Staff Pick
This is an extraordinary history of a Jewish prayer book. As an archivist is repairing the book, she finds unexpected things in the binding: a granule of salt, a wine stain, a fragment of a butterfly wing. As she discovers these items, the reader sees the story of their introduction into the book. Unlike anything I've ever read, the images in this book are sharp and sometimes unbearable. Despite the horror, this is an amazing, beautiful, fabulous book. When my store asked its employees for their three best books of the decade, it was one of my picks. I cannot recommend it highly enough. Recommended By Dianah H., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
The "complex and moving" (
The New Yorker) novel by Pulitzer Prize-winner Geraldine Brooks follows a rare manuscript through centuries of exile and war.
Inspired by a true story, People of the Book is a novel of sweeping historical grandeur and intimate emotional intensity by an acclaimed and beloved author. Called "a tour de force" by the San Francisco Chronicle, this ambitious, electrifying work traces the harrowing journey of the famed Sarajevo Haggadah, a beautifully illuminated Hebrew manuscript created in fifteenth-century Spain. When it falls to Hanna Heath, an Australian rare-book expert, to conserve this priceless work, the series of tiny artifacts she discovers in its ancient bindingaan insect wing fragment, wine stains, salt crystals, a white hairaonly begin to unlock its deep mysteries and unexpectedly plunges Hanna into the intrigues of fine art forgers and ultra-nationalist fanatics.
Review
"[A]n ingenuity equal to that standing behind her Pultizer Prize-winning March....[A] marvelously evocative journey backward in time." Booklist (Starred Review)
Review
"[A]n enthralling historical mystery....Rich suspense based on a true-life literary puzzle, from the Pulitzer Prize-winning Brooks." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"Each story is engrossing and deftly woven into the narrative, though the telling is sometimes facile or cloying. Nevertheless, this latest from Pulitzer Prize winner Brooks is a good addition to most libraries and excellent for discussion groups." Library Journal
Review
"Brooks demonstrates a gift for balancing research with a command of pacing and plot....Geraldine Brooks has...half-found and half-invented a swashbuckling book and, despite occasional quirks, woven a tale that's haunting and satisfying." The Los Angeles Times
Review
"[A] sprawling historical work equal parts CSI, period piece and romance-among-the-ruins....This is exciting stuff...and Brooks does a good job moving the plot along....[A]n ambitious book, a pleasure to read, and wholly successful." Minneapolis Star Tribune
Review
"[I]ntense, gripping...a tour de force that delivers a reverberating lesson gleaned from history....In writing an immensely readable novel that fleshes out gaps in the historical record, Brooks has extended the reach of a story that bears recounting." San Francisco Chronicle
Synopsis
In 1996, Hanna Heath, an Australian rare-book expert, is offered the job of a lifetime: analysis and conservation of the famous Sarajevo Haggadah, which was rescued during the Bosnian war. Priceless and beautiful, the book is one of the earliest Jewish volumes ever to be illuminated with images. When Hanna discovers a series of tiny artifacts in the book's ancient binding, she begins to unlock its mysteries, tracing the book's journey from its salvation back to its creation. In Bosnia during WW II, a Muslim risks his life to protect the book from the Nazis. In the hedonistic salons of Vienna, the book becomes a pawn in a struggle against the city's rising anti-Semitism. In Inquisition-era Venice, a Catholic priest saves it. Hanna's investigation unexpectedly plunges her into the intrigues of art forgers and ultra-nationalist fanatics.
Synopsis
The bestselling novel thatfollows a rare manuscript through centuries of exile and war, from the author ofThe Secret Chord and of March, winner of the Pulitzer Prize.
Inspired by a true story, People of the Book is a novel of sweeping historical grandeur and intimate emotional intensity by an acclaimed and beloved author. Called "a tour de force"by the San Francisco Chronicle, this ambitious, electrifying work traces the harrowing journey of the famed Sarajevo Haggadah, a beautifully illuminated Hebrew manuscript created in fifteenth-century Spain. When it falls to Hanna Heath, an Australian rare-book expert, to conserve this priceless work, the series of tiny artifacts she discovers in its ancient binding-an insect wing fragment, wine stains, salt crystals, a white hair-only begin to unlock its deep mysteries and unexpectedly plunges Hanna into the intrigues of fine art forgers and ultra-nationalist fanatics."
About the Author
Geraldine Brooks is the author of March, the recipient of the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in Fiction. She is also the author of Year of Wonders, Nine Parts of Desire, and Foreign Correspondence. Previously, Brooks was a correspondent for the Wall Street Journal in Bosnia, Somalia, and the Middle East. She lives with her husband, the author Tony Horwitz, and their son.