This is a spectacular book -- both the power of the storytelling (mesmerizing) and the emotional resonance, but most of all, the beauty of a community who accepts a mother and daughter where they are and finds ways to take care of them as they work through a deep and destructive grief. I love the moments when teachers, instead of punishing the restless Aviva, send her for a short walk to refocus, or give her sanctuary for lunch time, or hold her accountable for unacceptable behavior but also recognize her creativity and spirit. It's hard to imagine a community like this at this moment in time -- small, everyone knows each other, and they aren't always kind to each other, but they all recognize and take care of each other when needed. Also perfectly 6th grade creepy. ( )

This was an interesting story about a mother and daughter who had lost their husband/father in a violent, antisemitic incident. Their lives became very lonely and difficult, but the daughter's dybbuk helped her through the difficult experience. Her mother became clinically depressed, and the daughter dealt with the mother's depression with the help of some of their community. It was heartwarmingl to see how most of the community was so supportive of these people, and I hope that would be true. The mother flew out of her depression much too quickly to be realistic, but the story was very touching. The daughter was extremely mature for her age. ( )

Aviva and her widowed mother live next door to their synagogue in rooms above the mikvah, rumored to be haunted by a dybbuk only Aviva can see. This inside look at a close-knit Orthodox community explores changing friendships, antisemitic vandalism, and the many ways of dealing with grief. (Sydney Taylor Middle Grade Winner) ( )

*Spoiler alert*

When Aviva Jacobs was six years old, she was present at the synagogue when her caretaker father was attacked by anti-Semitic young men, pushed into the street, and killed by an oncoming car. But Aviva has no memory of this: now twelve, she lives with her mother in an apartment over the mikvah attached to the shul. Aviva's mother, who used to be a teacher at her Jewish school, now stays inside all day, and Aviva goes to school, but has no friends - her former best friend, Kayla, is now best friends with Shira instead.

But Kayla and Aviva are thrown together after a machanayim (dodgeball-like game) accident: their principal puts them in charge of the Bas Mitzvah Bash, which will be mother-daughter instead of father-daughter this year. The two become friends again during an after-hours exploration of the mikvah and its secret door. But when the shul is vandalized, Aviva's memories are forced to the surface, and her mother helps her confront the fact that there is not, and never was, a dybbuk.

Repressed trauma, anti-Semitic hate crimes, and depression are woven through a story as dark as its cover, and whatever transpired between Aviva and Kayla after Aviva's father's death remains a loose end. But there are glimmers of joy as well, a supportive and caring community, and a hopeful ending for both Aviva and her mother.

See also: Honey & Me (modern Orthodox Jewish community, friendship), We Were Liars (unreliable narrator, past trauma)

Quotes

Ema isn't so depressed. Ema's just...different. We're okay just the way we are, like we've always been. We don't need fancy names or doctors to tell us that we aren't fine. (38)

Pity follows me around like a handing storm cloud, impossible to overlook and impossible to confront, and I never eat in the lunchroom anymore. (67)

Old memories tickle at the edges of my thoughts, struggling to break in, and I push them out before I get lost in them. (89)

It's been almost five years, and I do okay when I cover it up and pretend I'm fine. (91)

I haven't thought of Ema as someone I've lost, not until now... (101)

"You aren't the parent here. It's okay to need things sometimes." (Mrs. Leibowitz to Aviva, 125)

...it feels like, for the first time, that I'm really a part of all of this. (134)

To the dybbuk, my happiness is unacceptable. (137)

I don't remember any of this, and I can feel an odd feeling bubbling up within me, like nausea but worse. It's coming from that cavern in my heart, the one I keep closed up and sealed away. "I don't remember," I say.....But I do. (147) ( )

Two stars because we need more Jewish fiction to be written. I'm Jewish, attend a Reform congregation; and am so white that I glow in the dark. That is the backdrop against which I read this book. I wanted to cheer for this book and be delighted! This was not the book I expected, but it is what I got. The cover is pretty but hints at nothing in the book. The title is misleading. People who aren't familiar with Sephardic or Ashkenaz Jewish culture will be totally lost reading this. I'm not even too clear on whether Aviva is Sephardic or Ashkenaz! There's clearly intended to be context clues indicating this is a modern Orthodox society on the East Coast of the US, but it isn't clear -at all-. This book is so poorly structured! Everything--character descriptions; characterization; the society around them; Aviva's mom--is super vague. There are no transitions between anything save for a new chapter being indicated. Not transitioned to: indicated, as in, you turn the page and there's a new chapter heading. I was not close to anyone as a reader. There wasn't anyone to care about. Aviva doesn't sound like a middle schooler, but a high schooler who's kind of dreamy, immature, and zones out a lot. The middle school stuff she sometimes notices was just barely present because she wanted to vaguely think some more, and sometimes refer to something that happened but uhhh i can't tell you because blahhhh THE DYBBUK IS THERE ZOMG FOCUS ON THAT.

