A New Novel Features Jewish Kings, Isaac Newton, and Mediterranean Romance—But Few Serious Ideas

In Jonathan Levi’s Septimania, the protagonist, Malory, discovers himself to be descended from the rulers of a short-lived 8th-century Jewish kingdom in southwestern France. (Septimania was in fact a medieval principality with a significant Jewish population.) The author, writes Michael Weingrad, “whips history, mathematics, politics, music, theater, and religion into his soufflé,” not to mention a 17th-century parallel plotline involving Isaac Newton and, above all, the story of Malory’s love for the beautiful Luiza. In his review, Weingrad concludes that the book, while succeeding as a love story, fails to live up to its own ambitions: