Novel: A City Forsaken
(Keter Publishing House, Hebrew, 2016)
Back cover (translated from Hebrew)
What do Jerusalemites hate about Jerusalem? Everything the city has to offer. They hate the garbage that invades their lives, as if it spawns from within the cracks. They hate the light that reveals every pore of filth, the drunks who like lizards rest on the curbs of the sidewalk. The beggars of Jerusalem they hate, the gaggling tourists who infuriate their senses. They hate the noise, the screaming, the madness bubbling up over the rim.
They hate the public servants, the rabbis, the philanthropists, the greedy contractors. They hate when people say that Jerusalem is the nucleus of the world, they hate the world, cause they want to remain alone, just them and the city, like a leper with his disease, to stay only with the city, to die with the city.
Three young men and a woman wander through Jerusalem, a city in which it is forbidden to look up at the sky. Street fights break out between rival cults, a red heifer cow saunters through the alleyways, garbage trucks zip around without stopping and a mysterious, naked motorcycle driver spreads fear amongst the religious inhabitants.
A City Forsaken is a dizzying novel that plays between realism and fantasy, love and hate, a dark reflection of this place and time.
If I forget thee o Jerusalem (Haaretz article, translated to English)