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bkish's review
4.0
I doubt that this book will resonate for someone who is not Jewish. I am and for me this was a powerful book with complex issues. It was a very dark story and there was some forgiveness and generosity. Some of the relationships tho were not handled with care.
I will write more later.
It is about relationship and an older man who is in Israeli parliament minister of trade and a position he takes which angers the Prime Minister. He is a powerful man and very stubborn. He applies his standards everywhere and he misses out. The book is about his flaws that he comes to realize and the price of it. The irony of life is obvious here that at a critical time in his life he meets his original enemy who denounces him to the KGB which results in his imprisonment.
It is a complex story and he is complex as we jewish people are always. The story had an impact on me so I will write again.
I will write more later.
It is about relationship and an older man who is in Israeli parliament minister of trade and a position he takes which angers the Prime Minister. He is a powerful man and very stubborn. He applies his standards everywhere and he misses out. The book is about his flaws that he comes to realize and the price of it. The irony of life is obvious here that at a critical time in his life he meets his original enemy who denounces him to the KGB which results in his imprisonment.
It is a complex story and he is complex as we jewish people are always. The story had an impact on me so I will write again.
lilliangretsinger's review
1.0
I did not finish this book.
I found the story interesting, but slow. I couldn't relate to the characters and just couldn't get comfortable with the book if that makes sense. Not my cup of tea.
I found the story interesting, but slow. I couldn't relate to the characters and just couldn't get comfortable with the book if that makes sense. Not my cup of tea.
kairakaira's review
3.0
I reread this via audiobook while doing yard work. It’s a fine book but wasn’t worth the re-read.
bookcrone_'s review
5.0
An Israeli politician, who is a former Soviet dissident and gulag survivor, encounters the informant who denounced him some 40 years earlier. I knew from the first page that I was in the hands of a thoroughly competent writer in the best sense: I could relax and lose myself in the story, knowing I wouldn't be tossed out by a false note. From beginning to end, it was a gem, and I cried at the end, just bawled, even though the narrator's politics aren't mine. That is more than competence, that is enviable craftsmanship.
abookishtype's review
3.0
Baruch Kotler has just arrived in Yalta to find that his hotel reservation has evaporated. His young mistress, Leora, wants to try the other hotels in the Crimean resort town but Baruch is ready to surrender and catch a bus back to the airport. At the station, a woman offers them a room for the week. Later that night, however, Baruch learns that he is staying in the house of the man who denounced him in the 1970s. David Bezmozgis' The Betrayers takes place over just a few days as Baruch confronts his denouncer, his denoucer tries to make a living, and Leora falls out of love with her hero...
Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type. I received a free copy of this book from Edelweiss for review consideration.
Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type. I received a free copy of this book from Edelweiss for review consideration.
agriffs's review
informative
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
dandyliion's review
3.0
While I am sad to say it, I simply could not fall into the rhythm of this story. I did develop some attachment to the characters presented here, but there remained a nagging sense that the characters were under-developed, perhaps a bit flat. There were a number of moments where I felt I needed to know just a little more, but that little more never surfaced, and I eventually read in hopes only of reaching the end. Worthwhile for the unique social commentary, but I otherwise would not recommend.
mjanemartin's review
2.0
Why oh why do publishers do things like print books with no quotations? At least in this book they used the dash to indicate someone speaking, but still a lot of the time you don't know who is speaking. If there's an advantage to using weird punctuation, I wish someone would point it out.
So I'm frustrated with the lack of quotations, there's a lot of politics regarding Russia/Crimea...settlements in the West Bank, Zionism...I'm not the most well versed on these subjects, but I'm not clueless either. I get the big picture. There's a fair amount of Hebrew words and religious customs I'm unfamiliar with...but this is all on me. I don't expect all the books I read to be readily spoon-fed to middle aged, white American women. I even enjoyed my struggle with the book in some parts.
There are three main characters, none of which are likable. I'm tolerant of unlikable characters sometimes. But the two protagonists did not fall into this realm for me. There's a passage where the two men go on and on about whose fault their messed up lives are...each blaming the other for a moment in time that they let dictate the rest of their lives. One is a moral absolutist who isn't all that moral, the other guy...I don't know what he is. But at one point he's incredulous that the other man hasn't thanked him for putting him in the Gulag...if it weren't for his 13 year stint, he wouldn't be where he is today. I didn't know if it was supposed to be funny or not. The characters were a little over the top for me. I kept thinking "is he really that (selfish, stupid, uncaring etc...)" Also, the coincidence that Kotler just happened to run into his Gulag guy...pretty far fetched.
I wasn't feeling this book. But, I'm in the minority. So, happy reading.
So I'm frustrated with the lack of quotations, there's a lot of politics regarding Russia/Crimea...settlements in the West Bank, Zionism...I'm not the most well versed on these subjects, but I'm not clueless either. I get the big picture. There's a fair amount of Hebrew words and religious customs I'm unfamiliar with...but this is all on me. I don't expect all the books I read to be readily spoon-fed to middle aged, white American women. I even enjoyed my struggle with the book in some parts.
There are three main characters, none of which are likable. I'm tolerant of unlikable characters sometimes. But the two protagonists did not fall into this realm for me. There's a passage where the two men go on and on about whose fault their messed up lives are...each blaming the other for a moment in time that they let dictate the rest of their lives. One is a moral absolutist who isn't all that moral, the other guy...I don't know what he is. But at one point he's incredulous that the other man hasn't thanked him for putting him in the Gulag...if it weren't for his 13 year stint, he wouldn't be where he is today. I didn't know if it was supposed to be funny or not. The characters were a little over the top for me. I kept thinking "is he really that (selfish, stupid, uncaring etc...)" Also, the coincidence that Kotler just happened to run into his Gulag guy...pretty far fetched.
I wasn't feeling this book. But, I'm in the minority. So, happy reading.