People of the Book: A Novel by Geraldine Brooks Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of People of the Book: A Novel
Book Review: A well crafted modern love story and historical thriller
Summary: 5 Stars
A fictional account based on a true story of the rescue and restoration of an ancient illuminated Jewish book, which takes us from Australia to Bosnia and beyond. Dr Hanna Heath is called from Australia to restore the Sarajevo Haggadah, through the course of the restoration she discovers a number of clues which provide hints about the books history. While the story unfolds in the present day, it is regularly interrupted with journeys into the past for fictional accounts of the books history based on Hanna's discoveries. It could be otherwise described as an ongoing novel interspersed with a number of short historical stories.
The story in the present revolves not just around the book, but also Hanna's strained relationship with her remote self-possessed mother and revelations about her family, and her growing love for Ozren, the Muslim librarian in Bosnia The historical stories include young resistant workers in the Second World War; a syphilitic restorer in Vienna; a gambling rabbi and a drunken Catholic priest in Venice; a resourceful Jewish girl in Barcelona; and a young and very talented oriental girl in Seville.
Hanna is a forthright and intelligent woman devoted to her work, her romantic involvement with Ozren is put to the test when she suspects subterfuge involving a forgery, and her relationship with her mother is tested when she discovers who her father was. The historical stories are at times violent, at times harrowing, often very moving, but always involving.
People of the Book is a complex and well crafted novel not just about an ancient book, but about a present day love story and a detailed gripping historical mystery; a book which is populated with many fascinating characters. It is a thoroughly involving story and at time heartrending; a very rewarding read.
Book Review: "I might as well say, it wasn't my usual kind of job"
Summary: 4 Stars
In this grand saga of history, war and memory, author Geraldine Brooks follows the path of the world-famous Sarajevo Haggadah. Unique because of its extraordinarily rich illuminations, the manuscript came to represent all of the suffering of the Bosnian Jews, particularly throughout the twentieth century. Believed to have been created in 14th century Spain, there lies deep within the book's beautiful pages the standard elements of prayers, poems and stories about the Jews exodus from Egypt that traditionally guided Passover.
It is in 1996 when Australian rare books expert Hanna Heath is offered the job to inspect and conserve the manuscript's condition in the hope that it can be exhibited as soon as possible to raise the morale of war-torn Sarajevo. Known throughout the academic world for her research and frequently applauded for her experiences in book restoration, Hanna is an extremely ambitious individual and is well aware that this job is a once in a lifetime career-maker.
Encouraged by the goodwill of the United Nations, Hanna travels to Sarajevo in the hope she can make a good documentation of the book so the authorities can at least print a beautiful facsimile to present to the world. Even before the plane lands, Hannah sees the destructive results of the Bosnian war, this devastated city, passing in a blur of "shrapnel-splashed buildings," as the book, now placed in a safe-deposit box in the vault of the central bank, is possibly in danger of disintegrating.
Assisted by the librarian Ozren Karaman, the young chief of the National University of Bosnia, Hanna begins her analysis of the work. She observes that the soiled and scuffed binding is of an ordinary nineteenth century style and that the parchments are now bound in simple cardboard covers. The dark brown calfskin spine and corners have begun flaking away and there are also no clasps on the binding. Also, the book is in real danger of being exposed to the wild swings of the Sarajevan temperature.
The burnished gold of the illuminations, so fresh and so blazing suddenly overwhelm Hanna, along with the numerous miniature paintings created at a time when most Jews considered figurative art a violation of the commandments. But what is most fascinating about the work is the discovery of three items buried deep within the codex: a small piece of a butterfly wing, a red stain that at first glance looks to be wine, samples of what appears to be sea salt, and a fine white hair.
It is the unearthing of these pieces that jump-start Hanna's spellbinding journey into the dark secrets of the Haggadah, a volume with a turbulent history that has survived war and exodus and the evils of the Catholic Inquisition. Made when the vast Islamic empire was the bright light of the dark ages, the book existed at a time where science and poetry still flourished even as the Jews, tortured and killed by Christians, were hoping to find a measure of peace somewhere in the world.
As the history of this manuscript steadily unfolds, Hanna finds herself gradually drawn to the battered and beaten down Ozren. His child, once a victim of the war, is now lying in a local hospital with brain damage, any hope of reviving him a dream at best. But as Hanna urges Ozren to seek the help of Western doctors, she must also contend with the constant resentment of her ambitious mother, an accomplished neurosurgeon who is of the mind that Hanna has squandered her opportunity to enter a "real profession," instead wasting her life as a "tradeswoman."
Obviously Hanna's exploration of the Haggadah, her affair with Ozren, and her troubled relationship with her mother form the core of the novel, but the scattered history of the manuscript and its journey down through the ages also plays a critical part. Moving from Spain in the 1500's, to Venice in 1609, to 1894 Vienna, and onto Sarajevo in the midst of the 2nd World War, Brooks embellishes cultures that once influenced and enriched one another, but paid the ultimate price for turning to prejudice, intolerance and fear.
