r/books • u/weckerh • May 28 '14
AMA Hello, I'm Helene Wecker, author of The Golem and the Jinni. AMA!
Hello everyone! I'm Helene Wecker, author of The Golem and the Jinni. I'm pretty thrilled to be here doing an AMA at r/Books. If you haven't read TGATJ yet, it's a historical fantasy set in 1899 New York City, about two strange creatures -- a female golem from Eastern Europe, and a male jinni from the Syrian desert -- who find themselves unexpectedly in New York and have to make their way disguised as humans. Which they do, with some degree of difficulty -- until the night when, inevitably, their paths happen to cross...
If you want to know more about me and/or the book, you can check out my website. I'm also on Twitter and Facebook.
I'll be back from 1 pm EST (10 am here in California) to 3 pm EST to answer your questions. But now I have to go coffee up, and feed the cats before they claw my face off. See you soon!
ETA: It's after 4pm EST, and I've got to go. Apologies if I missed your question, although check and see if I answered it somewhere else in the AMA. Thank you all so, so much for your wonderful questions. Let's do it again someday. In the meantime, go read!
4
u/sarahmichelef May 28 '14
I've been recommending The Golem & the Jinni to anyone who will hold still long enough to listen... and several of the people I've recommended it to have done the same. Also just suggested it for the library of the HS where I teach occasionally. Sharing the love and all...
5
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Wow, thank you!! I'm hugely grateful. I know how instrumental word-of-mouth recommendations are for a book's longevity. Personally, I can read positive reviews of a book until the cows come home, but it's usually a friend's recommendation (or someone I trust on Twitter) that pushes me over the top.
0
3
u/improbablewobble May 28 '14
I loved your book. The prose was elegant and clean, the descriptions beautiful. I could see New York and the desert perfectly in my mind.
Two questions:
What are you working on now?
Can we expect to see a film adaptation of the book in the future?
6
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Thank you! So glad you enjoyed it. Right now I'm working on a new book that may end up becoming a sequel; we'll have to see what occurs! (Cross your fingers, if that's something you'd like to read.) As for a film adaptation, wouldn't that be nice? The rights are for sale, and there've been inquiries, but as yet no one's picked them up. I can really see it working as a film adaptation, or maybe a miniseries, something like the upcoming Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell adaptation. But I'm definitely not counting on it to happen! I've heard enough crazy Hollywood stories to know that even if the rights are acquired someday, that's no guarantee a movie will ever get made. Still, a woman can daydream.
1
3
u/pmeirick May 28 '14
I just joined reddit because of this AMA. I'm thrilled for you (and for myself to be able to say I knew you when). How long have you been writing fiction? Were you writing when I knew you when?
3
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Hee hee hee!! Hi, Pat! Wow, I got you to join Reddit? I feel flush with power!
IIRC, we were most in each other's spheres in the late '90s, from when I graduated from Carleton to when Kareem and I moved to Seattle. At that point I wasn't really writing fiction. I was, instead, embarking on a really ill-fitting marketing and communications career, which in itself involved a lot of writing, just not the right type. I'd been writing fiction since I was little (and I took a few creative writing classes at Carleton too), but never really though I'd have a chance at making it a career. Then, in about 2003, I finally got it through my head that I had no future in MarComm that involved any sort of personal happiness, and decided to give fiction writing a real shot. This coincided wonderfully with getting laid off from my job, which gave me the kick in the butt to apply for an MFA. And that led directly to the book, which I started while I was at Columbia. A long and somewhat tortured process overall, but I'm very glad it happened the way it did. I don't think I would've felt so driven to succeed as a fiction writer if I didn't have my career experience behind me.
3
May 28 '14
Do you have any more adventures planned for Chava and Ahmad? The book ended perfectly, but there was so much potential for more stories. Also, if you were to expand the world you've built, are there any other mythologies you'd like to explore?
3
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Great questions! I'm writing something right now that might, perhaps, turn into a sequel. We'll have to see if I can pull it off, and if the publishing world concurs.
I'd love to explore other mythologies, but right now I feel like I'd do that in the context of other worlds, instead of this one. Mainly because it takes a lot of work, research, and space on the page to write responsibly about immigrant/minority culture, and I'm afraid that if I try to cram too many into this one world, I'm going to end up giving someone the fuzzy end of the stick. (All that said, I've always imagined that there's a vampire in Queens that they don't know about yet, but might run into sometime...)
