Jerusalem Beach: Stories

On NetGalley, the description of Jerusalem Beach, Iddo Gefen's debut collection, begins, “For fans of Etgar Keret...” I was immediately interested, as Keret is one of my favorite authors, but also skeptical that they shared anything more than the superficial connection of being contemporary Israeli short story writers. However, all my doubts disappeared after reading the first line of the first story, “The Geriatric Platoon”:

Grandpa enlisted in the Golani infantry brigade at the age of eighty.

Here is an author who can match Keret's wit and whimsy, drawing very real emotions from very surreal situations. I don't mean to imply that there is anything imitative or derivative about Gefen's work; it so imaginative that there are no proper comparisons for the stories themselves, just the genius of their author. The collection takes the reader from a desolate army outpost, to a Berlin that exists only on social media, to a microplanet abutting the sun.

Gefen is a neuroscientist, and his experience flavors his writing without overpowering it. In one story, a father seeks desperately for a technology to see into his daughter's dreams. In another, a woman and her fiancé set out to transfer memories to each other. But in all cases, the humanity is foregrounded and the technology is there only to support the author's message.

I absolutely loved Jerusalem Beach, and I plan to read Gefen's future work as quickly as someone can translate it (and maybe even faster if my Hebrew improves).

Thank you to Astra House for the advanced copy of this fantastic collection!