The sec­ond book in the Elisha David­son series, the saga con­tin­ues with fur­ther mys­ti­cal Kab­bal­is­tic adven­tures, this time includ­ing vis­its to and advice from King Solomon, him­self. Elisha, still mis­un­der­stood by his father, still try­ing to be a con­sci­en­tious per­son and save the Jew­ish peo­ple in secre­cy, finds and los­es pow­er­ful amulets, search­es for the elu­sive mag­i­cal Shamir, tastes heav­en­ly man­na, tries to help the less for­tu­nate, and wor­ries about the fate of his peo­ple. Mean­while, there is, of course some­one who is up to no good who is work­ing against Elisha and his friends. This is a rene­gade for­mer Kab­bal­ist, now known as The Oth­er, and he has enough knowl­edge to wreak hor­rif­ic dam­age to all Jews due to his pet­ty self­ish desires. Can be stopped before he has gone too far? We won’t know for sure until the next and final install­ment in the series.

Read­ers who up to now have had the impres­sion that Judaism is all about rit­u­al will learn that spir­i­tu­al­i­ty plays a major part in Jew­ish life, as well. And if they are under the impres­sion that heroes of long ago reside in the dusty pages of his­to­ry books, they will find that the long-ago fig­ures are star­tling present and alive in the minds of Jew­ish youth of today. These ele­ments com­bine with imag­i­na­tion run­ning wild and result in excit­ing sto­ry-telling set in the city of Jerusalem in which even the stones seems to come to life.

Read­ers who are curi­ous about Kab­bala, the secrets of Jew­ish mys­ti­cism and the Cham­bers will find this well-researched, Har­ry Pot­teresque tale an engross­ing read. Rec­om­mend­ed for ages 12 and up.