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4.18 AVERAGE
4.18 AVERAGE
I got the ARC from where I work at a library and I am so happy I did!
I think that one thing I need to read a lot more of is fiction from the last five years from Israeli and Palestinian authors that deals with the occupation. This book addresses interpersonal relationships, displacement, trauma, and love and memory in the context of the state of Israel and the Palestinian territories. It’s very sensual, extremely melodramatic, and does deal with the questions it raises in what I think are pretty careful ways, though it gets a little on-the-nose at times in terms of how it makes its political arguments. The book doesn’t present a very nuanced or forgiving vision of Yonatan’s Israeli contemporaries—whether this is due to Yonatan thinking he must be the only voice of dissent against the actions of the IDF or is due to the pessimism of the author towards Israeli youth, I am not really sure. All Israelis in the book except Yonatan’s mother are pretty gung-ho about military service and nobody except Yonatan brings up the issues they have with occupation, which I find very jarring, and nobody addresses the history of dissent among Jewish people in Israel—it is as if Yonatan exists in a vacuum where the movements of the 1970s didn’t exist, which I guess may be a reflection of how it really is for young IDF soldiers, but it does color the landscape of the book. The characters feel very isolated from wider cultural currents of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. The history the book talks about is mostly from the 1950s and before. I felt that there were also some missed opportunities to have Yonatan have conversations with Jews in the Diaspora about his politics in a broader sense, or to explore what would happen to his Zionism if he remained outside Israel for longer. Likewise, the narrative doesn’t give Laith and his sister a lot of background or depth, maybe because the reader is supposed to already understand where they are coming from—but if a young IDF soldier read this book, the two-dimensional political angel figures that these two twins turn into are almost past the point of belief and, in the best case scenario, would leave a politically transformed reader with a rosy and very shallow understanding of Palestinian culture or values. It feels as if the book is for an American audience.
I really love Yonatan’s gradually developing sexuality—that and the macho cultures he encounters at summer camp and in the military and in his grandfather’s stories really make this an incredible coming of age narrative. I adore the second-person narration addressed to Laith and the initial possibility of homoerotic play between teens that, rather than being dismissed in favor of a straight romance plot, rises like an increasingly insistent tidal wave and carries Yonatan towards other men and into a deep love connection with Laith. I think this part of the story is handled beautifully and honestly and is why my general impression of the book is so positive. I also Adore the narrative of Yonatan’s great uncle Jacko and his gay love for Rafi. I love the way the narrative handles the possibility that Jacko led a revolt inside Auschwitz and the hint that Yonatan’s mother is named for Rafi and Yonatan’s last name is from Samson as a tribute to Jacko’s long hair and his resistance to the Nazis.
I’m really stoked to read more from this author!!
I think that one thing I need to read a lot more of is fiction from the last five years from Israeli and Palestinian authors that deals with the occupation. This book addresses interpersonal relationships, displacement, trauma, and love and memory in the context of the state of Israel and the Palestinian territories. It’s very sensual, extremely melodramatic, and does deal with the questions it raises in what I think are pretty careful ways, though it gets a little on-the-nose at times in terms of how it makes its political arguments. The book doesn’t present a very nuanced or forgiving vision of Yonatan’s Israeli contemporaries—whether this is due to Yonatan thinking he must be the only voice of dissent against the actions of the IDF or is due to the pessimism of the author towards Israeli youth, I am not really sure. All Israelis in the book except Yonatan’s mother are pretty gung-ho about military service and nobody except Yonatan brings up the issues they have with occupation, which I find very jarring, and nobody addresses the history of dissent among Jewish people in Israel—it is as if Yonatan exists in a vacuum where the movements of the 1970s didn’t exist, which I guess may be a reflection of how it really is for young IDF soldiers, but it does color the landscape of the book. The characters feel very isolated from wider cultural currents of the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. The history the book talks about is mostly from the 1950s and before. I felt that there were also some missed opportunities to have Yonatan have conversations with Jews in the Diaspora about his politics in a broader sense, or to explore what would happen to his Zionism if he remained outside Israel for longer. Likewise, the narrative doesn’t give Laith and his sister a lot of background or depth, maybe because the reader is supposed to already understand where they are coming from—but if a young IDF soldier read this book, the two-dimensional political angel figures that these two twins turn into are almost past the point of belief and, in the best case scenario, would leave a politically transformed reader with a rosy and very shallow understanding of Palestinian culture or values. It feels as if the book is for an American audience.
