Apeirogon by Colum McCann

Colum McCann's most ambitious work to date, Apeirogon--named for a shape with a countably infinite number of sides--is a tour de force concerning friendship, love, loss, and belonging. Bassam Aramin is Palestinian. Rami Elhanan is Israeli. They inhabit a world of conflict that colors every aspect of their daily lives, from the roads they are allowed to drive on to the schools their daughters, Abir and Smadar, each attend, to the checkpoints both physical and emotional that they must negotiate. Their worlds shift irreparably after ten-year-old old Abir is killed by a rubber bullet and thirteen-year-old Smadar becomes the victim of suicide bombers. When Bassam and Rami learn of one another's stories, they recognize the loss that connects them and they attempt to use their grief as a weapon for peace. McCann crafts Apeirogon out of a universe of fictional and non-fictional material. He crosses centuries and continents, stitching time, art, history, nature, and politics together in a tale both heartbreaking and hopeful. Musical, cinematic, muscular, delicate, and soaring, Apeirogon is a novel for our times.

What an extraordinary book. Worth multiple reads, I am thinking.

This was unexpected and hugely powerful. I received this as part of the Goldsboro Books book of the month club, so it was a bit out of my usual reading sphere.

The word Apeirogon refers to a shape with a countably infinite number of sides, a fact that is strongly alluded to throughout this book - it is almost circular but ultimately multifaceted, like the conflict at the heart of the story. The book itself takes the form of a series of 1001 short vignettes, usually only a few paragraphs long if not shorter highlighting aspects of life in Israel and the West Bank, focusing in on two families who have both lost a daughter to the violence there, one Israeli and one Palestinian. The symbology and meaning behind each little snippet is always clever and gives added power to what is being told. The contrasts and little details on the day to day life of both Israelis and Palestinians are both brutal and sympathetic.

This is ultimately a critique of the status quo in Israel at the moment, the ultimate message is that the occupation itself is destroying the very peace it is trying to achieve. The two central stories are based on real stories, of Smadar and Abir, both of whom were teenagers killed whilst innocently going about their daily lives. The grief and anger present in the story is all very real, and the sense of forgiveness powerful.

This is a brutal and beautiful book. A series of contrasts that give a look into the vicious circle that is currently being enacted in the middle east, whilst at the same time giving a hope for a way out.