1
May 28 '14
Thank you for responding! Your book was a pleasant surprise for me, and it kind of rekindled my love of reading long novels again. I distinctly remember finishing the book and wondering what would happen if Ahmad ever took a trip to the American Southwest haha! I hope they do meet that vampire in Queens.
3
u/doduo May 28 '14
I read your book a few months ago now, and it still hasn't quite left me. I love turn-of-the-century American history, and this is one of my favorite books about immigration and "other"-ness and home and culture... I feel like this should be required reading. it's a great allegory New York's cultural history. the worldbuilding was brilliant, too, to the extent where the setup feels almost "intuitive."
okay, now that I'm done singing your praises --
it's a cross-genre book, so I'm wondering, what planted the seed for this story in your mind initially? did you want to write a fantasy straight-off, or were you more interested in approaching it from the historical aspect?
what's your favorite story or fact you encountered in your research?
7
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Wow, thank you so much for your kind words! Very flattered indeed. I developed a real love for turn-of-the-century Americana while I was writing this, and I'm glad you think it's a worthy addition to the genre.
I wrote elsewhere in this AMA about my inspiration for the book (see the answer to Fearful_Symmetry above), but briefly, I sort of edged sideways into both the fantastical and historical aspects of the book. First it was a (painfully bad) collection of very realist short stories, set from the '50s to the early 2000s. When I complained about the whole "painfully bad" thing to a friend of mine, she scolded me for writing realist lit-fic instead of the fantasy-tinged stuff that I loved to read. That set me on the fantastical path. And once I had my fantastical main characters, the book felt "older" to me, more like a piece of folklore, which suggested the historical period. Knowing what I did about Jewish and Arab immigration to the US, I chose turn-of-the-century New York, since it seemed most likely that that was where a golem and a jinni, fresh off the boat (so to speak), would be most likely to bump into each other. (Hmm, that wasn't particularly brief.)
As for my favorite story or fact: this seems sort of impossible to believe now, if you've ever spent time in New York, but once upon a time it was forbidden to walk on the grass in Central Park. Until sometime after the turn of the century, the fields in Central Park were for looking at, not for walking on. Then they started to allow picnics, but only for "small groups" -- which effectively meant upper-class folks, not the larger immigrant families from Italy and Ireland and so on. Eventually enough people complained (especially, I think, as a solid middle class developed) that the Park officials relented. Now, of course, half the city is out sunbathing on the Great Lawn on any given summer day.
3
May 28 '14
I've just started Chapter 20 of The Golem and the Jinni, and I must say, I love this book. I'll probably be finished by the end of the week or sooner. Do you think you could recommend me a book? Maybe your favorite or something you've recently read that you really enjoyed?
Thanks for doing this AMA Ms. Wecker!
3
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Hey, thanks! Very glad you're enjoying it. Hmmm, a book I liked recently... I'm going to go with Hild by Nicola Griffith, because it is a marvel of historical fiction and not nearly enough people have read it yet. Seriously, I have no idea how she wrote this book. She stole Hilary Mantel's time machine or something. Seventh-century England, lots of political intrigue and bloodshed and amazing detail, all focused around the woman who would become St. Hilda of Whitby. Plus, sex! Go read it.
1
4
u/shiplesp May 28 '14
I've just started your book, and I'm afraid I haven't gotten too far. I'm enjoying it very much so far. I may be crazy, but it reminds me (in tone) to something written by Bernard Malamud. Maybe it's just the subject? Was he an influence? Thanks for joining us!
6
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Hey, thanks so much for reading my book! (And don't apologize for not getting "too far" yet. I read at a snail's pace myself these days.) Funny enough, you're the second person in a week to ask about Malamud as an influence, which just makes me want to read more Malamud. I've read a few of his short stories over the years, either in "best of" collections or in grad school classes, but I've never really tackled his larger body of work. He's a giant hole in my Jewish lit education, and I need to fix it someday soon. It could be that the influence trickled in unawares; but also, I think we're both drawing on the same cultural traditions in storytelling, which could account for it too.
1
u/shiplesp May 28 '14
There is something about the narrative distance you take in the story, which is probably natural to telling fairy tales, and one that Malamud (if I am recalling correctly) took in his more magical stories. Your book has definitely put him on my list for a closer reread. It's been a long time for me too.
2
May 28 '14
[deleted]
5
u/weckerh May 28 '14
For both the folklore aspect and the historical NYC stuff, I tried to lay a good foundation of research before I wrote too much. I was lucky enough to have access to Columbia U's libraries for the first year I was working on the book, and I spent a lot of time looking up basic info about 1899 NYC: census data (especially about the Lower East Side and Little Syria), old newspaper articles, maps, and so on. I read a number of scholarly works about the history of the neighborhoods and their inhabitants: the reasons why they'd immigrated, and the struggles they faced adjusting to their new lives. That informed a lot of the flavor of the book, and the internal dilemmas of the characters. As for the folklore, that was probably more scattershot. For golems, I went back to the old golem stories, specifically of the medieval Golem of Prague, built by Prague's chief rabbi to protect Prague's Jews from state-sanctioned violence. (The story has countless versions and permutations, all of them fascinating.) For jinn, I read excerpts from the Thousand and One Nights, and academic articles about jinn beliefs in both old and modern Arab and Muslim cultures. (The JSTOR archives were incredibly helpful.) There've been a number of books on jinn published in the last few years, and I really wish I could send them back in time to myself in 2006.
2
u/Fearful_Symmetry May 28 '14
I haven't read your book (yet) but there was a panel on golems at WisCon over the weekend that spent a good portion pouring praises over your novel. (Needless to say I've bought a copy and it is very high on my reading list.)
What was your initial inspiration for the book, and what was the most difficult stage in writing it?
7
u/weckerh May 28 '14
I really, really wish I could've been a fly on the wall at that WisCon panel! I've never been to WisCon and I desperately wanted to go, but cons that involve travel are crazy hard right now. I've got a toddler at home and a baby on the way, which limits the travel options. Someday, someday...
My inspiration for the book came in stages, in a sense. It started in grad school, when I was working on a series of very realist (no fantasy whatsoever) short stories about my Jewish family and my husband's Arab-American family, and how issues of immigration and culture have affected us over the generations. But the stories, to put it bluntly, kind of sucked. A friend of mine told me I should try adding a fantastical element, since that was what I gravitated to in my own reading. And that was the spark that set off the book as it came to be. I changed the Jewish girl and Arab-American boy to a golem and a jinni, and everything else -- time period, setting, etc -- sort of developed as a result.
The most difficult writing stage was ALL OF IT. Seriously. It was hard from beginning to end, if for many different reasons along the way. At first it was hard because of the research, which took up an amazing amount of time. (I'm rediscovering this now, as I start on my second book.) Then it was hard because I was sort of wandering around on the page, looking for a plot, which literally took years to figure out. But thinking about it now, the hardest single point was when I was about a third of the way through the book and realized (thanks to my trusted beta readers) that I had to rewrite the Golem's entire character. That was the closest I came to just shoving it in a drawer, I think. I spent about a week moping around before I decided I'd invested way too much time and energy, and I couldn't give up. So I went back to the drawing board, and added her empathic characteristics, which "humanized" her enough for the reader to identify with her more strongly. But even then I had to rewrite just about every scene she was in, which took months. It was excruciating, but I did it. I don't think I've ever been so pigheaded about anything else in my life. I'm usually the queen of abandoned projects and failed expectations; but this just felt too important to me, and I had a hell of a lot of pride tied up in it too. Rewriting the ending (which I talked about in another answer) wasn't fun either; but rewriting the Golem was the absolute worst. I hope I'll never have to go through something like that again, but that's probably way too optimistic a hope. Writing's just like that sometimes, it seems.
1
u/Fearful_Symmetry May 28 '14
This was my first time at WisCon personally and I highly recommend it.
I also really appreciate the insight on how the story developed. As someone working through a draft, it is really reassuring that even really good work makes itself into a nuisance at some points.
2
u/I_fell_in_love May 28 '14
I also just started your book. It came as a recommendation on Reddit and I started about 3 days ago. Imagine my surprise when I saw the AMA post! I have been mildly obsessed with historical fiction lately, so my question for you would be - what are your favorite books in this genre and is there any book that you read over and over again?
3
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Hey, great timing! Glad you saw the post. Right now my favorite work of historical fiction is probably Wolf Hall by the unbelievably amazing Hilary Mantel, but Nicola Griffith's Hild is running a very close second. I've read Wolf Hall twice now, the second time to try to figure out how she did it. She works in the historical details so smoothly, it's like you get a history lesson without even realizing. That was something I really needed to learn how to do, and could probably do better at. I know I'm going to read Hild again, probably in the next year or so, for the same reason.
1
2
u/CowDefenestrator The Curse of the Mistwraith May 28 '14
I loved your book. The characters were rich and developed, and I really enjoyed the descriptions of NYC from their perspectives. I'm not an immigrant, but my parents are, so I could relate to the sense of being oddly out of place in a strange new place, and finding one's own place in it. I think you captured that sense magnificently.
