Summary: In which Len, a stoned high school art teacher who describes himself as culturally Jewish and does not know Yiddish or Hebrew, decides to create a golem based off of instructions on the internet, and then recruits Miri, a lesbian OTD Chasid who works at his local bodega, to translate between Yiddish and English when it turns out the golem is created only speaking languages it has previously learned. Together, they address important questions, such as: is it morally good or morally bad to take a golem to a KKK rally?

This may be the most Jewish book I have read this year, and I am currently working my way through a linguistic study of yinglish (Becoming Frum: How Newcomers Learn the Language and Culture of Orthodox Judaism by Sarah Benor, very good, recommended).

This book is excellent and funny. When I was reading the history of golems chapter, aka "let's do a quick overview of antisemitic violence beginning with the Exodus", I was like "if this book sticks the landing, I am going to buy a copy", because it managed to be so fucking funny even whilst discussing that.

I would be remiss if I did not link to chestnut_pod's review and hamsterwoman's review, both of which convinced me to read this book.

Here are my bulletpoints about it!

• The elevator pitch for this book could have been: a funny romp about antisemitism.



• It really does maintain that romp as long as it possible can, and no further, when it dissolves -- like a boulder through a KKK statue -- at a white power march.



• So, did it stick the landing? Mostly, I suppose.
  
  Look, as soon as it set up the idea of "the golem at a white power march", it would have been a cop-out if the golem had not made it to the white power march.
  
  And it did have to grapple with the question of morality, and I can tell several things about this author in that he had Len struggle to come up with a way to sum up his feelings that the golem should not be allowed to murder everyone at that rally, and try to convince Miri of his opinion, by saying "would it be good for the Jews?"
  
  Because no! It would not be good for the Jews!
  
  On the other hand, it was good the golem was there for two Jews specifically: Len and Miri. Because, yeah, it was just a demonstration, a march, they're not really attacking any Jews... until the mob spots two Jews.



• Like, I cannot stress too much that the book decides it's going to stop being funny now, and it's the moment you discover they're burning a Jew in effigy, because the "reason" for the march is because some community college students found out about a statue being of a KKK leader, and so the blame is placed on the Jewish community college teacher. And so they make an antisemitic caricature exactly what you think it looks like. And then they burn it.



• You basically have two opinions on this matter. The Golem can smell Jew-hatred and wants to kill everyone he can smell it on. Len, however, is living in 21st century New York City and know about the internet, public opinion, and everything that has happened since the previous iteration of The Golem was killed at Babyn Yar. (I was not kidding about the chapter on antisemitic violence.) Miri tends to agree more with The Golem than with Len.
  
  Len should be grappling with the question of creating something that goes on to murder people, but he doesn't do that, possibly because The Golem seems so certain that the Creating The Golem only worked because it was Time For Some Goleming. (The conceit of the book is that there is only ever One Golem. Everyone who has made a golem, has actually made The Golem, and only one golem can exist at any point in time because it's the same golem).
  
  To settle the matter on if The Golem should go to the rally and kill everyone, The Golem decides the only opinion on this he'll care about is Larry David's, because watching Curb Your Enthusiasm is how The Golem taught himself English in less than a day.
  
  And so they manage to contact Fictional Larry David.
  
  Fictional Larry David, who has been gotten onto a Zoom call on the premise that this is a movie pitch, no hesitation at all, not even a blink, agrees with The Golem.



• It is absolutely fascinating to me that Len is the one who is most convinced that you should not take The Golem to the rally and The Golem should not kill people and is the one to deactivate The Golem to stop it from killing more people, and Len, of course, cares more about the lives of the white supremacists than the white supremacists care about his (because, of course, Chekov's Antisemitism does go off and Len is nearly murdered by the mob by getting too close and Sounding Like He's From New York Jewish), and of all the Jewish characters in this book -- and I am including Fictional Larry David -- Len has probably received the least antisemitic attention in his life.
  
  Someone who makes the fricking golem: "okay but... can he protect the Jews just by scaring them a lot? Will that work?"
  
  Fictional Larry David: *no hesitation at all* set the golem loose on the KKK.



• Does Fictional Larry David think the golem is actually a golem? Does he think the golem is a robot? Does he think this is real? I have an urge to write a drabble that explores that, and I am so intrigued on if the author ran this whole plot point by the Real Larry David, since the author is a Hollywood screenwriter and, if anyone writing a golem book might already have or be able to get Larry David's contact info, it may be him.



• So, is this book recommended?
  
  Honestly, there are parts of it I think should be required for Specific People Who Are Never Going To Read This Dreamwidth Review Trust Me.
  
  The book does have some not-so-great parts and weird chapter moments, like a backstory chapter about Len and his friend going to Sweden to track down the fraudster who keeps putting Len's apartment up on Craiglist as a vacation rental, and when Miri describes losing her virginity (it is not as bad as it sounds from saying "some dude wrote about a lesbian having gay sex for the first time and about how she was bad at it and got called crazy", but that was, really, completely unnecessary to keep in the book).
  
  Also I suspect many people (both Chasidim and non-Chasidim) are not going to like all the stuff about the Grand Rabbi of Miri's Chasidic Sect and how he buys politicians and is involved in a lot of corruption. Apparently a lot of that came out of an idea for a TV series or something (I'm not going back to check the afterward of the book) that the author came up with with a friend. It is frankly unnecessary to the story.
  
  On the whole, the author seems to have thrown in a lot of different random ideas into this book. Some of them work very well. Some of them should have been mercifully removed.
  
  I guess my rating, if I had to give letter ratings, would be: A-
  
  It does a lot of good things. It also did not need to do some of the things it does. But the chapters are short and quick reads, it's funny, and when it's not doing weird stuff, it's hard to put it down.



• Are there things to nitpick? Absolutely. But the author was definitely have moments of "fuck it, why not" and a lot of them work very well.
  
  Where else are you going to have a golem convert an 11 year old "witchy" girl to Judaism just so the golem can dig out a septic sewer for the girl's dad -- because the golem isn't able to work for goyim, and the girl wouldn't need a bris and the dad would -- and in return the girl's dad to then drive the golem to the rally? I note that he does it by telling her to stand on one foot and tells her what Hillel tells that guy, and yes, I could nitpick that Hillel ends the famous "the rest is commentary" with "now go and learn" and the golem does not do that, but, really, why nitpick something like this.



• This book really is pure self-indulgence on the author's part and we're along for the ride, and the ride may be a little bumpy at times, but I do recommend the book. It's short and quick and funny-until-that-moment-humor-has-to-stop-being-funny-so-it-can-be-real.



• And it ends where it truly has to end, to be the book it started out as: Len deactivates the golem. They are in a stolen car, fleeing the aftermath of the rally, both of them are injured. Len and Miri still disagree on the morality or the necessity of the golem's actions and what they should be doing.
  
  The end. Also, since Len was able to make a golem off of instructions on the internet, and the entire internet now knows about the golem, I predict that five minutes after the end of the book, someone has now re-made the golem, since Len helpfully and conveniently released the golem to be reanimated (because, remember, there's only ever one golem at a time).