Cover of Martyrs' Crossing

Martyrs' Crossing

"SOPHISTICATED AND SUSPENSEFUL . . . TAUTLY WRITTEN . . . Wilentz knows the world she writes about very well, and her descriptions have a solid specificity that lends authority to her fiction."

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-The New York Times Book Review

"At a closed Israeli checkpoint, Marina, a Palestinian mother, clutches her ailing boy, desperate for access to Jerusalem and its doctors. When a young Israeli soldier waits too long before deciding to disobey orders, a martyr is born. Thus begins a graceful, painful, illuminating novel of the Middle East. . . . [Wilentz's] prose tugs at the reader. . . . The characters are magnetic. . . . [This] is a very human tale of regrets, revenge, and the elusive nature of absolution."

-Entertainment Weekly

"SO PRECISE, SO STARTLING, SO UNFORGETTABLE. . . . These characters are all pawns of history and politics, but Wilentz makes them live."

-Los Angeles Times

"MAGNIFICENT . . . Wilentz writes with a prose style reminiscent of The New Yorker's highest ambitions: crystalline, pure, faultlessly communicative. . . . Like the best documentaries, Martyrs' Crossingallows us unprecedented access to a little-understood and often misrepresented part of the world."

-Chicago Tribune

"A BRILLIANTLY RESEARCHED MEDIDATION ON THE CRISIS IN THE MIDDLE EAST . . . Martyr's Crossingmatches Damascus Gatein the quality of research and the mass of intriguing characters-and yet it remains a lean thriller."

-The New York Observer

Audience
adult
Length
medium · 330 pages

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Liked Martyrs' Crossing? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked Martyrs' Crossing. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. Death of a Monk Shares Middle East, Israel, fiction
  2. City of Oranges: An Intimate History of Arabs and Jews in Jaffa Shares Middle East, Israel, israel palestine
  3. Peace Is the Way: Bringing War and Violence to an End Shares nonfiction
  4. How to Make Peace in the Middle East in Six Months or Less: Without Leaving Your Apartment Shares Middle East, Israel, nonfiction

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“If you want more of the same (historical fiction), start with these.”

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“If it was the Middle East that hooked you, try one of these.”

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