Aviva's mom apparently has agoraphobia and depression, but it's so vague, like everything else in this freaking book, that I didn't pick up on it at all. It's framed like neglect and honestly, sleeping all the time can be a lot of different diseases or medication. Many diseases or medication that have people sleeping all the time can also make it hard for them to leave the house for a variety of reasons. I honestly thought Aviva going into foster care was going to be a plot point. No, Aviva's mom just...stays neglectful really, until a friend blames herself for letting Aviva's mom get sick. What? I don't know. "The Hunger Games" did this WAAAAY better: the main character also had a mother who was depressed over the death of her husband, and the main character had to take care of her family as a result. She actively worries they'll have to go into the community home, as foster care is known in that world. She thinks about her mom and notes stuff on their relationship, and on her mom's relationship to her dad. AND SHE TALKS ABOUT HER DAD. It's clearly stated when and how he died, how much he influenced Katniss, and how her life changed. Aviva does NONE of those things. She uhms and uhhh's her way through it. At the end of the book, it's suggested that her dad died in an anti-Semitic attack and...the author approached and wrote this in a way that just had me shaking my head.

I don't know if Aviva liked her dad. Aviva clearly dislikes her mother and resents her for becoming mentally ill. I know nothing on Aviva's parents' marriage. Was it arranged? Did they like each other? It's suggested they got along as partners and raised Aviva well. SUGGESTING THINGS AND HINTING IS ALLLL THIS BOOK DOES. UGH. Aviva bristles at the idea of her and her mom accepting any charity after her father's death, and is understandably in tears after a girl is cruel to her about her family's situation. The girl says the only reason Aviva's mom has a job running the older, smaller, less popular mikvah is because the community feels sorry for her. Awful, awful. I was kind of surprised Aviva didn't lash out in some way. There's some conflict between her and her former best friend, a different girl. It could have been interesting, but the author favors blandness and skipping right to conflict being resolved in the next paragraph.

Aviva doesn't even think of stopping the dybbuk until the sixty-five percent mark of the book, despite the title suggesting this would be the whole plot! And he's kind of defeated by...Jell-o? What? Can you get food poisoning from Jell-o? EDIT: No, not unless it's weeks old. PLOT FALLS APART. If handwritten clues were stuck inside Jell-o, how did the ink not wash off? Jell-o is water-based! But dybbuk, Aviva repeatedly states, are defeated by an affected person reciting the Kaddish. Kaddish is recited frequently. Like, multiple times per prayer service in some places. Avvia doesn't point any of this out because ooh, that would be a plot hole. In some branches of Judaism, it's recited every day for a month. Ooh, plot hole. In Orthodox circles, the rules are different because there's restrictions on women and girls reciting it. Does Aviva mention this? No. Does she reflect on what it means for her? No. It's just a boring yet over the top scene of the dybbuk trashing the synagogue while she davens. Where is her rabbi in this, anyway? She could reach out to him about -everything-, but she doesn't. She can reach out to a teacher, and have the teacher be proactive! The teacher wasn't really. What a waste. And that's true to life that teachers do ignore kids at times, but still. She could read the Kabbalah. I knew an Orthodox woman who was well-versed in it. Rare, but it would have been even more interesting here!

The plot twist around the dybbuk was infuriatingly stupid. The destructive acts performed by Aviva and the fact she kept getting kicked out of class were totally ignored. She was allowed to get away with so, so much. EVERYONE enabled her behavior. No one got her or her mother psychiatric care, and it was never mentioned why! MENTION HOW ORTHODOX COMMUNITIES SEE MODERN PSYCHIATRY, DAMMIT. The author could have mentioned faith healing as per Orthodox communities! it would have fit so neatly into the story! But no. Avoidance of conflict, character development and establishing the worldview of Orthodox--everything this book said it would do--is the name of the game.

This book raised a lot of really serious issues, and DID NOTHING WITH THEM. What was the author -thinking-? And DON'T "orthodox blahblah" me. I googled all the stuff I was furious about to make sure I hadn't missed anything, and stand by my opinions.

If you want to learn about ultra-Orthodox Judaism, the movie "Fill the Void" is about an eighteen-year-old who has to decide whether or not to marry her brother-in-law after her sister tragically dies. I was so upset the first two times I tried to watch it beyond the sister dying, that I turned it off super early into the movie. Even reading the wikipedia summary made me cry! It's a movie that won a ton of awards because of how accurately and sensitively it portrayed ultra-Orthodox Judaism and because the storytelling was so good. Unlike here, which tells me nothing and is poorly written. ( )