BookBrowse Reviews Odessa by Gabrielle Sher

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The horrors of the pogroms in the historical Russian Empire are reimagined through the lens of Jewish folklore in this haunting tale of resistance, autonomy, and survival.

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Blending history with magical realism, Gabrielle Sher's debut novel Odessa takes place in the early 20th century Russian Empire during the pogroms, a series of government authorized attacks on Jewish communities throughout the empire. We follow Yetta, a bright, spirited girl on the cusp of adulthood, happily engaged to be married, as she is brutally murdered when Cossacks run riot through her village. Stricken by grief and rage, her father Mordechai calls upon his studies of ancient Jewish texts and enacts a ritual to bring his daughter back. Though Yetta is seemingly revived, her body and soul are changed in irreparable ways—a painful truth that she and her family must reckon with, all while the threat of further violence closes in.

It quickly becomes clear after Yetta's resurrection that, in a desperate act to save his daughter, Mordechai has tapped into the lore of the golem, a being from Jewish legend that is said to be forged from clay and given life by its creator (see Beyond the Book). Remarkably strong and resilient, the golem acts as a protector of the Jewish people, carrying out its master's orders without question.

In the context of the father-daughter relationship of Odessa, this controlling dynamic between master and golem becomes more morally complex. In life, Yetta had a rebellious streak, sneaking out of the home to visit her betrothed against her father's wishes. Now, reborn as a golem in a body crafted by Mordechai, her free will is suppressed and she is compelled to follow his commands. Knowing this, Mordechai sends Yetta out to defend their community from further Cossack attacks, emotionally manipulating her into doing so willingly, in order to mask the reality that she has no agency. "God saw you, and gave you strength," he tells Yetta. "More strength than a man. A miracle, a real miracle. And if God has given it to you, it would be spitting in His face not to use it."

Though Mordechai bends the truth and forces his daughter into dangerous situations, he is not quite a villain in Odessa—he does these things because he genuinely believes they are the right things to do in order to protect his family and set his people free from persecution. Through her complex characters, Sher explores how, especially in times of conflict and war, good people can do bad things in the pursuit of freedom or self-defense—be it Mordechai's manipulation, Yetta's violent revenge against the Cossacks, or her mother, Frieda, keeping secrets from her family.

Frieda is Mordechai's opposite: While he sees his daughter's new form as a weapon and boldly pursues justice through brute force, she is decidedly more gentle, anxious, and ruminative. As a woman, she is confined entirely to the home, expected to carry out her husband's commands; indeed, in many ways, her life mirrors that of a golem, lacking in autonomy, which she laments: "She wished she did not freeze when she was afraid, watching herself from a numb distance as she obeyed her husband. She wished she could shout to herself in those moments to wake up, push back, be strong." As the narrative progresses, Frieda begins to protect her family and pursue her freedom in a quieter, more peaceful way than her husband's tactics, as she seeks to find a means of escape without the need for further bloodshed. This subtle contrasting of Mordechai and Frieda's approaches introduces the idea that there is more than one way to be strong, and that cycles of violence can indeed be broken.

While her parents are positioned to contrast each other, Yetta fights to reconcile two seemingly contradictory aspects of herself: the broken mortal girl mourning the life she could have had, and the powerful supernatural entity bound by duty to her people. This struggle manifests thematically, but also physically. It becomes clear that Mordechai's ritual separated Yetta's body and soul not only spiritually, but in a much more literal sense. As such, Yetta must fight to reunite the fractured pieces of her being. But if Yetta the golem is to seek revenge on behalf of Yetta the human, she risks becoming precisely the kind of monster she always feared.

If there is one weak link in this complex family dynamic, it is Yetta's younger brother. Compared to the others, he feels underdeveloped, serving merely as a device to showcase Yetta's caring nature. Still, this does little to hamper the novel's overall impact. Odessa is a bold, gripping exploration of a dark era in human history. Through Yetta's tragic story, her struggle to reconcile life before and after death, and her parent's contrasting responses to her trauma, Sher looks at what it takes to survive against impossible odds, and what it truly means to be alive.

This review first ran in the June 10, 2026 issue of BookBrowse Recommends.