I really love Yonatan’s gradually developing sexuality—that and the macho cultures he encounters at summer camp and in the military and in his grandfather’s stories really make this an incredible coming of age narrative. I adore the second-person narration addressed to Laith and the initial possibility of homoerotic play between teens that, rather than being dismissed in favor of a straight romance plot, rises like an increasingly insistent tidal wave and carries Yonatan towards other men and into a deep love connection with Laith. I think this part of the story is handled beautifully and honestly and is why my general impression of the book is so positive. I also Adore the narrative of Yonatan’s great uncle Jacko and his gay love for Rafi. I love the way the narrative handles the possibility that Jacko led a revolt inside Auschwitz and the hint that Yonatan’s mother is named for Rafi and Yonatan’s last name is from Samson as a tribute to Jacko’s long hair and his resistance to the Nazis.
I’m really stoked to read more from this author!!
When his family moves from America to Israel, Jonathan embarks on a passionate love affair with his new country. But in the year before he joins the Israeli army he meets Palestinian twins Nimreen and Laith, with whom he forms an intimate bond of love and friendship. The beautifully wrought story of Jonathan’s conflicted beliefs and passions reminds us that the mentality of Us vs Them can only end badly for both. And that a love story isn’t any good unless it breaks your heart.
i reread this book, because i haven’t read it in about two years and wanted a refresh and wow does it still hit so hard. it made me cry,,, at multiple points throughout. everything about this book is beautiful, the writing, the imagery, the relationships, the commentary. i love the relationships between laith and jonathan and nimreen and jonathan. they love each other, all of them but in very different ways, and ultimately that’s not enough! and it sucks! i don’t think i’ll ever stop thinking about this book or jonathan or laith or nimreen or darwish or white lilies. i don’t wish i could read this book for the first time again. because every time i read it feels brand new.
fav quotes: “i was a soldier who dreamed of white lilies, sand everywhere. i pulled a flower from you body. not from you breast or belly, but from your face, laith, your beautiful eye. your winking eye. i could feel it in my breast, though, the way your wink blossomed into a red flower, into white lilies.
“maybe, i thought, you were staring up at the same sky, with the eye that had not turned into a flower. maybe this was the last sky we’d ever look at together, laith.
what a big sky.”
“can i blame him, laith? can we blame anyone for the ways in which fear opens their lips? i don’t know.”
“i took your right hand in my left hand, threaded my fingers through your fingers, and i took nimreen’s left hand in my right one. do you remember how she laughed, and then you laughed too, and then i laughed too? how hard i held on to your hands, as hard as i possibly could? how i let go?”
fav quotes: “i was a soldier who dreamed of white lilies, sand everywhere. i pulled a flower from you body. not from you breast or belly, but from your face, laith, your beautiful eye. your winking eye. i could feel it in my breast, though, the way your wink blossomed into a red flower, into white lilies.
“maybe, i thought, you were staring up at the same sky, with the eye that had not turned into a flower. maybe this was the last sky we’d ever look at together, laith.
what a big sky.”
“can i blame him, laith? can we blame anyone for the ways in which fear opens their lips? i don’t know.”
“i took your right hand in my left hand, threaded my fingers through your fingers, and i took nimreen’s left hand in my right one. do you remember how she laughed, and then you laughed too, and then i laughed too? how hard i held on to your hands, as hard as i possibly could? how i let go?”
challenging
informative
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
This novel is absolutely moving and completely heartbreaking. It's the kind of story that sticks with you, long after you've put it down for the final time. It was the kind of book that, while I was reading it, I couldn't put it down - I'm pretty sure I read it during lecture because I physically could not let it go when there was still so many things unresolved. Moriel Rothman-Zecher tackles pretty heavy topics, and accomplishes so much.
Moriel Rothman-Zecher is an Israeli-American novelist and poet whose work has been published in The New York Times, The Paris Review and Haaretz. Rothman-Zecher says he came across this novel idea almost by accident - that he was trying to write something else, but it wasn't working but then all of a sudden, during a period of fasting, he realized he was writing the wrong book. No matter what brought on this realization, I'm glad it allowed this book to be born. It's definitely the kind of eye-opening novel the world needed.
The story opens with Jonathan, who is in military prison for something readers don't quite yet know. But he's reflecting and all of a sudden telling us about his summer. Of being excited to join the Israel Defense Forces. Of meeting two Palestinian citizens of Israel - the twins, Laith and Nimreen. Becoming friends with them, loving hanging out with them and then loving them. The summer is full of love and confusion as Jonathan grapples about what this friendship means for who he believes he is.
There seems to be no happy ending here, cruelly reminding us of the first word of the title: sadness. But the story is so clever, so well-written, that even readers are caught between this debate with Jonathan. Urging him to understand, falling in love with Laith and Nimreen the same way Jonathan is. There's this false hope that maybe everything will be okay, because it has to be. The story is intense, and sometimes I felt lost in the politics I didn't quite understand, but the heart was so large, and the desire to share this story was so profound. Even if you're not familiar with the politics, I heartily recommend this novel, because it is and it isn't about the politics - it's truly about the ways in which is affects the people caught within the politics.
The ending is not satisfying. But the characters are so rich in complexity, the prose so lyrical and searing, the plot so revealing in what war can do to people, that this book is well, well worth the read.
*This review is also published on my blog*
Moriel Rothman-Zecher is an Israeli-American novelist and poet whose work has been published in The New York Times, The Paris Review and Haaretz. Rothman-Zecher says he came across this novel idea almost by accident - that he was trying to write something else, but it wasn't working but then all of a sudden, during a period of fasting, he realized he was writing the wrong book. No matter what brought on this realization, I'm glad it allowed this book to be born. It's definitely the kind of eye-opening novel the world needed.
The story opens with Jonathan, who is in military prison for something readers don't quite yet know. But he's reflecting and all of a sudden telling us about his summer. Of being excited to join the Israel Defense Forces. Of meeting two Palestinian citizens of Israel - the twins, Laith and Nimreen. Becoming friends with them, loving hanging out with them and then loving them. The summer is full of love and confusion as Jonathan grapples about what this friendship means for who he believes he is.
There seems to be no happy ending here, cruelly reminding us of the first word of the title: sadness. But the story is so clever, so well-written, that even readers are caught between this debate with Jonathan. Urging him to understand, falling in love with Laith and Nimreen the same way Jonathan is. There's this false hope that maybe everything will be okay, because it has to be. The story is intense, and sometimes I felt lost in the politics I didn't quite understand, but the heart was so large, and the desire to share this story was so profound. Even if you're not familiar with the politics, I heartily recommend this novel, because it is and it isn't about the politics - it's truly about the ways in which is affects the people caught within the politics.
The ending is not satisfying. But the characters are so rich in complexity, the prose so lyrical and searing, the plot so revealing in what war can do to people, that this book is well, well worth the read.
*This review is also published on my blog*
Absolutely beautiful writing. Very poetic. I enjoyed the last third of this book, but it was somewhat of a slow start. For me, the weakest part were the characters and their relationships. It’s like so much effort was put into the writing that the characters were more or less left by the wayside. The conflict within the story was fascinating and understandable on all sides. But it just lacked something. And as much as I enjoyed the last third, I didn’t like the ending itself as much as I wanted to.
challenging
emotional
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Beautifully written book about a passionately Zionist kid who grew up in the USA but moves to Israel in 12th grade because his Israeli mother's father is dying. Jonathan is planning on joining the Israel Defense Forces when he graduates. But his simple Zionism is confounded when he befriends Palestinian twins. This book does not shy away from complexity. Powerful and sad with maybe just a tad of hope.
challenging
emotional
informative
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Antisemitism, Islamophobia, War