A Strange Death: A Story Originating in Espionage, Betrayal, and Vengeance in a Village in Old Palestine - Hardcover

Halkin, Hillel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1586482718 ISBN 13: 9781586482718

Publisher: PublicAffairs, 2005

Synopsis

In 1917, the members of a spy ring who sought to assist the British in driving the Turks from Palestine were betrayed. Two were hanged; one, the iconically beautiful Sarah Aaronsohn, shot herself to escape torture and died a lingering death four days later. It was said that four of the women of the town of Zichron were seen laughing hysterically as the arrests of their neighbors were carried out. Each met a strange fate: one died prematurely, the second went mad, the third was an invalid and the fourth lived out her life in disrepute.

When Hillel Halkin read this story of the village that he lived in, it inspired him to begin a journey into the past. His friends and neighbors each offered a different version of the events of 1917, and Halkin discovered that each of them was in some way affected by the legendary fate of the spy ring. So he began to dig: into the stories, the artifacts and debris of the town, in which he found beguiling traces of events that had taken place half a century earlier. Most of all, Halkin listened to the village's storytellers, of whom none is more expansive than Yanko Epstein, who runs the town museum. Yet even Epstein, for all his love of a good yarn, proves to have a jaw like a steel trap when confronted with aspects of the ancient betrayal.

A journey into the place where history and legend overlap, a murder mystery, a lyrical evocation of the doomed attempt to build a Languedoc town on the Eastern Shores of the Mediterranean, a deft investigation into the betrayal of idealism — A Strange Death is all of these.

About this title

About the Author

Hillel Halkin is a writer, translator, and columnist for the Jerusalem Post, Commentary, and the New York Sun. He lives in Zichron Ya'aka.

Review

"A superb measure of lyricism mixed with suspense. Read it and you will be enriched." -- Elie Wiesel

"An absolute knockout of a book for anyone who has been to or is going to Israel." -- Robert Littell, author of The Company and The Amateur

"An artful treatment of history worthy of the highest praise." -- A. B. Yehoshua, author of The Liberated Bride and A Journey to the End of the Millennium

"An important addition to the work of questioning and re-reading the history of Palestine and the Middle East." -- Diana Abu Jaber, author of Arabian Jazz and Crescent

"In probing the mystery, Halkin uses the tools of an expert novelist and a skilled investigative journalist." -- Booklist, April 1, 2005

"Vivid, almost poetic prose...Halkin is, among other things, a first-rate detective...An extraordinary achievement." -- Washington Times, June 19, 2005

"Will provide any reader with the pleasure of high entertainment played out against a background of unending historical interest." -- Commentary, June 1, 2005

"[Halkin is] also a terrific investigator-narrator-tour guide. It's a difficult combination to resist." -- New York Post, June 5, 2005

A[n] entertaining book...full of flamboyant figures, sparkling conversation, snappy wit, lyrical description...autobiography, history, counter-histories...bobbe meises, and almost mythical incidents... -- The Jerusalem Report, September 19, 2005

Stunning... It is hard to imagine a more beautiful and evocative piece of writing about Palestine under the Ottoman Turks. -- New York Sun, June 1, 2005

About this edition

• Publisher: PublicAffairs
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 1586482718
• ISBN 13: 9781586482718
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 388