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zeljana 's review for:
The World That We Knew
by Alice Hoffman
In a world where human demons roam the streets of WW2 Berlin, a teenage daughter of a rabbi answers a mother's plea to protect her daughter. She does that by invoking a golem, a legendary creature from Jewish folklore, which would keep her safe. The story follows both of these two young women and a few more characters throughout the war years in nazi-occupied Europe.
The story, like other stories I read by Alice Hoffman, has touches of magical realism, but it is very subdued. The language is fairytale-like, poetic and the atmosphere feels very real. It was very easy to get into the story and accept all the "unnatural" elements of it.
This is between 4 and 5 stars for me because I really enjoyed it, but I feel it could easily be even better. If Ettie has the knowledge and magical power to invoke a golem, I would expect to see more of that in the rest of the novel, but it's as if that side of her just disappeared towards the end, which was disappointing for me and seemed like a wasted opportunity. Still, a good read.
The story, like other stories I read by Alice Hoffman, has touches of magical realism, but it is very subdued. The language is fairytale-like, poetic and the atmosphere feels very real. It was very easy to get into the story and accept all the "unnatural" elements of it.
This is between 4 and 5 stars for me because I really enjoyed it, but I feel it could easily be even better. If Ettie has the knowledge and magical power to invoke a golem, I would expect to see more of that in the rest of the novel, but it's as if that side of her just disappeared towards the end, which was disappointing for me and seemed like a wasted opportunity. Still, a good read.