This is a well evolved compelling murder mystery that hooked me from the prologue. The main setting is modern day Egypt, Jerusalem and Palestine with three main characters and dozens of valuable extras. The Egyptian Khalifa is a chain-smoking, Indian Jones wanna be, police detective, with a huge heart and troubled conscience. Layla is an angry Palestinian journalist trying to avenge the death of her beloved father with pen and paper and finally Ben Roi the bitter, alcoholic, self destructive, Israeli police detective with a broken heart. All of the characters are fatally and fabulously flawed with personal stories that force you to become involved.
The main event that brings all of the characters together involves a 15 year old murder that has already been solved. The story is fascinating, from the mysterious ancient Jewish "treasure" to the tale of the hateful Nazi's. It spans a millennium in its telling and occasionally is hard to follow because of its lengthy time-span, multitude of characters and rapid switches back and forth between all of the interlocking stories. While the murder mystery and interesting characters were enough to hook me, I found one of the most intriguing parts of this novel to be its frank assessment of the Palestinian/Israeli conflict seen sympathetically and critically from both sides.
If you like grown-up murder/mysteries I strongly recommend this one.
Personally I prefer immature story lines with short words, simple sentences and lots of sex. Your book sounds okay too. Did it have pictures?
Posted by: Patricia Bessey | 04/14/2009 at 10:49 AM
LMAO! Not only did it have pictures, it also had pop-ups, coloring pages and a connect the dots.
Posted by: Ann | 04/14/2009 at 04:22 PM
I like murder/mysteries with a side of sex. Deoes it have sex in it?
I just read a book "Hidden Garden" it was soooooooooo good.
Posted by: Jane the pain | 07/16/2009 at 09:21 AM
Unfortunately no, Jane. Not even a pair of titties to be found.
Posted by: Ann | 07/16/2009 at 09:29 AM