People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks

I really expected this to be a better book, because the author is a past Pulitzer Prize winner (for March in 2005). Then again, although I remember reading that book and the general premise, I don't remember much of anything about it, and one would expect Pulitzer winners to be at least memorable.

The premise for this novel is promising: the Sarajevo Haggadah, a Jewish illuminated prayer book from the 1400s, has been rescued from destruction in war-torn Bosnia by a Muslim museum director. (This is a real book and the rescue really happened, but the rest of the events and characters are fictionalized.) A young book conservator from Australia is hired to stabilize the condition of the book, and finds several clues inside which speak to its long history--a butterfly wing, a white hair, salt crystals, a wine stain, a groove for an absent clasp. From these small clues come five stories tracing the progress of the book from one hand to another through the centuries. Framing the history of the book is the modern-day story of Hanna, the book conservator.

Unfortunately, as all this plays out, the novel is less than riveting. The historical episodes all seem to be "tellings" of events, rather than living representations of people and their interactions. Most characters are portrayed as stereotypes, with the Jewish people as the persecuted, the Christians as the persecutors, and the Muslims as sympathizers with the Jews. That struck me as rather odd in view of today's political climate.

The story of Hanna is most explored, and she is by far the most fully realized character. The problem is, though, that she is not a very sympathetic character and her story seems to have little to do with the rest of the book. The way she is portrayed turns a novel of historical fiction into "chick lit," in my opinion. I found the account of her intellectual involvement with the book as observed by the museum director, followed immediately afterwards by her sucking on his fingers in a restaurant, to be highly amusing but unconvincing. And why is her continuing conflict with her surgeon mother even pertinent?

Obviously a great deal of research went into the writing of this novel, and all that information is somewhat interesting. But, altogether, this is just a ho-hum read.