Description: In the year 999, when Ben Attar, a Moroccan Jewish merchant, takes a second wife, he commits an act whose unforeseen consequences will forever alter his family, his relationships, his business, and his life.
Brief description:
A. B. Yehoshua (1936-2022) was born in Jerusalem to a Sephardi family. Drawing comparisons to William Faulkner and described by Saul Bellow as "one of Israel's world-class writers," Yehoshua, an ardent humanist and titan of storytelling, distinguished himself from contemporaries with his diverse exploration of Israeli identity. His work, which has been translated into twenty-eight languages, includes two National Jewish Book Award winners (Five Seasons and Mr. Mani) and has received countless honors worldwide, including the International Booker Prize shortlist and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize (Woman in Jerusalem).
Review Quotes:
"Extraordinary . . . Yehoshua is so graceful and eloquent that his work's timeliness also succeeds, paradoxically, in making it timeless."-The New York Times Book Review
"An immensely intelligent, humane book . . . A. B. Yehoshua is a world-class writer at the height of his powers."-The Boston Globe
"Wherever this innovative, erudite, suggestive, mysterious writer-a true master of contemporary fiction-points us, there can be no doubt, it is essential that we go."-Neil Gordon, the Washington Post