Category: Reading the World

Reading the World Challenge – Israel

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I’ve finished my first country and while it took a little longer than I anticipated I feel like I’m off to a great start. My nonfiction book was written by an Arab born and raised in Israel and the novel’s main storyline was the prejudice against migrants with many chapters coming from her perspective. So, I liked that both books helped me see Israel from the eyes of someone not in the majority.

Nonfiction

Around the World in 60 Seconds: The Nas Daily Journey-1,000 Days, 64 Countries, 1 Beautiful Planet by Nuseir Yassin with Bruce Kluger, 2019, 272 pages

My review is here.

Fiction

Waking Lions by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen, translated from Hebrew by Sondra Silverston, 409 pages, 2013

My review is here.

My goal is to read a fiction and nonfiction book set in and written by someone who was born in that country. As recommendations have trickled in I realized that it’s the ‘born in that country’ part that is going to make some books not work. I’m excluding the immigrant experience. It wasn’t my intent, I just didn’t really think it through in those terms. I’m not going to change the rules at this point. Maybe I’ll do a spin off challenge for that.

That being said here are three books I’ve read and liked in the last few years that were set in Israel, but not written by someone born there.

Too Far From Home by Naomi Shmuel – a children’s book about a girl who was born in Israel to two immigrant parents. A good book about prejudice and belonging. 4 stars

Dawn by Elie Wiesel – This is the second in the Night trilogy and a profound look at the evil of war. 5 stars

How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less by Sarah Glidden – A graphic memoir by a New Yorker taking her 10 day Birthright trip to Israel. 3.75 stars

Reading the World Challenge – Israel

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ISRAEL Fiction

Waking Lions by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen, translated from Hebrew by Sondra Silverston, 409 pages, 2013

How I found, chose this book-It chose me. I ran across this book while I was cleaning up our spring book sale and the cover spoke to me.

I finally finished my fiction read from Israel and it was a gritty, moral look at the prejudice one can have against refugees in any country. It’s dense and slow moving, but it does pack a punch.

Dr. Etian Green hits a black migrant on his drive home from a long shift at an Israeli hospital. Even a doctor couldn’t save the man and so begins the moral crisis for this husband, father, and healer. When he is blackmailed by the man’s widow Etian’s whole life begins to spiral.

It felt like a quiet book because there wasn’t a lot of dialogue. What I got instead was a front row seat to the inner minds of Etian, his wife, and the beautiful widow. Fascinating. Etian goes from dislike of the refugees to understanding their plight in his country.

The writing was beautiful. The story was thoughtful and somewhat suspenseful. But I had zero problem putting this down until about 3/4 of the way through, when it picked up and I stayed up late to finish it. So, it’s a good book, but not one you’ll breeze through. And it’s the better for it.

And that cover? Gorgeous.

A few examples of the writing…

“However much he wanted to feel compassion for them, he couldn’t help recoiling from them. Not only from their smell and bodily fluids but also from their faces-alien, staring, filled with undying gratitude. He didn’t speak their language, and they didn’t speak his, so they communicated with waving hands and facial expressions.” p. 54

“A thin man reached out for a handshake, and Eitan shook his head, thinking that somewhere along the way, his empathy button had stopped functioning. He should have felt something. Kindness. Compassion. The responsibility of one human being for another. Not only toward this man standing here and shaking his hand emotionally while he himself was only waiting for him to stop. He hadn’t felt anything for the man on the ground with his head split open either. Or perhaps he had felt something but not the right something. Not what he should have felt.” p.75

“But Eitan knew he had never been more awake. And, appalled, he realized that at that moment, at that specific moment, he was prepared to set the whole house on fire.” p.208

“It would be his fault. Because he hadn’t taken good enough care of his family, and families are fragile things.” p.227

Reading the World Challenge – Israel

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ISRAEL nonfiction

Around the World in 60 Seconds: The Nas Daily Journey-1,000 Days, 64 Countries, 1 Beautiful Planet by Nuseir Yassin with Bruce Kluger, 2019, 272 pages

How I found it- Gage and watched some of the Nas Daily videos during our homeschooling days and I snatched this up when I saw it in Michigan bookstore. It’s been sitting on my shelves ever since just waiting for this challenge.

About the author- Nuseir grew up an Arrabas, an Arab city in Israel. It’s a middle class small to middling size city where he stayed until a visit to Ohio when he was 19. After graduating from Harvard and working for Venmo for a few years his idea for this epic adventure became a reality.

Nuseir, or Nas, decided to travel around the world and post a 60 second video of wherever he was in the world EVERY DAY for 1,000 days! He mentioned from the beginning that because he was an Israeli with an Israeli passport he was prohibited from going to a majority of the Arab world. Even though he was Arab. Right at the beginning he talked about money, politics, and religion so he could get them out of the way. He didn’t want his videos to be about any of that, he wanted to bring people together. And they did! I was amazed that he was able to acquire such a worldwide following as he traveled. He started doing meetups where he’d arrive in a country and tell his viewers where he’d be and when and people would show up. Amazing.

I was impressed with the introspective way he did talk about religion and politics. While it did come up in different places for the most part, it was kept to a minimum. The one strictly religious experience with a Jewish brother and sister who confronted him in Jerusalem was shocking to me, but given the current climate maybe it shouldn’t have been. There were countries, like Senegal, where he highlighted that all religions lived side by side and there was nothing but love.

The book doesn’t follow his journey from beginning to end, rather he groups countries and people by categories like Fun & Adventure, Getting Personal, Conflict, and Humanity. I loved getting to read about his preconceived ideas versus what he found when he got there. I loved so many of the stories, even the one that didn’t end well. I learned about new countries like Seychenelles gained some insight into countries I’ve always wanted to visit.

This was the perfect book to begin this challenge. There are lots of pictures and the book is well laid out and colorful, but the stories are the main draw. It gives me hope for our planet. I love it!!!

And where did he end up after traveling the world? He now calls Singapore home.

Reading the World Challenge

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I’m back! I’ve been unable to use my blog for weeks but think everything is okay now. Bloggers know how frustrating this can be. I haven’t used my blog as much as Instagram these past few years because I wasn’t able to use my own photos. I still haven’t entirely fixed that problem but did manage to get this one on here so there is hope.

On September 1st I embarked on a new challenge. I’m calling it Reading the World and I’m going to attempt to read a fiction AND nonfiction book from every country in the world.

I’ve been toying with the idea for a few years and finding a few people attempting to read one book from each country on Instagram gave me the push I needed. I’m going to use the current UN list of 193 countries, but am opening to reading the territories too if books are recommended, but it’s not a priority.

I need your help! The rule (made this up myself) is that the author must be from the country and the book must be set in the country. There’s wiggle room for sci-fi or fantasy where the setting is fluid. Please recommend favorite books! I combed my shelves and pulled out this stack, once I have one fiction and one nonfiction from a county it gets read. The only one I had to start was Israel, so I’m currently reading there.

Send me any recommendations and especially these since I already have one book. I need nonfiction books for these countries. I’m partial to memoirs, but anything is fine.
Canada, Afghanistan, Japan, Poland, Nigeria, Sweden, S Korea, Trinidad &Tobago. I need fiction options from Sierra Leone and Pakistan. I’m open to kids books too, sometimes those are my favorites!

I’ll be on here more since I’ll be tracking my progress. I’m excited for this challenge and excited to blog more. I’ve missed it.