Odessa

• Author: Gabrielle Sher
• Genre: Horror
• Publication Date: April 21, 2026
• Publisher: Little, Brown and Company

In a powerfully imagined Russia at the height of the pogroms, a grief-stricken family turn to ancient magic to bring their daughter back from the grave.

Yetta is a bright, quick teenage girl with a wild, searching spirit. Stifled by her mother’s anxiety, her father’s rules, and the path that’s been laid out for her, she craves the kind of freedom she doesn’t know the edges of. But her family has reason to be cautious and restrictive. Fear has wrapped itself around their shtetl. Jews are mysteriously disappearing, and there are whispers of an impending Gentile attack. When violence comes to their door, Yetta is killed.

Her father, in his grief, fumbles through his nascent knowledge of ancient texts and old magic to bring her back. By some miracle, Yetta is returned—but although she looks the same, Yetta is not the girl she once was. She knows there is a secret her family is keeping from her. The answer resides, in part, in the monstruous being stalking the villagers and their enemies, lurking in the woods beyond the shtetl, something that may be of her father’s making, and a being which has plans of its own.

The summary of this book really caught my attention, and I was so intrigued to see how Sher would work with both Jewish history and folklore. Pogroms were a regular occurrence in Russia among other countries, and were a prime factor leading my own ancestors to leave Russia and Ukraine for America, so this is a story close to my own heart. This left me prepared to love the story, and I was thrilled to see all the Jewish representation.

To start with, the story takes place in the shtetl of Odessa under the threat of regular pogroms at the hands of the Cossacks. It’s told through the eyes of Yetta and her parents, Mordechai and Freida. Each of them has such a different voice, and it was simple to tell who was narrating any chapter, and I love how fully Sher developed her characters. 

Freida demonstrates traits of obsessive-compulsive disorder early in the book, with rituals that she must complete to keep her family safe, even as she knows she doesn’t have any real power to protect her loved ones. She’s very close to Miriam, the rabbi’s wife, and they grew up together. She’s terrified of the violence that strikes their shtetl, but equally terrified of leaving a place she’s spent her entire life and not knowing what to expect.

I thought that the elements of Jewish folklore were incorporated into the story beautifully. After an especially violent pogrom, their beloved daughter Yetta is murdered, and her father winds up having her resurrected as a golem, the historical protector of the Jewish people in dangerous times. The three main characters all handle these events in very different ways.

Mordechai turns to the two people he works with—Rabbi Gershon and Mendel, and works to find a solution to fight back against the Cossacks since their previous efforts at making crude weapons failed against the latest attack. In addition, they want to figure out what is in the woods threatening the Jewish residents, and lean into their studies of Jewish texts to find answers. Freida is struggling with her innate desire to want to protect her children, and knows deep down that she can’t. As for Yetta, she takes on a lot of the responsibilities around the house including caring for her younger brother, Ephraim, and is romantically linked to her neighbor Benyamin, although she keeps putting off marriage. She finds herself struggling with the changes she is experiencing—rapid healing and excessive strength, vague memories about the end of her life, and confusing reactions from the people around her.

I really loved how conflicted Yetta was portrayed. She demonstrates wisdom and bravery, but she’s torn between the life she was expecting to have and the life she ends up with. She was also conflicted about her relationship with Benyamin, her duty to protect the people of the shtetl, and her duty to her family. She was a complex and fully realized character, and I really empathized with her easily. 

Overall, this was a fantastic book that I can recommend to everyone. While it is technically considered horror, this is more of a horror-lite book and never really got me to the point of being afraid or having nightmares, and features magical realism, folklore, and historical fiction elements as well, keeping this book always interesting. The pacing is even and has plenty of action to keep readers engaged. There is a lot of violence, but it never felt gratuitous, and came across more through the various reactions of the characters as their village is under increasing levels of threat from the outside. It pulled on my emotions, although I found myself wishing that Ephraim played more of a role in the story, but his part was more like a baby than a five-year-old, and he barely played any direct part in the story. However, I really loved watching the changes that occurred within both Yetta and Freida, even as Mordechai works to try and protect the people of the shtetl, and strives to fight back against their enemies. The Jewish representation in this book is outstanding—there are familiar Yiddish phrases throughout the story, and it relies heavily on Jewish folklore about golems and dybbuks. The shtetl feels claustrophobic, and so does the story itself, yet I loved the unexpected ending. This is one that I can easily recommend.

Bottom line: A powerful story about the bonds of family and what we do to protect the ones we love, sprinkled liberally with Jewish tradition and folklore, this is a book not to miss out on. 

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links, and I may earn a small commission at no cost to you if you purchase through my links.