of the content warnings (this book can be quite graphic and dark), if you dislike tropes commonly found within Young Adult literature, if you dislike historical fantasy, or if you are looking for a complex, nuanced dive into historical issues of race, religion, and queerness.
A Similar Book:
The Witch Haven by Sasha Peyton Smith. Similarities between these two books include:
· A Progressive-Era American setting
· Fantasy elements
· A protagonist who tries to solve the mysterious murder of someone close to them and uncovers the dark side of society’s ruling class in the process
· Romance
· Social justice themes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Hate crime, Homophobia, Violence, Blood, Antisemitism, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, and Classism
Moderate: Child death, Genocide, Gun violence, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Racial slurs, Rape, Sexual violence, and Alcohol
Minor: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Drug use, Suicide, Forced institutionalization, and Abandonment