Suspense set in OSLO
Novel set in Beersheba, Israel
14th December 2016
Waking Lions by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen, novel set in Beersheba, Israel.
This novel opens with a most eye catching line: “He’s thinking that the moon is the most beautiful he has ever seen when he hits the man” and within seconds we know that this is not a physical event, the protagonist has actually run someone over.
Dr Eitan Green is a man under pressure whose work situation has been problematical of late and with a new SUV he decides to clear his head and put the car through its paces in the middle of the night, on his way home from a particularly taxing day working at the hospital. It is on the dirt tracks that the unfortunate encounter takes place. Eitan gets out of the car to assess the damage to the human being and notes that there is no damage to his car. He determines life is ebbing away from Asum, who is lying broken and bleeding on the ground and in an instant Eitan is back in his vehicle and roaring off, leaving no apparent trace.
Haunted by nightmares once he is back in the bosom of his family, his life has of course shifted and can never be the same.
But he has left an item at the scene, there are consequences to come. He is forced into unanticipated action, blackmailed to act, otherwise his deed will be made public. He is ensnared and finds himself in a situation that is complex, illegal and fraught – yet he himself can make a difference to many human beings…. It is an interesting conundrum that the author has invented.
Who is Eitan and would someone with more backbone have confessed to his unintentional killing? What kind of husband is he in actual fact? The moral issues of his actions are at the heart of this novel, and the effects of a snap decision come to haunt him and his family. Breaking point hovers in the murky distance, there is an edginess that anticipates everything falling apart. How will the novel conclude?
It is the uncertainty of where things will end that kept me glued to the book, as there are at times subtle, at times seismic shifts that take the plot in a variety of interesting trajectories.
The writing style for me, however, didn’t work so well. It is a dense and meandering style that relishes exhaustive detail, which at times becomes actually rather exhausting to read. This may in part lie with the translation but there are descriptive inserts which just detract from the story, they feel slotted in and at times quite irrelevant (although in one of the off-piste ponderings you do find out what a Dreidel is!).
The dusty and barren nature of the land around Beersheba certainly comes to life in the novel, and the heat is an extra dimension that adds to the growing tension of the storyline.
It is a book that has introduced me to the issue of migrant Africans – Eritreans in the book – who seek refuge in Israel. Also featured are the Bedouin, who clearly are for the most part held in poor esteem and because I know little about this, parts of the storyline were I am sure lost on me. Which then left me wondering how much research one should do as a reader to further inform oneself about the issues raised in a novel…. Yet J K Rowling manifestly brings the world of Harry Potter to life, there is no research to be done there, and perhaps Gundar-Goshen too might have added a few insightful paragraphs to really evoke the social setting in this book.
I will be interested to see what the author tackles in her next book.
Tina for the TripFiction Team.
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