Indeed, the entire story of the Haggadah from its survival until today is a series of miracles: The young Jewish girl, who together with a Muslim librarian, endeavour to keep the book safe from the Nazis; a Viennese doctor whom the so-respectable bourgeoisie entrust to him the care of their private parts and the confidences of their lives; an alchoholic priest who works as sensor for the office of the Inquisitor of Venice, reading and passing judgement on the works of alien faiths; and a Jewish painter whose family is unwittingly caught up in the Spanish Inquisition as the government tries fanatically to purify the Church.
The Haggadah travels down through the ages, surviving these same human disasters over and over again, and finally tumbling into the arms of Hanna, where it reminds us of the fragility of the human condition and the terrible burdens of repression and tyanny.
Certainly the book provides an ultimate test of its owners, its beauty seducing Christians, Moslems and Jews alike as it is battled and fought over and finally secreted away at the end of the 20th century. Central to this beautifully realized story is its startling vision of tolerance, the Haggah remaining a fascinating symbol of human unity in an age where religious and cultural divisions continue to run deep. Copyright Michael Leonard 2008.
Book Review: Journey of a Prayer Book
Summary: 4 Stars
When do we consider loss in our own lives? What cost and what effect does loss have on our everyday existence? Is it traumatic only when a loved one passes or is there more of a sense of collective loss when looking at centuries of war, loss of life or needless destruction of towns and cities? How do we measure that loss compared to a loss of love or even when a beloved object goes missing? In reading Geraldine Brooks' novel, one comes away with a personal reflection of what loss means.
PEOPLE OF THE BOOK integrates all of the various and very dissimilar kinds of loss by telling the story of a journey of a beautiful rare meticulously engraved Haggadah.
Pulitzer prize winner Geraldine Brooks does a terrific job with this story. She was able to weave the true story of this missing prayer book into a well written historical fiction novel.
Hanna Heath is our protagonist who is an Australian book conservator summoned to investigate the authenticity of this newly surfaced gem of a prayer book which had been saved from a Bosnian museum by a librarian.
Hanna makes a series of discoveries while examining the find as any ancient book conservator would. She uncovers an insect wing, a thin strand of white hair, a stain that appears to be blood or wine, and some evidence that the prayer book had been near or around salt water. The investigation takes us back in time through centuries to the 1480's in Seville.
Brooks so competantly weaves a tale with intimate details and she introduces us to all of the PEOPLE who touched or were changed by this BOOK. The true story of the Haggadah is a beautiful and intimate study of the basic goodness of mankind through difficult and ominous events and Brooks is successful in capturing that quality in her literary art.
PROS:
Hanna's investigation leads us and her into the depths of intrigue, deception, and suspense. The journey of the book itself helps Hanna find out more about herself as well as truths she never knew existed. Fantastic weaving together of truth and fiction.
CONS:
Only one for me: the last chapter. It was just a little too pat and a bit incredulous. The main reason for this wonderful book not being a perfect five.
Recommended: B
Bentley/2008
Book Review: A holiday or commute read only
Summary: 3 Stars
I was disappointed with this book after some of the glowing reviews on this site: it's a perfectly adequate holiday read, but personally I found it emotionally unsatisfactory and quite contrived.
Hanna is a book conservator who is employed to restore a 15th century Jewish religious book; she does this and finds some artefacts that raise questions in her mind of how they got there - an insect's wing in the binding, a wine stain mixed with blood etc. The narrative intersperses these stories in between Hanna's own first-person story, but there's no great mystery involved.
Hanna herself never uncovers these stories for herself and I did find myself wondering why we need to know. At the end we're left with a story of the people who've encountered the book at various stages of its life, but they're quite arbitrary. Many of these stories are of exiles and persecution of the Jews throughout history, and this is where the weakest part of the book was for me: I felt that the author wanted to make a political point about inhumanity, intolerance, humanity under the most difficult circumstances - but they remained an intellectual exercise rather than coming to life and conveying any real, true emotion.
I would guess that whether you love this book or not will depend a lot on whether you warm to the voice of Hanna: I unfortunately found her Australian voice and attitude irritating and again very contrived. The cliches came thick and fast: the disturbed relationship with her feminist mother leaving her cold and unemotional; the father figure in her university conservationist-mentor; the instant love affair (even though it only lasts a few nights) with the war-ravaged Muslim...
The end of the book, too, takes off in a disconcertingly odd angle that is completely out of keeping with the rest of the story: and not in a good, compelling way, just another artificial twist-in-the-tail to try to make some kind of moral point.
So overall this is a perfectly acceptable tale for whiling away a commute or other long journey, but it's fairly shallow and, for me, instantly forgettable.