Rachel Reviews: What Was Forbidden by Jonathan Bockian

I, personally, love an historical murder mystery. My requirements are that it must evoke the place and the period firstly but that the action and the characters must also be believable. Jon Bockian's book delivers this to a high degree and he has created a novel which is tense, informative, creates investment in the characters and brings alive 17th century Venice - all good.

The story is about Ebrais specifically: Jews. Anyone who has read The Merchant of Venice will have an idea of how they were perceived in England around this time and it would appear that that was (literally) true in Venice also.

We follow Yehudit, a Jewish widow, who decides to investigate the brutal death of her brother, Mordechai. She is determined to discover the truth of what happened to him although she's up against it: as a woman and as a Jew. We also follow a "detective" investigating called Zachera and get his angle on things as a Venetian and someone keen to find the killer. And we follow Mordechai in flashbacks, so we are privy to what leads up to his demise. Moving between these three threads, we are led towards different characters, many of whom could have had a motive for causing harm to Mordechai. Was it a 17th century hate crime? Was it an envious rival for love? Was it to suppress a possible insurrection? Was it family protecting its reputation and standing in an already difficult environment?

This history was new on me. I had no idea about the tensions that were rife at this time and I enjoyed learning about Shabbetai Tsvi, the false messiah, again something about which I had no knowledge. The evocation of the group that Mordechai attends and the content of their discussions I found dense in detail but necessarily so, as Bockian uses this to expound the ideology that was dangerously being bandied about by certain Ebrais at the time.

But apart from that, this book is a great read: tensely rendered, with flowing prose; well-researched historically, with characters that feel rounded and in whom you are invested. I especially felt for Mordechai as his hopes and aspirations for a different future seemed within reach and yet, Bockian balances the possibility of him escaping with the constant pull of expectation from family, society and tradition which threaten it at every juncture.

A great historical fiction read.

Rachel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

This review was first published on Reedsy Discovery where I was privileged to read it as an ARC: