Prizes and Awards:
Amazon.ca/Books in Canada
First Novel Award Shortlist 2003
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Product Details
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Product Description
Amazon.ca
If you want to read one novel that captures the difficulty of living under a veil of terror, read Edeet Ravel's Ten Thousand Lovers. This mesmerizing love story opens in Jerusalem in the 1970s, where Lily, an Israeli-Canadian linguistics student, is trying to hitchhike to Tel Aviv. Ami, a handsome army interrogator, picks her up and they soon fall in love, but maintaining their happiness in a country constantly on the verge of war is no simple feat. After all, as Ami warns, "this is a land that devours its inhabitants." Nevertheless, they attempt to spin a cocoon of happiness for themselves and their idealistic group of friends, who represent the various aspects of Israeli society, including an Arab named Ibrahim and his Mennonite girlfriend Mary Jo. Lily becomes pregnant and she and Ami marry, but Ami's warning--and his profession--return to haunt them.
Writing in a style both matter-of-fact and vulnerable, Ravel heartbreakingly illustrates the futility of striving for normalcy in a country gone mad. Looking for perspective on the crisis, in which the politics debated by the characters have hardly changed in 35 years, Lily constantly refers to the etymology of Hebrew words. She shows how even the erotic language of the ancient "Song of Songs" has been transformed into the words of violence: "grenade" stems from "pomegranate" and "terrorist" evolved from "spoil." The name of Lily's lover has a similarly complicated history: "The word am means nation, and ami means 'my nation,' but Ami's mother liked the name because she was French. Actually, the French world for friend, ami, is close to a Hebrew word for friend, amit, and Ami was almost called Amit, but a nurse at the hospital made a mistake and wrote Ami on all the documents." True to his name, Ami is symbolic of many in the nation, torn between his love for his country and his conscience. Ami is highly complex and endearing character, and his and Lily's love story will not be easily forgotten. --Leah Eichler
Books in Canada
Ten Thousand Lovers, by Edeet Ravel, tells the story of a young Canadian woman, Lily, who while studying in Israel in the 1970s meets and falls in love with a handsome and charming Israeli man a few years older and a thousand times more worldly. Ami is a former actor, well loved by his friends, so obviously he has a terrible secret. He is an interrogator for the Israeli army. He is not a soldier but a freelancer; the army makes an exception for him because he is so successful at what he does. He is able to extract information from prisoners through charm and finesse, whereas his colleagues are less successful using violence and torture. He is, of course, distrusted by his colleagues and even his superiors have doubts about him. Ami tries very hard to keep his two lives separate, but as his relationship with Lily becomes more serious he makes plans to find a new occupation. That proves easier said than done. He has been involved in top secret work, and the army is not about to let him go. Ami has a mother who is confined to a mental hospital; she abandoned reality after two of Ami's brothers died within a week of one another. The story begins in the 1990s in London where Lily is visited by her 20-year-old daughter who is studying dance in Belgium, and flashes back to her meeting and romance with Ami 20 years earlier. Throughout the book there are a series of mini lectures on the derivation of Hebrew and English words, which were of mild interest at the time, and I find that a week later I remember only one: Long ago in the Golan Heights there lived a group of thieves and murderers who toked up on hashish before going out on their raids. From hashish comes the word assassin. Ami has a mini breakdown as he repeatedly tries to sever ties with the army. The premise of the novel can be summed by a quote from Hendrik Hertzberg: "...torture is abhorrent not only for what it does to the tortured but for what it makes of the torturer." The writing is powerful and the sense of impending tragedy is ever present. A strong and compelling debut.
W.P. Kinsella (Books in Canada)
W.P. Kinsella (Books in Canada)
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Customer Reviews
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Most helpful customer reviews
11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Ten Thousand Lovers,
By victoria schmid (Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Ten Thousand Lovers (Hardcover)
Ten Thousand Lovers is an excellent book and I would recommend anyone interested in culture or love or the struggles of life to pick it up. Ravel is able to take the reader to the exact point of her narration and she pours her heart and soul into the pages of her work. The reader is given a better understanding of Israel and a culture that is so foreign to most of us while at the same time we feel as if we are part of the story that is unfolding around us. Ravel was able to make me laugh and cry as I turned the pages of this generous book and I was unable to put it down until I had finished it completely. I have already bought my own copy and am pushing it on all my friends.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Ten Thousand Lovers by Edeet Ravel.,
By Meg (Ottawa, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Ten Thousand Lovers (Paperback)
Set in the seventies, the novel demonstrates the political landscape of the newly formed Israel, through its citizens and their personal and professional lives. They are constantly coping, separating/distancing themselves, waiting for disaster. With the title, Ravel reminds the reader to look beyond the central story. This is the story of one lover, but also ten thousand lovers. It is the story of one couple, but thousands of couples feel this way. In a country that encourages distance for protection, the love of Ami and Lily is bound through intimacy and closeness with each other and with the land. A very good read -- hard to put down. I cried!
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Ten Thousand Lovers,
By autumnrose (Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Ten Thousand Lovers (Paperback)
This was a sad but interesting book. I totally love the cover. I also like how there is a lot of information about the languages of the Middle East.
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