The World That We Knew was published by Simon & Schuster in 2019. Berlin, 1941: Hanni Kohn, a Jewish mother, knows she cannot save her daughter Lea from the Nazis. She seeks out a rabbi’s daughter who creates a golem — Ava, a creature made of clay and animated by sacred words — to serve as Lea’s protector. Ava appears human but is not: she cannot feel, cannot love, cannot die (unless the word of life is erased from her forehead).
The three narratives follow Lea and Ava fleeing through occupied France toward Spain; Julien, a young Frenchman who joins the Resistance; and Ettie, a girl who hides in a heron house in the French countryside. Their stories converge in a narrative that refuses to separate the historical from the magical — the golem is as real as the Gestapo, and both operate according to implacable logic.
Hoffman’s achievement is making the golem work simultaneously as Jewish folklore, as metaphor (what does it cost to create a protector who cannot feel?), and as plot device (Ava’s superhuman strength makes escape possible where it would otherwise be impossible). The novel treats the Holocaust with appropriate seriousness while insisting that Jewish mystical tradition offers resources for survival that historical fiction typically ignores.
Collecting The World That We Knew
First edition (Simon & Schuster, New York, 2019): Hardcover with dust jacket.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $15–$30
- Very good/very good: $8–$15