A comprehensive but dramatically flat retelling of Arab history from a Muslim perspective.
Tawfik (Saudi Arabia: A Personal Experience, 1991) tells the story of the Arab people up to the time of Muhammad in this historical novel.
In 1800 BCE, in the city of Ur, Nahor—a member of a group of traders known as the Hebrews—hears that his son, Azar, has a new child, so he goes to visit him. Azar wants to name the baby Nahor, after his own father, but the elder man recommends a different name: “This boy should be called Abraham, a name that means ‘father of nations’. I have seen signs and believe he will be a great man.” As an adult, Abraham learns from the angel Gabriel about the true God, called “Al-ILah.” Gabriel also tells Abraham that his son Ismael must be taken to the city of Beca (later known as Mecca), where he’ll rebuild a house for God that was destroyed by the great flood. This house, the Kaaba, is the center of Arab worship for centuries. It’s not until a later prophet, Mohamed, comes along, though, that the original faith of Abraham and Ismael is restored. The novel is divided into three sections: the first deals with the founding of Mecca and the interactions between the Arabs and their Middle Eastern neighbors; the second chronicles the “Age of Ignorance” and further international relations; and the final section describes the rise of Mohamed. Tawfik’s prose is simple and largely unadorned: “Preparation to build Allah’s house and the sanctuary began in earnest. Abraham was a rich man and able to pay the cost of this large undertaking.” Overall, the book reads less like a novel than it does a historical summary with some light dramatization. As a result, much of the text is devoted to exposition, and people come and go quickly, not allowing much time for character development. Readers interested in Arab folk history will find Tawfik’s book a fairly concise synthesis of various sources and traditions. However, she doesn’t add enough elements or complicate the story enough to make it a truly compelling work of fiction.
A comprehensive but dramatically flat retelling of Arab history from a Muslim perspective.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: 978-0-9629455-1-9
Page Count: 344
Publisher: Windmill Publishing Company
Review Posted Online: Aug. 22, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Catch-22 is also concerned with some of war's horrors and atrocities, and it is at times painfully grim.
Catch-22 is an unusual, wildly inventive comic novel about World War II, and its publishers are planning considerable publicity for it.
Set on the tiny island of Pianosa in the Mediterranean Sea, the novel is devoted to a long series of impossible, illogical adventures engaged in by the members of the 256th bombing squadron, an unlikely combat group whose fanatical commander, Colonel Cathcart, keeps increasing the men's quota of missions until they reach the ridiculous figure of 80. The book's central character is Captain Yossarian, the squadron's lead bombardier, who is surrounded at all times by the ironic and incomprehensible and who directs all his energies towards evading his odd role in the war. His companions are an even more peculiar lot: Lieutenant Scheisskopf, who loved to win parades; Major Major Major, the victim of a life-long series of practical jokes, beginning with his name; the mess officer, Milo Minderbinder, who built a food syndicate into an international cartel; and Major de Coverley whose mission in life was to rent apartments for the officers and enlisted men during their rest leaves. Eventually, after Cathcart has exterminated nearly all of Yossarian's buddies through the suicidal missions, Yossarian decides to desert — and he succeeds.
Catch-22 is also concerned with some of war's horrors and atrocities, and it is at times painfully grim.Pub Date: Oct. 10, 1961
ISBN: 0684833395
Page Count: 468
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 1961
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Steinbeck's peculiarly intense simplicity of technique is admirably displayed in this vignette — a simple, tragic tale of Mexican little people, a story retold by the pearl divers of a fishing hamlet until it has the quality of folk legend. A young couple content with the humble living allowed them by the syndicate which controls the sale of the mediocre pearls ordinarily found, find their happiness shattered when their baby boy is stung by a scorpion. They dare brave the terrors of a foreign doctor, only to be turned away when all they can offer in payment is spurned. Then comes the miracle. Kino find a great pearl. The future looks bright again. The baby is responding to the treatment his mother had given. But with the pearl, evil enters the hearts of men:- ambition beyond his station emboldens Kino to turn down the price offered by the dealers- he determines to go to the capital for a better market; the doctor, hearing of the pearl, plants the seed of doubt and superstition, endangering the child's life, so that he may get his rake-off; the neighbors and the strangers turn against Kino, burn his hut, ransack his premises, attack him in the dark — and when he kills, in defense, trail him to the mountain hiding place- and kill the child. Then- and then only- does he concede defeat. In sorrow and humility, he returns with his Juana to the ways of his people; the pearl is thrown into the sea.... A parable, this, with no attempt to add to its simple pattern.
Pub Date: Nov. 24, 1947
ISBN: 0140187383
Page Count: 132
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 5, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1947
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