Edward WhittemoreRecensioni

In this final book of the [Jerusalem Quartet] Whittemore follows the career of one Yossi, an Iraqi born Jew who becomes a deep agent for the Mossad in Syria, the Runner, who poses and then, in some way, becomes a Syrian and for decades successfully transfers information that, among others, enables the successful fight for the Golan Heights and some shifting of the borders to the west. In the end he works for the Syrians as well and the stress overwhelms him but it is hardly surprising. The man who is his 'handler', Tajar, the first head of the Mossad (I have no idea of any of the historical accuracy of any of this but I suspect names are changed and the essence is true) is a very minor person in the previous novel as is 'Bell' who in the previous book was the head of 'The Monastery' a British undercover organization in Egypt. Whittemore was undoubtedly an agent himself for the US, deeply knowledgeable about all things Middle Eastern. His description of the implosion of Lebanon is masterful. I grew up reading endlessly about the chaos there and it was helpful to read about how it came about in this more intimate way. I think, having read all four books, Whittemore is attempting to show how generation after generation the same theme, with variations, plays out between Arabs, Jews, and Christians, nothing resolved, nothing changes (as in improves). There are merely periods of quiet punctuated by extreme violence and reshufflings. A few die in the crossfire, a few survive to sit on the sidelines watching history repeat itself very much like water, always different, always the same. Any person interested in the Middle East will find the Quartet worthwhile reading. ****1/2½

The third of four in the extraordinary and strange novels of the Jerusalem Quartet is very different from the first two. For one, it's serious, shadowed, dark. This is not a John LeCarre mystery, clever layers within layers, this third book is a meditation on purpose and what happens if a person loses hope. Stern, the son of Plantagenet Strongbow, born in the desert around the turn of the century is a child of everywhere and everyone, nowhere and no one. He is a big quiet, intriguing, kind, loveable and mysterious man. His dream is of helping to create a Palestine where the monotheistic monoliths, Christianity, Islam, Judaism can exist in harmony. Directly opposed to this sort of blasphemy (although they are only one among many) are the Nazis who, in love with death (in their own sick way recognizing that in death is the perfection they seek--absolute control, absolute authority). Cairo, unthinkably, is under threat. Rommel is impossible to stop. How do the Germans always seem to know what the British have planned? Stern has worked as an agent for decades and comes under suspicion. Joe O'Sullivan Beare (from the previous novel who, appropriately, has lived as a shaman in the American Southwest for the last ten or so years but is an old friend of Stern's) is called in to unravel the mystery of Stern. Instead he finds that Stern is unraveling, for as the war rages on, he is losing fait, suspecting that his cause is hopeless, that the difficulty is within the human soul -- that humans are impossible to manage, life itself is impossible to manage because all is in constant in motion, changing, evolving . . . and at the core? Life and love, life and suffering and loss are inseparable. Some kind of fundamental, almost impersonal wickedness is inevitable. The story itself is a vehicle for these meditations and if you don't like thoughtful books, don't bother. It feels as if there ought to be a plot, what with all swirling secret agents and agencies at loggerheads, but there really is not. What Joe does find out is . . . well, I can't spoil, but it has more to do with the state of a soul and what I was writing of above so if you're looking for a clever plot, etcetera, stay away. Honestly, I never did figure out, not for sure (if there even is an answer in the text I might have missed it) whether Stern did betray anything to the Germans by accident or on purpose. And it's not really the point, is it?

Correction: The review below mine on the book page states that the novel is set during WW1. No. It is WW2.½

Whittemore gets that it is impossible to be rational about anything to do with the Middle East and multiply that by infinity when the subject is Jerusalem. Likely the initial settlement there was chosen for practical reasons, e.g. that there is no inherent spiritual reason why this 'hilltop' has become the possibly the most important city on the planet, as regards the life of the spirit. Whittemore does not try to unravel the mystery, instead he weaves a story of improbabilitie and intersections, layering one upon another from the Babylonians to the Crusaders, the Greeks to the Ottomans, to the early moments of the Zionist movement. In this second of the Quartet, a poker game begun in 1921 between three people, a black Arab-Sudanese, a Jewish-Hungarian ex-diplomat/soldier and an Irish ex-Independence fighter continues. The stakes are high: the winner will win Jerusalem. Meanwhile, the quest for the original bible (known as the Sinai Bible) is still on, though muted through this book. 3000 year old Haj Harun, the defender of Jerusalem, hosts the poker game and arbitrates when needed. That's all you need to know. Either you will be drawn in or you won't. ****1/2½

We just can't help wanting to put things into orderly categories but some novels thoroughly defy the notion. What often happens, alas, is that these authors get compared to others with a similar issue and then dismissed from the 'canon' as being, sure, yeah, realists about some things but so off the wall about the rest, that what can a scholar do but ignore such chaos? Whittemore belongs firmly in this category. You know that from page 1 with the description of Plantagenet Strongbow, born around 1840 and heir to the Dukedom of Dorset. No, actually, you know it from the second you read his name. You also know you are in the hands of a genuine storyteller. I am not going to describe the plot or even the characters as that would take all day and night, but summarize by saying, the last book I read that actually helped me understand the turmoil that is the Middle East was David Fromkin's A Peace to End All Peace (1870's). This is the second. (There have been others, but not like these two.) Sinai Tapestry is the first of four novels that make up a quartet--the purpose of which, I think, is to lift out and pinpoint specific currents, happenings and obsessions that emerge from the epicenter of the Middle East, the Sinai and Jerusalem. All of these are historically 'true' occurences. Then there is the other piece of the story, literally 'the story' but not historical because how can it be? Whittemore's aim here is to capture the essence of the matter: positing an original Bible, a chaotic document 'suggesting infinity' written by a blind man and an imbecile, replaced by a religious fanatic who decided that the real Bible was too chaotic so he carefully forged a better one (this in the 1800's) destroying himself with the effort. Other dreams and obsessions exist too: of creating a peaceful land where the three monotheistic religions can live side by side. This theme, this thread has also been present for over a century, albeit lesser as being the most fantastical idea of all. I spent a lot of time reading, looking things up (Asa Jennings! Who knew?) and a certain amount of time staring out the window. The portrait of Jerusalem is also quite wonderful, so affectionate and so uncompromising. This first of the four ends in 1922 and I think the next one starts right then. Sometimes fiction does a better job at revealing truths than just the facts, m'am.
*****

A stunning opening shot in what might be one of my favorite quartets of all time.

“But for Tajar this chance glimpse at the incomprehensible counterorder of the universe was truly startling, far more so than any random clash of chaos could have been behind the tangle of wild rosebushes in his walled compound, where a huge ancient cactus guarded the gate with a thousand sharp swords.”

This is the last book by this author that I will ever read. This is the last book that the author had written. The final segment in The Jerusalem Quartet, 𝘑𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘩𝘰 𝘔𝘰𝘴𝘢𝘪𝘤, is a stand-alone work. All four of the books are. Each one a masterpiece. Each one a separate sliver of glass in the mosaic that Whittemore arranged to convey or encapsulate or merely grapple with understanding the greater picture of existence. Pieces shattered from Southeast Asia and the Middle East and the American Southwest and North Africa all reassembled in some semblance of a reality that could seem too poetic if it weren’t so painfully authentic. The soul is racked. The heart is pummeled with rifle butts. The skin is abuzz with the fire and sandy winds from a world in which we humans had sprung, from which we evolved, from which we developed ever-greater technology to bomb us Earth-birthed humans back into dust. The brain is left to pick up the pieces.

And so, there’s a mosaic.

It’s beautiful. It’s horrifying. It makes me feel less than what I am. It makes me want to pedal my arms through those whipping winds to discover the source of it all—whether there was an ultimate meaning or not. For that mosaic cobbled together in the desert, burnt into the sand, blown by ghost caravans, kissed by djinn, trampled by angels holding aloft burning swords, is as honest and scintillating a tableau of human history I’ve ever read.

And it’s the last book.

Only five novels, and what an impact. I doubt the impression could ever be worn from my mind, no matter how excoriating the scirocco.

What beauty. What horror. What friendship. What life. What a grand gulp of air at the finish, staring up into the unblinking sun.

I’ll never get to read any more of Whittemore. What a shame. But, then again, what a shame to have never read him at all. His influence will run the length of the rest of my life—whether writing or simply staring at the writing in the short grass. Maybe looking for meaning. Maybe just wanting to feel the warmth and immediacy of it all. Ever and always returning to that mosaic in appreciation and awe.

I could weep if there were any moisture in the wilderness. I could sing if it weren’t so dry. I could smile and count grains of sand. I could write.

I shall write.

Thank you for your tireless vision. Thank you for your undying voice in the dunes.

Quin's Shanghai Circus is a product of the 1970s, written by a man who had an amazing career as a military officer, CIA operative, and manager of a Greek newspaper, among other things. The language is lush, the imagery strange and compelling, the story intricate, and the characters complex.

I'm sorry to say that I didn't actually like it.

A young man named Quin, born in Japan and raised in the Bronx, meets a man named Geraty, who suggests to him that he can learn more about his long-dead parents if he escorts a simple-minded adult orphan, Big Gobi, to Japan. Big Gobi's original guardian and sponsor, Father Lamoureux, knew Quin's parents, and in gratitude for Gobi's return, might be prompted to talk about them. It seems Geraty also knew them, or knew of them, before and during World War II, but he claims to know almost nothing.

It seems a simple, if enormous, undertaking, but there's nothing particularly tying Quin to his current abode and employment. So off he and Big Gobi go, traveling on a freighter, returning to Japan where they were both born.

What follows is an intricate journey through prewar conspiracies, espionage, corruption, and mystery. Key figures are Quin's parents themselves, apparently involved in an espionage ring; a one-eyed general, head of the Japanese secret police, the Kempeitei; the general's lover, the prostitute, now madam, called Mama; Mama's sociopathic younger brother; a Russian former Trotskyite disillusioned with with Lenin's Russia became; Father Lamoureux himself; and the General's brother, a Japanese baron whose title and lands passed to the General when he converted to Judaism and became Rabbi Lottman. Each witness tells a story that twists the previous one into strange and unrecognizable shapes, raising a a dozen questions for every real answer Quin gets.

It's a revealing and often dark look at Japan before and during the war, and includes a shockingly brutal account of the Japanese army's atrocities during the Rape of Nanking. Along with the brutality and grotesqueries, though, there is humor, humanity, and compassion.

I didn't like this book, but it is, nevertheless, a good book. It's a glimpse into another world, both the world of the book and the world in which it was written. It's not to my taste, but it is interesting and very well done.

Recommended with reservations; it's not for younger readers or very sensitive readers. Very much an adult read.

I received a free electronic galley of this book from the publisher via NetGalley.

Originally published in the 70s, Whittemore's works have been brought back into print by Old Earth Press, and I'm mighty glad they did. This is a huge, sprawling thicket of a novel, with action, espionage, atrocities, prostitution, pornography, and the oddest cast of characters you'll ever likely run across. Although the story is confusing at first, with each chapter you gain a new layer of understanding. By the end, Whittemore had left me breathless.

A tremenously crazy and unpredictable book. It's "over the top" most of the time, but in a good way. Whittemore's closest relative author-wise might be considered Tom Robbins, but his voice is quite unique. Just when you think he's just being funny, you realize he's in deadly earnest. Whittemore is a sadly neglected author.

I prefer _Quin's Shanghai Circus_ to this later book by Whittemore, but it's good too. Perhaps this one pushes "whacky" a bit too far for me.

There are two things you need to know about this novel.

It has no quotation marks.

It’s a spy’s novel, specifically a spy with a sense of drama.

And that’s what Whittemore was: an ex-CIA case officer who took up being a novelist.

The lack of quotation marks are a sign of the spy. Dialogue and personal statements aren’t any more privileged and accurate source of information than documents and personal observations. Sources lie, they misremember, they self-aggrandize, conveniently forget, or are double agents.

The drama comes in with Whittemore’s heavy use of foreshadowing, telling us what his characters don’t know, zooming back into history at the switch of a paragraph – to the Mongols, the late 19th century, and World War Two.

The plot starts with a mystery of motive and relationship. A clownish, fat man, given to constantly daubing horseradish under his nose, tries to get a massive collection of Japanese porn past the somewhat censorious U.S. customs officers of 1965. Failing that, he shows up at a bar, which just happens to share his last name, and tells a story to bartender Quin.

And, thus, we set off on a quest which is mostly about the revelation of hidden family relations, in turn tangled up with a Soviet intelligence operation in wartime Japan seemingly inspired, loosely, by Richard Sorge’s and Hozumi Ozaki’s activities.

Through it all we get misinterpretations, misunderstandings, deceptions and conceptions and a deceptive conception perpetrated by a priest of eidetic memory, a sadistic policeman, a whore of 10,000 customers, that fat man peddling fake pornographic movies, a Russian anarchist, a Kempeitai officer, an international mobster, a Japanese rabbi, and a not so innocent retarded man. And then there’s Quin’s father, proprietor of a circus of debauchery in Shanghai.

Grotesqueries and dark farces abound: the anus as dead drop; the image of Japanese prostitutes nullifying the influence of the foreign sailors swarming ashore at Japanese ports; a picnic of four gas-masked figures on a Japanese beach; the fat man magically echoing, at novel’s end, and the journey of the legendary monk Nichiren (predictor of the kamikaze that saved Japan from the Mongols).

And the real grotesquerie at the center is a three page, detailed listing of atrocities committed during the Japanese rape of Nanking during World War Two.

It’s a readable book, bizarre in its incidents. Those who like puzzles might enjoy figuring out the sexual and genetic relationships of the characters. It is part of one of the novel’s themes, the complexity of relationships. Other of Whittemore’s concerns, both very spyish, is understanding the order behind history’s chaos and how we can never be totally sure of each other’s past.

But it’s a book that, for me, fades from memory. Despite other’s claims that it is a secret history, it pales in presentation – if not colorful detail and setting – to others like Jake Arnott’s A House of Rumour or the fantastical secret histories of Tim Powers. It may indeed be a story of redemption for the fat man or a statement that history is fantasy, but, for me, it was a travelogue of curiosities and not empathetic engagement.

Even the rape of Nanking and the apocalyptic finale of Quin’s circus left me noting incidents and feeling little. I suppose, in the end, I approached a spy’s novel like a certain kind of spy – just passing through, noting the details, and not feeling much for the locals.

My reaction to reading this novel in 2004.

"Edward Whittemore (1933-1995)", Tom Wallace -- Wallace, a former Yale classmate of Whittemore, provides a biographical essay on the author. Wallace was Whittemore's early editor and, eventually, agent. Wallace speculates that Whittemore may have been a CIA agent longer than the official ten years he was with the agency. Wallace also mentions that Whittemore's Jerusalem Quartet is a worthy combining of his great-grandparents, one who was a minister and his wife, a popular author of the time of works for "shop girls".

"Edward Whittemore's Sinai Tapestry: An Introduction", Jay Neugeboren -- A brief description and criticism of the Jerusalem Quartet with particular emphasis on this novel. I got a little impatient at hearing how great the book was and just wanted to get to reading it. Does publisher Old Earth Books feel the need to have this extended advertisement because they're reprinting a series that did terrible, in terms of sales, when it was first published?

Sinai Tapestry, Edward Whittemore -- This is a picturesque novel with nothing much at the core. I enjoyed the characters quite a bit. There's the Richard Burton like Plantagenet Strongbow who, amongst many other things, writes a huge history 33 volume work called Levantine Sex which is suppressed by the British Government. (It is described as "preposterous and true and totally unacceptable". It proposes man is a beast who, in his thinking, will never be content with simple animal pleasures and that there is no order to the universe.) There's the millennia old Haj Harun who thinks he was appointed by King Melchizedek to be Jerusalem's protector. There is Stern, Strongbow's son, who wants, in Palestine a homeland for all adherents of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. There's Skanderberg Wallenstein who finds a bizarre Bible, the oldest ever discovered, which contradicts, in its bizarre melange, the beliefs of all three of those faiths, a Bible composed of tales told by a blind man to travelers around an oasis, tales written down by an idiot who added his own touches, a Bible hidden by Wallenstein but not destroyed -- instead he spends years in a cave forging another Bible to be found in its place. But despite all these touches and more, the novel presents a murky message and has nothing at its core. The Bible Wallenstein discovers is unexplained: do all three religions spring from it?, did it somehow anticipate them prophetically?, did its creators tap some Jungian space of archetypes? Whittemore, by the way, never really mentions any of these possibilities. But the stories of the three religions, the effects they had on the world, can't be written off as superstition. Even an atheist denying the supernatural has to believe that, at least in the case of Christianity and Islam, something dynamic and abrupt happened that shaped men's minds and became a force documented in secular history. This whole confusion of time as exemplified in the confusion of stories and figures. Whittemore does seem to know something about early versions of the Bible and their discovery and some of the parts of Wallenstein's Bible remind me of medieval tales mixing Alexander the Great ahistorically with all sorts of other figures. That confusion is mirrored, amusingly, in the occasional confusion of Harun's mind about what time he's living in. It also allows Whittemore, who spent a lot of time in Jerusalem, to drop in a lot of odd historical bits about the city. But nothing much comes of all the picturesque wonderings, via Wallenstein's Bible and Harun as well as the other characters with more traditional life histories. Stern dies in Cairo in 1942, his dream unrealized. I got the sense that a lot of the structure of the book was Whittemore leading up to what he thought would be the shocking atrocities committed by Turkish troops in Smyrna in 1922. While that part of the book was interesting in that I hadn't heard of the event before, it wasn't particularly shocking and didn't seem an adequate climax to the plot. Still, despite the plot weakness, the bizarre details and characters may keep me reading this series.

"An Editorial Relationship", Judy Karasik -- Karasik, one time lover and one time editor of Whittemore, talks about their relationship and Whittemore's last days as he died of cancer.

Il n'était pas comme nous. Non. Il est devenu un hakim (= sage en arabe) sur le tard. D'abord un lettré, puis ensuite un hakim."

Ce n'est pas un livre de science-fiction. C'est un livre trans-genre. Une hypothèse ceci dit: peut-être que les lecteurs de science-fiction sont plus habitués aux OVNI littéraires et prêts à entrer dans les aventures de l'écrit les plus folles. Quelques clés pour bien décrypter cette œuvre inclassable.

* Clef n°1: Strongbow, anglais excentrique, brillant élève de Cambridge, publiant Le Sexe levantin en 33 tomes ... ça me fait penser à quelqu'un mais qui ? Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890), renvoyé d'Oxford (et pourtant brillant intellectuellement), fan d'érotologie arabe et hindou (la première traduction non expurgée du Kama Sutra, c'est lui), arabisé et islamisé au point de faire le pèlerinage de La Mecque.

Ce serait trop simple que Strongbow ne renvoie qu'à Burton, Whittemore renvoie à d'autres figures célèbres du monde arabe, l'une m'est apparu à la page 87 lorsqu'il est fait allusion au soufi persan 'Attar. Tout de suite après, l'auteur compare l'oeuvre de Stongbow en 33 volumes à un hadj (cad un pélerinage) ... ça me fait penser à quelqu'un mais qui ? Ibn 'Arabi dont Les Illuminations de La Mecque est en 37 volumes et comparé à un hadj intérieur. L'épisode de Strongbow et la persane me fait penser à Majnun et Leïla (le Tristan et Iseult persan)

* Clef n°2: la Bible originaire. Evidement, l'idée de découvrir un nouveau texte d'une telle importance pourrait laisser sceptique. Cependant, on se rappelle que le 20ème siècle a été marqué par deux grandes découvertes de textes religieux: Qumran et Nag Hammadi. Que d'autres textes de nature religieuse ou philosophique se trouvent dans une grotte ou une bibliothèque privée quelque part dans le monde arabe n'est pas impossible. Le Codex du Sinaï joue à fond cette carte.

Quant à cette idée de Bible originaire, on la trouve aussi bien dans le judaïsme, le christianisme que l'islam. La kabbale distingue la torah originelle (celle d'avant l'adoration du veau d'or) et la torah actuelle. Gershom Scholem (pour prendre une référence universitaire) en parle mieux que moi dans plusieurs de ses ouvrages. Le Codex du Sinaï mentionne d'ailleurs le Zohar, grande référence de la Kabbale. L'Evangile (au singulier) est, d'après les gnostiques (appelés plus tard hérétiques par les chrétiens) différent des quatre évangiles canoniques. Quant à l'islam, il reprend à son compte l'accusation faite aux juifs et eux chrétiens d'avoir substitué une fausse torah et un faux évangile (pour les plus radicaux) ou du moins, d'avoir altéré, certains passages (ceux annoncant la venue du prophète Mahomet, qui serait en fait le nom qu'il faudrait lire derrière le "paraclet"). Texte sacré et falsification, le moyen orient est plein de ce type de spéculations.

