The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption [Paperback]

Yori Yanover (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 2008

What if the Messiah finally came to redeem the world . . . and she turned out to be a girl? A gorgeous one, from a good Orthodox family in Scranton, PA, no less. Never mind that her father is strongman for the "Cosmic Wisdom Movement." It turns out that she may have even better qualifications-shrouded in a twenty-year-old mystery. Whatever the source of Nechama Gutkind's inspiration, the status quo will never be the same!

Editorial Reviews

Review

"A strong debut novel" --Association of Jewish Librarians Newsletter

Review

"Laugh out-loud funny. Complex and interesting plot. it was a great pleasure to finally read a novel featuring a Jewish theological approach to the apocalypse... for sheer fun and weirdness, The Cabalist's Daughter excels."

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Product Details

• Paperback: 296 pages
• Publisher: Ben Yehuda Press (September 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 097899809X
• ISBN-13: 978-0978998097
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,218,881 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars It's One of a Kind -- yet funny, February 22, 2009

By 

David Holzel - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption (Paperback)

If you're fascinated by mysticism, if you like techno-thrillers, redheads, tough Jews, New York City and Scranton, Pennsylvania... If you think the end is nigh, if you're bemused by government ineptness but hate terrorists and evil angels... If you levitate or have spent any amount of time meditating in a cave, buried up to your neck... If you want to read only one book this year that features both a (pseudonymous) Lubavitcher rebbe (the Grand Master) and musician Leon Russell (the Master of Space and Time)... If you want to think about the Bible in new ways and have a laugh in the process... Then pick up Yori Yanover's "The Cabalist's Daughter."

It's better than whatever you're reading now.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Five Star Messianic Thriller, December 2, 2008

By 

Tzvee (New York City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption (Paperback)

The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption

Yori Yanover has crafted the Jewish answer to the blockbuster TV action series "24."

The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption by Yori Yanover is the most clever action-packed Jewish novel ever written.

This book is informed by Yanover's deep knowledge of Jewish religion and beliefs and his wide learning of kabbalah and Jewish messianism. Yori maintains a pace of action in this book that can rival that of any of the best screenwriters in Hollywood today.

I will be astonished if a savvy TV producer does not grab up the rights to this book. Yanover's story cries out to be adapted to a major creative TV release.

Who is this outstanding author? Yori is a well-regarded journalist and writer who also pioneered the Jewish Internet and virtually invented the Jewish blog.

I must issue this disclaimer. I worked as a colleague in awe of Yori at the Jewish Communications Network in 1996 and 1997. I am forever indebted to this man who showed me how to persevere in the face of great business challenges and maintain a focus on the tasks at hand - in this case inventing the Jewish Internet in a company that was run by the proverbial management team of well-intentioned amateurs.

Yori is at once a pious Jew, a heretical Israeli and a voracious consumer of modern pop culture. Nobody I know could craft a more clever assemblage of the latest news of the Jews as Yori did at JCN - every day of the year - with absolutely astonishingly brilliant photoshopped images, clever headlines and acutely on the money judgment of what was and was not newsworthy.

Now Yanover tells a story in this new book of a master cabalist in Brooklyn -- father of the messiah. With allusions to the Hasidic mystical dynasty and to ancestral legend, Yanover keeps one eye on Judaism's core beliefs and the other on the Kojak-like tensions that make up the Lower East Side of New York City.

Does this description of this book seem like it marks a totally fresh and novel writer's formula? You bet it does.

Is the world ready for Yori's outlandish messiah story replete with "firefights, helicopter battles and strange visions"? In an era that has witnessed one bestselling Christian apocalypse series of books after another it is high time that we, the founding dramatic Israelites, came back to the center of the stage and offered up our answer, as Yanover does indeed in this great new book.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Girl Saves World, God, October 16, 2008

By 

David Roth (New York City) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Cabalist's Daughter: A Novel of Practical Messianic Redemption (Paperback)

What if after the great hasidic leader from Brooklyn had died, his followers cloned him? And what if his offspring came out a girl?

The Cabalist's Daughter does to the Jewish messianic tradition what The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy did to physics and philosophy. Using humor and comic-book drama, the novel depicts an age-old plot joining countless Jews and gentiles in an effort to redeem the world behind God's back.

The Girl, as the Cabalist's daughter comes to be known in pop lore, is raised by her biological father's henchman until, at age 20, she leaves home and begins to roam the countryside, challenging the status quo. Her miracles quickly spread her myth, which, in turn, attracts the forces of evil, supernatural and human alike.

Against a background of suicide bombers and rooftop sharpshooters, crumbling cities and a world economy gone mad, there she is, seemingly made up of light and air, skipping over the puddles of the Lower East Side, an indefatigable messenger of hope, with a ragtag gang of hapless apostles... until the inevitable day of reckoning.

The most brilliant part of the book are the homiletic passages, which play fast and furious with Jewish tradition. It is a thing of beauty and often very funny.

The plot is interesting, at times too violent for my taste, but acceptable. After all, thuis is a messianic girl we're talking about.

I'm definitely looking forward to a sequel.