I recently borrowed The Haj from my university library. I'll tell you right off the bat, it was not my first choice. I was really looking for some books by Kurt Vonnegut, but they were gone. So as I made my way around the stacks and stacks of novels, I came across the work of Leon Uris. I read Mila 18 this past summer and loved it. The story moved quickly, the characters were compelling, the book was tragic and uplifting all at once. The Haj, I'm sorry to say, is not nearly as good as Uris's masterful telling of the Warsaw ghetto uprising.

Thankfully, The Haj does move quickly. It's not boring, there aren't long, overly descriptive, passages that bring you nowhere, and it first glance it's a pretty good read. What brings this book down is character development. With the exception of Gideon Asch, a grizzled Israeli pioneer/soldier/politician/hero, none of the characters are particularly interesting. Ibrahim, the chief of a small Arab village, and the Arab analogue to Gideon, starts out angry and unreasonable to believe and instantly turns into a pragmatic, visionary man. Unbelievable.

If you like the subject- Arab-Israeli conflict, Middle Eastern history, political scheming- then it's a decent read. Otherwise, keep moving.

Recommended: Yes