* Clef n°3: les figures intemporelles. Il y a d'abord Melchisédech. Quand il apparaît dans la Genèse, on ne sait rien de lui (d'où vient-il ? Qui est-il ?), il est là avant Abraham. C'est une figure originaire qui précède les trois monothéismes et qui symbolise un peu le rêve de l'auteur de sortir des querelles de texte. On retrouve cette intemporalité avec le prêtre Jean (allusion au judéo-christianisme, cette fragile époque où chrétiens et juifs étaient unis ? L'Eglise de Jérusalem était dirigé par Jacques le Juste, ceci dit Jean représente le versant mystique du christianisme, le côté le plus ouvert), l'antiquaire qui est peut-être là depuis le début de Jérusalem (ne serait-ce pas Melchisédech ?). Au fond, Whittemore nous montre un Orient dont les question séculaires n'ont pas pris une ride. Les politiques européennes qui viennent tenter leur chance en Orient rajoutent un problème mais ne sont qu'une péripétie, une parenthèse face à de telles questions.

Bon, je m'arrête là. Mon intention n'est pas de toute façon de faire étalage de ma science mais surtout de montrer que ce premier livre de Whittemore est plus profond que ne le laisserait croire son anodine publication chez Ailleurs et demain (merci à Gérard Klein pour ce courage éditorial !), une collection de SF, et qu'il est écrit par quelqu'un qui connaît bien le monde oriental et qui en maîtrise les grands classiques. Là où c'est plus fort encore c'est que bien entendu, il n'y a nul besoin de connaître toutes les sources auxquelles l'auteur a puisé; l'auteur s'en est inspiré pour nous recréer un orient bien à lui et il n'y a qu'à se laisser porter. Chapeau.

Het Jeruzalemkwartet behoort tot het meest monumentale dat ooit op het lezerspubliek is losgelaten. Het is geschiedenis verpakt in een spionageroman, heeft een ongekende rijkheid aan personages en verschuift in de loop van het kwartet van extravagant naar ingetogen. Het vraagt aandacht en ietwat van uithoudingsvermogen, maar de beloning volgt. Jericho mozaïek is een meer dan waardige afsluiter van een memorabel kwartet.
Volledige bespreking via http://wraakvandedodo.blogspot.be/2012/09/edward-whittemore-jericho-mozaiek.html

Ah yes, thought bell, races & wars and caravans of believers and seas, with their armies of chance and their games of skill... all come to meet in a orange grove at the crossroads of Jericho

Inspired by true events, this centres on the one Mossad agent who gives up everything to spend his years buried deep within Syria. A pivotal role in the taking of Golan heights and the birth of Israel as we know it today. Although being Edward Whittemore it is also much more than that, the theme of threes continues with each religion represented in the beautiful town of Jericho where old men (a Moslem, Jew and Christian of course!) meet daily for board games and chat. Life flows around them and characters touch, fleetingly but with great impact.

Less dark than the last but with the current future hanging over the scene we know there no happy ending. Still it’s bitter-sweet and cleverly mixes an overarching tense espionage plot with a feel of purely reminiscing of a past eventful life, of what will be will be. Its tone very much showing this is the last book in series. The characters are of course full and many and varied, the plot has more focus then before and passed fast so this feels the shortest one of series even though it’s not.

One word that sums it up is satisfying, a good end to an astounding series. It could easily be read alone and enjoyed but would lose that peaceful finality. More accessible than the others so recommended to lovers of historical fiction, those interested in middle east history. For those seeking chaos try the 2nd book.

Just here in the shadows in the strong quiet sounds of their being.. Nile shadows after all, the shadows of the world raging. But those strong quiet echoes of the river are within us too, thank God, going right on and never to be still..

Egypt during WW1, with Germany fast encroaching is a place full of spies. A chaotic whirlwind of double dealing and confusion. In amongst them is the Monastery, headquarters of the secret, secret British service, where the tough decisions are made, where the most secretive espionage is done. Brought into this mix is the garrulous Irish Man of Jerusalem Poker, his task to find out the truth of Stern. A double, triple agent? Fighting for peace, but whose? And at what cost?

