Night Owls

August 1, 2024
Jewish mythology, Yiddish theater, and New York City history meet in the present day. The Sender sisters, Molly and Clara, are surprisingly successful 18-year-old co-managers of a revived Yiddish theater on Second Avenue in Manhattan. That's because they're also more than a century old; Molly and Clara are Estries, undead women from Ashkenazi lore who turn into blood-drinking monsters and can fly around on owls' wings. They've done a good job of keeping their true identities a secret, but of course, new love interests complicate everything. Molly's girlfriend, Anat, gets possessed by a dybbuk who might have ties to Molly's past. Clara would insist that she doesn't have feelings for Boaz, their Syrian Jewish employee, but his ability to see the dead and his family's possession of a magic ring turn everyone's world upside down. The plot becomes a bit rudderless once the action picks up in the various storylines, circling around several loci but never quite making the stakes and motivations feel clear or urgent. Debut author Vishny's writing is at times muddy but mostly unobtrusive and is most successful when re-creating scenes from older history. Overall, the story excels at taking relatively hidden aspects of Jewish history, contemporary community life, and bubbe meises (or fables) and making them feel fresh and vibrant. A spirited retelling of lesser-known tales. (author's note)(Paranormal. 14-18)

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Starred review from September 15, 2024
Grades 8-12 *Starred Review* Sisters Clara and Molly are estries---creatures from Jewish folklore who shape-shift into owls and thirst for blood. They comanage the Grand Dame, a wonderfully old Yiddish theater in New York City that provides the perfect cover for their dietary needs. Unbeknownst to them (for now), their funny, clever coworker Boaz is able to see the undead, a threat to both their centuries--old secret and Clara's vow never to fall in love. But when Molly's girlfriend, Anat, is taken, Clara and Boaz are drawn together into a rescue mission, bringing them face-to-face with some terrifying monsters (including the ones inside them). Plus, Boaz's theft of an ancient relic with an increasingly strong will of its own sets off another set of interconnected problems. Vishny presents an intense, immersive quest full of deeply woven traditional and cultural lore, with emphasis on the value of Jewish faith and culture to the development of the characters. Serious situations experienced through the lens of enchantingly witty and emotional characters combine with a gentle touch for delicate subjects, and a plethora of Jewish experiences is illuminated. Readers will be a little bit scared of and for Clara and Molly in a story jam-packed with sweeping action, historical asides, and threads to follow.

COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

November 1, 2024
Clara and Molly are posing as young women who run the Grand Dame in New York City's East Village, a movie house that started life as a Yiddish theater. In fact, the sisters are two undead Estries, feeding off the blood of the living. Clara's rules: No romance. Only feed on Jews. The latter is to protect the Jewish community from blood libel (the false accusation that Jews use the blood of Christians for ritual purposes), the former to protect themselves from entanglements that would lead to their discovery and eradication. But Molly has a secret girlfriend who has become possessed by some sort of entity, and Clara...well, her relationship with their scapegrace ticket seller Boaz, who can see ghosts, is fraught. In a story that begins with small stakes and grows through successive iterations of drama to a showdown against Ashmodai, Prince of Demons, the details of the legacy of Jewish theater are engaging, and the strongly drawn romantic embroilments even more compelling. Film history weaves through the characters' interests and becomes inseparable from the enchantments that drive the action. Subplots, flashbacks, and bits of Jewish folkloric backstory strengthen the narrative drive, making this complex but accessible queer-Jewish-vampire rom-com thriller a hit on all fronts. An author's note provides historical background. Anita L. Burkam

(Copyright 2024 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)

Starred review from December 13, 2024

Gr 9 Up-In this stunning debut, Jewish vampire sisters battle the Prince of Demons while finding love and championing indie cinema in a novel that is by turns hilarious, heartrending, and historically illuminating. Teens Clara and Molly Sender are the managers of the Grand Dame Cinema on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, dedicating their spare time to saving early films-and drinking blood. Clara and Molly are Estries: century-old female vampires from Jewish folklore who can also turn into owls. Clara has two rules for survival: "No romance. Only feed on Jews." The second rule is meant to protect their community from antisemitism, but the rule about romance is made to be broken. Molly (who was a Yiddish theatre starlet in her past life) is making viral clips about Yiddish theatre with her girlfriend, Anat, when their romance catches the eye of her landlord, Ashmodai, Prince of Demons. When Ashmodai steals Anat and Molly goes in search of her, Clara teams up with her secret crush, Boaz Harari, a Syrian-Jewish American high school graduate who also has the ability to see and converse with ghosts. In line with Jewish folk tales, the sisters and Boaz need to outwit Ashmodai to protect the world of the living. Alongside the suspenseful plot, Clara, Molly, and Boaz's voices are distinct, offering poignant perspectives on what it has meant to be Jewish in America throughout history. Vishny's prose is full of ironic humor, too: The sisters depend on the East Village bubbes at the cinema to send them Nice Jewish Boys to snack on (but not kill), a neat inversion of community matchmaking. VERDICT Sisterhood, vampire romance, and the immigrant history of Manhattan makes this novel a triumph.-Katherine Magyarody

Copyright 2025 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2024
Clara and Molly are posing as young women who run the Grand Dame in New York City's East Village, a movie house that started life as a Yiddish theater. In fact, the sisters are two undead Estries, feeding off the blood of the living. Clara's rules: No romance. Only feed on Jews. The latter is to protect the Jewish community from blood libel (the false accusation that Jews use the blood of Christians for ritual purposes), the former to protect themselves from entanglements that would lead to their discovery and eradication. But Molly has a secret girlfriend who has become possessed by some sort of entity, and Clara...well, her relationship with their scapegrace ticket seller Boaz, who can see ghosts, is fraught. In a story that begins with small stakes and grows through successive iterations of drama to a showdown against Ashmodai, Prince of Demons, the details of the legacy of Jewish theater are engaging, and the strongly drawn romantic embroilments even more compelling. Film history weaves through the characters' interests and becomes inseparable from the enchantments that drive the action. Subplots, flashbacks, and bits of Jewish folkloric backstory strengthen the narrative drive, making this complex but accessible queer-Jewish-vampire rom-com thriller a hit on all fronts. An author's note provides historical background.

(Copyright 2024 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)