10 must-read new SFF book releases to cozy up with this November
By Lacy Baugher
The Way Back – Gavriel Savit
A sweeping historical fantasy that draws inspiration from both the Jewish folk tradition and contemporary authors like Neil Gaiman and Philip Pullman, The Way Back is the second novel from author Gavriel Savit, whose debut Anna and the Swallow Man was a Sydney Taylor Book Award winner.
Set in the Eastern European shtetl of Tupnik in the 19th century, where a young Jewish boy, Yehuda Leib, and a girl named Bluma each have unexpected encounters with Death. As a result, they each must travel to the Far Country on the other side of the cemetery, a dangerous realm inhabited by demons, in order to find the House of Death and reclaim what they have lost.
The official synopsis describes the story as follows.
"For the Jews of Eastern Europe, demons are everywhere: dancing on the rooftops in the darkness of midnight, congregating in the trees, harrowing the dead, even reaching out to try and steal away the living. But the demons have a land of their own: a Far Country peopled with the souls of the transient dead, governed by demonic dukes, barons, and earls. When the Angel of Death comes strolling through the little shtetl of Tupik one night, two young people will be sent spinning off on a journey through the Far Country. There they will make pacts with ancient demons, declare war on Death himself, and maybe– just maybe–find a way to make it back alive."
The Way Back is available on November 17