This, I think is the most difficult book of all the Quartet. Not just, because in stark contrast to the previous books it so very dark but because it’s filled with dialogue. Action is light and happens between the lengthy conversations as characters bleed their life story onto the page. It's worth hanging on though, the payoff is good, all that listening has drawn you into the tragedy unfolding (Don’t worry no spoiler it starts at the end). I say good, I admit I was in tears and unlike before there is no obvious truth here to comfort, well apart from that, life is murky after all.

It’s a powerful book and I don’t recommend starting here. If it doesn’t sound like you, you can probably skip to the last book but it would be a shame, it’s a intense book, but a good one.

"Revolution, said Stern. We can't even comprehend what it is, not what it means or what it suggests. We pretend it means total change but it's much more than that, so vastly more complex, and yes, so much simpler too. It's not just the total change from night to day as our earth spins in its revolutions around a minor star. It's also our little star revolving around its own unknowable center and so with all the stars in their billions, and so with the galaxies and the universe itself. Change revolves and truly there is nothing but revolution. All movement is revolution and so is time, and although those laws are impossibly complex and beyond us, their result is simple. For us, very simple. Relentlessly plunging Jerusalem into its greatest turmoil since the First Crusade." ½

"…..Mummy dust. Trading in futures, Religious symbols.
With that kind of backing, the three men seemed unbeatable. Year after year, they stripped visitors to Jerusalem of all they owned, bewildered emirs and European smugglers and feuding sheikhs, devout priests and assorted commercial agents and pious fanatics, every manner of pilgrim in that vast dreaming army from many lands that had always been scaling the heights of the Holy City, in search of spiritual gold, Martyr and Szondi and O'Sullivan Beare implacably dealing and shuffling and dealing again"

2nd in the quartet and a nice place to start. A place where harsh surrealness(?) meets whimsical reality. Where a 12 year poker game is played for the control of Jerusalem and an insane millionaire alchemist who tries to destroy them destroy what?. Or it’s a story of three (four?) lives, unreliable narrators all.

For the characters at first loom larger than life before we scratch underneath and find them unerringly human before the heroism bleeds back in and it goes full circle. Myths and legends deserving of the sweep history from the garrulous, gun running Irish man, saved by the dancing baking priest to Harun defender of Jerusalem for 3,000 years, wearing his rusty helmet and tattered cloak living in the slipstream of memory or maybe just insanity. It doesn’t matter much which, there is a different truth here.

Of all the four it has most contrast and I think therefore most interesting. It has the myth but also heavy history and these play on each other wonderfully. Whittemore really draws you in to care about the characters. It’s not perfect in a reread, I guess because the tension of who wins the poker game is lost, but the 1st time I was blown away.

So just be prepared to relax and enjoy the ride, as he does wander off track. It's a brilliant, utterly unique book and if you go in open minded it might just break your heart.

Highly recommended.½

http://nwhyte.livejournal.com/1501027.html

It's a rather pale reflection of Illuminatus! and Midnight's Children, set in and around the Holy Land (the original, not the district in South Belfast) in the early 20th century. Extra coloration of various characters' background is brought in from Cambridge University, Albania and Ireland, none of it very convincing in detail (bad luck I suppose that I know all three of those locations reasonably well). The main strand of a confused plot concerns an ancient Biblical manuscript which supposedly disproves everything in both Old and New Testaments. (*rolls eyes*) The writing is not as funny as the author obviously thinks it is. It filled out the spaces for me while travelling and that is the best I can say for it.½

A strange and memorable book. A series of haunting puzzle pieces--some beautiful, some brutal, most of them sad--told in a lucid, readable prose style far clearer than the story it relates. If I read this book again, I will start making a diagram at the beginning showing how all the characters and incidents connect to each other. I'm sure I missed a lot - but I'm not completely sure I want to go on this ride again.

1st book in the Jerusalem quartet. Great boo. Great characters whose lives intertwine with each other weaving a fine tapestry.

A great book. Should really be condidered a prolouge of the Jerusalem Quartet. A true tapestry of a novel½

Of the 5 Whittemore books this one is the best. It is an amazing book and 1 of my all time favorites.

*note to self.copy from Al.

*note to self.copy from Al.