Exile

Exile
by Richard North Patterson

Exile
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Book Summary Information

Author: Richard North Patterson
Reader: Dennis Boutsikaris
Edition: Music CD
Audio: English (Published)
Format: Bargain Price
Published: 2007-01-09
ISBN: N/A
Publisher: Macmillan Audio

Book Reviews of Exile

Book Review: Contrived and Overlong
Summary: 3 Stars

This is the textbook definition of a contrived plot: Jewish lawyer has an affair with Palestinian woman in law school. Years later, she's accused of assassinating the Israeli Prime Minister. Jewish lawyer, still in love with her, risks all to defend his old girlfriend. Will he prevail, against all odds? What do you think?

The first half of this book is as good as Richard North Patterson gets. His prose is never luminous but doesn't get in the way (although there are one or two brief sex scenes that are, to put it politely, embarrassing). Halfway through the book, the hero lawyer must go to the Middle East on a fact-finding tour, and the story slows to become an earnest travelogue, with very little advancing the plot.

Then the story returns to the U.S. for the climactic trial, which results in about 200 pages of detailed recapping of what we already know. The solution is painfully obvious and there is no suspense as to how the story will end. With vapid characters and no real tension to the story, Patterson's bland, intrusive writing style becomes increasingly annoying, especially after 700+ pages.

However, I have to give him credit for bravely attempting to portray the conflict in the Middle East from several different angles. He makes clear that there are more than two sides; there may be six or seven, or even more, and Patterson strives to present them all. If you've followed events in the Middle East closely, however, you won't learn anything you don't already know.

I skimmed the last 200 pages because it was so repetitious and obvious, but if he'd managed to maintain the pace of the first half, this might have been an excellent book.

Summary of Exile

David Wolfe's life is approaching an exhilarating peak: a successful San Francisco lawyer, he's about to get married and has been primed for a run for Congress. But when the phone rings and he hears the voice of Hana Arif-the Palestinian woman with whom he had a passionate affair in law school-he begins a completely unexpected journey. The day after Hana's call, the Prime Minister of Israel is assassinated by a suicide bomber; soon, Hana herself is accused of being the mastermind behind the murder. Now David must make an agonizing decision: Will he, a Jew, represent Hana-who may well be guilty-or will he turn away a woman he can never forget????????
?
Ultimately David's guest takes him to Israel and the West Bank, where, in a series of harrowing encounters, he learns that appearances are not at all what they seem. Culminating in a tense and startling trial with international ramifications, Exile is that rare audiobook that both entertains and enlightens. At once an intricate tale of betrayal and deception, a moving love story, and a fascinating journey into the lethal politics of the Middle East, this is Richard North Patterson at his most brilliant and engrossing.

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