This was a perfect 3-star book -- didn't love it, didn't hate it. The Hebrew was pleasant and relatively quick and painless to read, for the most partThis was a perfect 3-star book -- didn't love it, didn't hate it. The Hebrew was pleasant and relatively quick and painless to read, for the most part. The story itself was not particularly gripping, but it was interesting for its historical value.
The narrator of this apparently autobiographical novel is a boy who emigrates from Egypt to Israel with his family in the early 1950s. He is unaware of the Holocaust and its ramifications until he befriends an adult, Yisrael Moshe Farkash, a Hungarian Holocaust survivor. Farkash describes his experiences to the narrator and finally entrusts him with the prayer book and gemara which stayed with him throughout his difficult passages -- as an orphan in the beginning of the war, apprenticed to an abusive baker, then during his brief experience in the camps, and finally during his harrowing illegal journey to Israel before the War of Independence. The book ends on a sweet, touching note.
Although the story itself wasn't anything amazing, it was interesting to get a feel for 1950s Israel and the motley crew of immigrants and Holocaust survivors who made up Jerusalem's population then. This book is also a good choice for someone who wants to begin reading in Hebrew and feels intimidated. The Hebrew is clear and simple, but the story can be appreciated by an adult....more
I see why this is a good book, and I admire what Llosa did here. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have liked.
This is a book about tI see why this is a good book, and I admire what Llosa did here. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have liked.
This is a book about the events surrounding Trujillo's assassination in the Dominican Republic, told from a variety of perspectives: Trujillo himself, the several men involved in the plot to kill him (who seemed pretty interchangeable to me as characters and really didn't need individual narratives), and a woman named Urania years later, looking back on the events from her unique perspective as she visits her estranged father in the Dominican Republic years later.
Although I can't claim to know much about the Trujillo era, if Wikipedia can be trusted Llosa did his research and got the details right. I'm usually not a fan of fiction that speculates about the inner lives of actual people, but I did find Llosa's renderings of Trujillo, his henchmen, and his assassins complex and believable. And I'm also not a fan of multiple narratives, but here it kind of worked.
Now for the bad: I found this book heavy on many levels. The writing was dense and detailed; the subject matter dark and depressing. It wasn't an easy book to get through and felt bloated at times. Though some of the characters were interesting (I particularly liked the rendering of President Balaguer), many of them left me cold when it came to personality, particularly Urania who, as another reviewer pointed out, was a Mary Sue.
If you have a special interest in the Trujillo era I think this is a good book to read; if you're just looking for an interesting or gripping read, this may not be the best choice.
Merged review:
I see why this is a good book, and I admire what Llosa did here. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy it as much as I would have liked.
This is a book about the events surrounding Trujillo's assassination in the Dominican Republic, told from a variety of perspectives: Trujillo himself, the several men involved in the plot to kill him (who seemed pretty interchangeable to me as characters and really didn't need individual narratives), and a woman named Urania years later, looking back on the events from her unique perspective as she visits her estranged father in the Dominican Republic years later.
Although I can't claim to know much about the Trujillo era, if Wikipedia can be trusted Llosa did his research and got the details right. I'm usually not a fan of fiction that speculates about the inner lives of actual people, but I did find Llosa's renderings of Trujillo, his henchmen, and his assassins complex and believable. And I'm also not a fan of multiple narratives, but here it kind of worked.
Now for the bad: I found this book heavy on many levels. The writing was dense and detailed; the subject matter dark and depressing. It wasn't an easy book to get through and felt bloated at times. Though some of the characters were interesting (I particularly liked the rendering of President Balaguer), many of them left me cold when it came to personality, particularly Urania who, as another reviewer pointed out, was a Mary Sue.
If you have a special interest in the Trujillo era I think this is a good book to read; if you're just looking for an interesting or gripping read, this may not be the best choice....more
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