The
novel tells the story of Eitan, an Israeli neuro-surgeon, who,
exhausted after a 19 hour shift at the hospital, finds himself
involved in a fatal SUV collision in which he hits an illegal
immigrant from Eritrea. In that isolated moment in time, he makes a
decision which proves to be life changing for him. He leaves the
fatally wounded man to die at the roadside.
Unknown
to him, the accident was witnessed by the Eritrean’s wife and she
begins to extort Eitan for his medical skills and he is forced to
surround himself with deception for the price for her silence. This
sets the scene of the underlying theme of power throughout the
narrative of the book and its misuse. It is a story of secrets based
on the unspoken.
There
is a tension to the story as it revolves around the emotionally
charged triangle of Sirkit the widow, Eitan and his wife Liat, with
the dramatic irony that Liat is the police officer investigating the
hit and run incident. The book is threaded through with themes of
guilt, shame and racial intolerance, with gestures towards wider
political themes, including a sub-plot involving the Bedouin Arabs.
Opinions
within the reading group were varied, as is reflected in the score but there was general agreement that the overuse of
psychological analysis became tedious, making it a dense and slowly
paced read. In addition, although the text raised many searing moral
questions and dilemmas, the third narrative dampened the emotion and
didn’t really evoke any real empathy towards any of the characters.
One of us, although
not present, had read the book, reported it as not very memorable.
Score: 6.3
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