- Paperback: 240 pages
- Publisher: Piatkus Books (7 July 2005)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0749935901
- ISBN-13: 978-0749935900
- Product Dimensions: 23 x 15.2 x 2.4 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,929,357 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Description
Review
"'Shifra Horn offers us a world in which the vicissitudes of exile are reflected in signs and wonders... The intermingling of fact and storytelling has a plausibility not achieved since Isaac Bashevis Singer... This is all quite brilliant.' The Independent 'Shifra Horn is a natural storyteller' Jewish Chronicle"
Product Description
Following a terrorist explosion on a bus in Jerusalem, Yael, a married mother who narrowly escaped the attack, is haunted by the last image she recalls before the horror: a little blonde child waving to her from the window of the bus, and the sound of Beethoven's Ode to Joy, which was playing on her car radio. Yael's husband, Nachum, seems unable, or unwilling to understand what she has been through, and although her friends and colleagues are sympathetic, they cannot share her pain. Still traumatised, she feels compelled to seek out the blonde child's grieving father, the enigmatic and mysterious Avshalom. Drawn to him through their mutual suffering and fascinated by his unusual background, Yael begins to fall helplessly in love with him. Avashaiom too, cannot deny his own feelings, but his belief that the loss of his wife and child is divine punishment for past sins overshadows any glimmer of hope for their future.
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First Sentence
And life has returned to normal. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
And life has returned to normal. Read the first page Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brillaint and emotional set in a tormented land,
By
This review is from: Ode to Joy (Paperback)
Shifra Horn's contemporary novel set in Jerusalem sheds is a brilliant book by an incredible author. It is obvious that so much of the material is based on real feelings, strains and emotions in a country that has terrible inner torments. It is a wonderful read just as a straightforward novel but more importantly is shows something of what life is like for people living close to the terror brought about by the Palestine/Israel conflict. The book is sympathetic to feelings or ordinary Israelis living in Jewish "neighbourhoods" (settlements) in East Jerusalem as well as to their near neighbours and friends the other side of the separation barrier. It also shows some of the strains that exist between ultra orthodox and secular Jews.I cannot recommend this book too much. Buy it and read it and try to understand what it is saying.
5.0 out of 5 stars
An Outstanding Work,
By
This review is from: Ode to Joy (Paperback)
Ode to Joy is a beautifully written book. It is told from the perspective of an Israeli woman, Yael, who is traumatised by witnessing the suicide bombing of a bus in Jerusalem during the 2002 intifada. The book examines her emotions and her relationship with her insensitive husband and her child, family, friends and colleagues as she tries to come to terms with this shocking event.The book moves at a gentle pace, but the description within it is of such a depth that it is worth taking in every word. This is translated from the original Hebrew version, and is extremely well translated so that the reader is not aware that they are not reading the original version. The conflict overshadows the lives of people living in Jerusalem, but the book does not attempt to take sides and different characters have completely different perspectives on the rights and wrongs. This will not appeal to all readers, but the standard of writing is such that this is a book which is worth of literary awards.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A masterpiece of contemporary Israeli literature,
By Gary Selikow (Great Kush) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Ode to Joy (Paperback)
Yael Maggid, a young married mother who works at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has recently experienced the passing of her father, a Greek-born holocaust survivor and is doing research on the culture of the ultra-orthodox Haredi communities.
Driving to work one day she is distracted by a game of peekaboo with a beautiful blonde child at the back of a bus, while listening to Beethoven's Ode to Joy on the radio. Moments later the bus, filled with children, is destroyed in a horrific terrorist homicide bombing. This trauma put's Yael's life into turmoil, and is not helped by the lack of sympathy by her husband Nachum. She meets Avshalom, who has lost his small son and wife in the massacre. She believes that her love for Avshalom may help excise the ghosts haunting her, while she struggles to raise her little son Yoavi and sort out her problems with her husband and her relations with her friends and colleagues. The book tells us about Yael's life and background, about her childhood about her marriage and motherhood, friends and colleagues. Just before the birth of her son, she attended a rally of the far-left Women in Black movement, and a women cursed Yael that she would lose her son in a terror attack the same way that she lost her own son. She believes that marrying Avashalom will excise the curse, because his loss was in place of that that she would have suffered as a result of the curse. This is a story of how terror and conflict affects the lives of ordinary Israelis and a story of pain and loss, of love, struggle and hope. It takes a look of the lives and struggles of people in Israel, of families, women and children, as well as those commonly experienced by people the world over.
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