The Tel Aviv Dossier
One day, in the city of Tel Aviv, an event transpired that was beyond the forces of nature. Reports were sketchy, but everyone agreed that something enormous had taken root, pushing the city outward and upward, its new slopes harbouring 'giant, shapeless forms . . . with a kind of ancient, patient gait . . . like caged animals who had been let out at long last.' At least that's what Lavie Tidhar and Nir Yaniv would have the reader accept. Mingling traditional narrative styles, different points of view, apocryphal testimony, and podcast transcripts, the two authors have constructed a novel that is alternately cryptic, frustrating. baffling, and engrossing. The Tel Aviv Dossier attempts nothing less than the creation of a new literary mythology, and while it falls short, the venture is nevertheless worthy of consideration. The authors keep the reader off balance throughout, tossing around allusions to messiahs, religious conflicts, and otherworldly beings. Whatever has happened to Tel Aviv is beyond easy comprehension, and as survivors come to grips with their new reality they start inventing new legends. The authors continually shift the narrative perspective, eventually pulling out all the metafictional stops as a character in the second half of the book finds himself reading the very accounts that make up the first half. As the novel progresses, patterns emerge, and there is a hint that what the reader holds may very well be the Bible of a new age. It's an audacious conceit, and Tidhar and Yaniv are strong enough to keep the story readable even when it befuddles. Much of The Tel Aviv Dossier is exasperatingly oblique, and as a whole it feels rushed and incomplete. One wishes the authors had taken the time to flesh out events in greater detail. The Tel Aviv Dossier is an imperfect little beast, but in its pages lie the seeds of originality and passion. If Tidhar and Yaniv ever see fit to expand upon their new religion, the outcome is sure to be interesting. -----Cory Redekop, Quill & QuireThe Tel Aviv Dossier has to be the most enjoyably bizarre novel I've read. The authors, Lavie Tidhar and Nir Yaniv. have woven a complex story of catastrophic destruction, psychotic characters and religio-political apocalypse (in both senses of the word) into a story that never ceases to amaze and confound from page to page. The first half of the book is presented as a dossier of first-hand accounts of the destruction of Tel Aviv by seemingly sentient tornados. These are a mixture of letters, emails, audio and video transcripts that quickly build up a picture of the chaos and carnage that are unfolding. You do need to concentrate as a large number of characters are introduced briefly only to disappear from the narrative. These include a deranged fireman, a young orthodox Jew undergoing a crisis of faith, a tourist, a ufologist and a disembodied head. The impression was similar to the film 'Cloverfield' - quite disjointed and jarring, no real idea of what's going on, but overall very effective. By the end of this section, my head was spinning. With Tel Aviv isolated from the rest of Israel, two characters now head in to the city to investigate and the narrative takes on a more traditional form. Sam is a member of the Israeli secret service and Mordechai a historian with dubious credentials. As they separately head deeper into the carnage the earlier narrative threads begin to come together and then things start to really get weird. I don't really know how to describe this book. It defies both categorisation and comparison. If you want a unique reading experience then treat yourself to a copy of The Tel Aviv Dossier. -----Gareth D. Jones, SFCrowsNestIf you are looking for something different and unusual, this book is it. --- --42SciFi-Fantasy.comThe Tel Aviv Dossier has to be the most enjoyably bizarre novel I've read. The authors, Lavie Tidhar and Nir Yaniv. have woven a complex story of catastrophic destruction, psychotic characters and religio-political apocalypse (in both senses of the word) into a story that never ceases to amaze and confound from page to page. The first half of the book is presented as a dossier of first-hand accounts of the destruction of Tel Aviv by seemingly sentient tornados. These are a mixture of letters, emails, audio and video transcripts that quickly build up a picture of the chaos and carnage that are unfolding. You do need to concentrate as a large number of characters are introduced briefly only to disappear from the narrative. These include a deranged fireman, a young orthodox Jew undergoing a crisis of faith, a tourist, a ufologist and a disembodied head. The impression was similar to the film 'Cloverfield' - quite disjointed and jarring, no real idea of what's going on, but overall very effective. By the end of this section, my head was spinning. With Tel Aviv isolated from the rest of Israel, two characters now head in to the city to investigate and the narrative takes on a more traditional form. Sam is a member of the Israeli secret service and Mordechai a historian with dubious credentials. As they separately head deeper into the carnage the earlier narrative threads begin to come together and then things start to really get weird. I don't really know how to describe this book. It defies both categorisation and comparison. If you want a unique reading experience then treat yourself to a copy of The Tel Aviv Dossier. -----Gareth D. Jones, SFCrowsNestIf you are looking for something different and unusual, this book is it. -----42SciFi-Fantasy.com