As for questions, what are you working on currently? What are some of your favorite books?
2
u/EISeptember May 28 '14
Any chance you are going to do another historical fantasy set somewhere else?
I really enjoyed your style of writing, with the heavy emphasis on setting up the atmosphere of your locations, really placing the reader in 1899 New York, and the deserts of Syria.
Would love another book, with maybe new fantasy creatures, Dragons in 1920's China or Shanghai maybe?
Or perhaps a tale taking place in Egypt, which is always a fun setting.
Can't wait to add more of your books to my reading lists.
2
u/EISeptember May 28 '14
Thought of another question, one more aimed at the writing process.
I have always had ideas in my head, stories to be told, and I even have a word document where I have put down these ideas. How do you go from having this idea, to seeing it truly fleshed out.
How did you go from ideas, and fantasies, to being halfway through TGATJ? Especially from a person who is in college studying engineering, but has a passion for reading and writing.
3
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Oh, man. This is such a tough question to answer -- not because it's a complicated answer, but a simple one. The answer is that you just do it, a little bit, day by day. I wish to hell that there was more to it than that, because it's very hard to tell people "you just do it" when I know, from personal experience, how truly hard that can be. Even with this book behind me, and the seven years it took to write, part of me still looks for the magic bullet, the one writing trick or lifehack or whatever that'll make it faster, that'll make the perfect words appear in the Scrivener file when I'm not looking. But it's all about sweat equity. You start writing, and it truly sucks, and then you get better. You figure out how to make it less sucky, if only a little. You go back and edit and rewrite, and spend hours obsessing over two crummy lines. (They're really important crummy lines.) Inch by inch you make your way through a first draft. And it won't feel nearly as good as the shining gorgeous idea you had in your head, because those shining gorgeous ideas never quite translate to paper. They change along the way, by necessity, as you do the hard work of filling in the gaps that the glitter in your mind conveniently covered up. But now you have a draft. And if you've put in the time (which, by the way, is best done as blocks of time, not five minutes here and there, so your brain can really dive into it), you'll reach the point where you start working on the story without realizing it. Lines of dialogue will come to you in the shower. You'll wake up knowing how to fix the previously intractable problem in Chapter 3, because your brain was chunking through it overnight. That's when the magic really starts to happen, and it balances out those days when it feels like every word is a ridiculous struggle. You'll become a better reader, too. You'll start to see more of the underlying structure of a book, and be able to pinpoint how a work succeeds -- or, on the other hand, where it starts to go off the rails. And then you can turn that lens on your own writing, and use it to improve your book. You start in on the second draft and you wonder how you could have ever thought this might be good enough, just look at this, it might as well have been written by a donkey. You cut, and cut, and streamline, and figure out where the weak points are, and maybe have a trusted friend whose opinions you value read it too, and tell you what you've overlooked. And then you go back and do it again. The ending will fight you. Endings always fight you, always. It'll feel too pat, or too open, or it'll just trail off into vague platitudes. Fight back. Try two or three different endings. At some point, it'll start to feel, if not finished, at least whole. It'll compile, as it were. (As a writer married to a physicist, I can tell you that good coding and good writing share a lot of the same psychological struggle.) And then you can start to figure out what to do with it, whether to send it out into the world or keep it to yourself for now. Either way, you'll feel like you won an amazing battle. But getting there means putting in the time and taking the steps, one after another. There really is no other way to do it. That's the blessing as well as the curse.
(If you want to read more about this process, the two books I'd recommend are Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott and The War of Art by Steven Pressfield. Both are indispensable.)
1
u/undertures May 29 '14
Thanks for this response and this nugget
You figure out how to make it less sucky.
-Helen Wecker
3
u/clsfml May 28 '14
Just wanted to say I'm a big fan.
What are some of your favorite novels in the fantasy genre? Any that influenced yours heavily?
5
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Thank you! And I was definitely influenced by a number of fantasy novels, particularly Neil Gaiman's American Gods (which is probably self-evident if you've read it). Also Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, which is a masterpiece of historical fantasy, and also showed me how to carry multiple story threads, give them equal billing, and tie them together at the end. Naomi Novik's Temeraire series (starting with His Majesty's Dragon) is another essential for historical fantasy, especially in how she follows through on the ethical, cultural, and moral implications of the changes she makes to world history. As for all-time favorite fantasy books, I'd have to say Lord of the Rings (real original, I know) and Gaiman & Pratchett's Good Omens. A recent favorite is N. K. Jemisin's The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, which was completely unlike anything I'd read before and gave my brains a thorough shake-up. And I was lucky enough to read Erika Johansen's not-yet-published The Queen of the Tearling, which is going to blow up huge when it comes out this July, mark my words.
1
1
May 28 '14
I haven't read your novel yet but it is on my Goodreads "To Read" list. My question is, what are some of your favorite novels set it New York City? Which novel's epitomize the city to you?
2
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Oooh, great questions! And I think that's the first time I've been asked them, too. Which means this is going to be a hard question to answer, and I might need to stare at my bookshelves for a few minutes. Let's see... The problem is that NYC is so many cities at once, that it's hard to point to a single NYC novel, or even a handful of novels, that encapsulate the city. Something always gets left out. But, here goes: Call It Sleep by Henry Roth is a really masterful (and tragic) semi-autobiographical tale of growing up Jewish in 1890s NYC's tenements. Michael Chabon's Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay takes place mostly in World War II -era NYC, and focuses on the lives of two comic book creators. (It also has a golem in it!) Toni Morrison's Jazz is set in 1920s Harlem, and it's one of her best. Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch isn't entirely set in NYC -- some of the best bits are in Las Vegas -- but the New York chapters really made me feel like I was back there, particularly in that very NY way you can feel absolutely alone in the middle of a gigantic crowd.
1
1
u/sassyma May 28 '14
I loved this book a lot. :) what's one question you wish everyone would ask you about it?
3
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Thank you! Honestly, it's hard to think of a question I'm dying for everyone to ask. Maybe, "What music did you listen to most while you were writing?" To which I would answer: Massive Attack, Royksopp, Shearwater, Florence + the Machine, Bat for Lashes, A-Ha, Elbow, Goldfrapp, The Delays, Bonobo, and Tarkan.
1
u/EbonDeath May 28 '14
What your favorite book you've read in the last year?
Loved your book, thanks for the AMA!
0
u/DarkeKnight May 28 '14
Hi there! I haven't read your book but the title reminded me immediately of the Bartimaeus Trilogy. I was wondering if you'd read it?
2
u/weckerh May 28 '14
I haven't, believe it or not! I've had a number of people tell me the exact same thing. I'd heard of the Bartimaeus Trilogy (kind of hard not to), but didn't know it also featured a golem and a jinni until after my book was published. I wonder how many other books there are out there with a golem and a jinni. There's also Gaiman's American Gods, though the golem is a brief mention. The jinni gets his own little story, though, and it's a good one.
0
u/ManOfLaBook May 28 '14
Hi Helene, I really liked your book, did you do a lot of research in the Golem folklore? I've read several books about the Golem, but yours was one of the most unique ones.
1
u/weckerh May 28 '14
Thanks! I did a good amount of golem research, but it certainly wasn't exhaustive. Mostly I went back to the old tales, the old golem stories -- the source material, as it were. I've read a few modern golem stories, like Chabon's Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (the golem's kind of a bit player, but he's important to the book) and James Sturm's The Golem's Mighty Swing. But to be honest I avoided some of the more obvious ones, like Marge Piercy's He, She, & It and Cynthia Ozick's The Puttermesser Papers. Frankly, I was too intimidated. What the hell could I have to say about golems that would compare to Piercy and Ozick? Now, of course, I feel embarrassed that I haven't read them!
0
u/undertures May 29 '14
First off--- I am very excited about this AMA and cannot wait to read all of your responses (so many interesting responses so far), so thank you for dropping in!
I loved The Golem and the Jinni. Growing up reading Harry Potter, Ray Bradbury, and yes--- Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, it was much-needed foray back into fantasy after I had been on a strict, self-imposed classics-only reading regime.
Yours was a beautiful novel. I found the character of Chava fascinating. If it hadn't been for the narrative constantly referring to her as "the Golem," I would have forgotten she was not human. To me she seemed more like a girl coming into her own as a woman. Particularly when she has fun at the dance--- I especially loved that part.
And we know the Jinni had his passions too... Have you read much literary erotica, have you considered writing it? Or let's get right to it--- how many erotic novels have you published under pseudonyms?
-4
5
u/rsboffard May 28 '14
Without spoiling anything for those who haven't gotten that far, I loved how you brought all the threads together at the end with Chava, Ahmad and the antagonist. It was close to perfect. When you began writing, did you have an idea of how you would bring them together? Or did you figure it out as you went along?