Ten Thousand Lovers: A Novel
The personal and the political are forever struggling to coexist, especially in Israel. Such is the case in this moving first novel about two lovers in Tel Aviv in the 1970s. Lilly is a young Canadian studying in Israel; Ami is a handsome former actor, the perfect boyfriend except for one flaw: he is an army interrogator. Ravel tells the tale in flashbacks, jumping between the past, as Ami becomes more and more disenchanted with the treatment of the Arab prisoners he must interrogate, and the present, as Lily, now a professor, remembers her first love. By setting the action at a time when the Israeli occupation of Palestinian lands was in its first stage, Raveet adds an extra level of poignancy. Lily and her college friends anticipate peace, while Ami, seeing the hatred from both sides, is less sanguine. The tragedy here is both anticipated and inevitable, but the textured personal story rises above its political context like a melody soaring beyond the steady rhythm pulsing below it.Ilene CooperCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved