In this powerful satiric novel, Dolly, a young Israeli doctor, wanders through a nightmare metropolis “without a base, without a past, without an infrastructure. The most demented city in the world.” On her back, she carries an abandoned infant whom she claims as her son. Through Dolly, a brilliant re-creation of the familiar Jewish Mother archetype, the overlapping issues of motherhood and nationhood are examined in vivid, often viscerally disturbing prose. The writing is razor-sharp and occasionally hilarious. Castel-Bloom employs her powerful humor to make palatable the no-holdsbarred horrors of daily life in a perpetual war zone.
Orly Castel-Bloom was born in Tel Aviv in 1960 to French-speaking, Egyptian Jewish parents. A leading voice in contemporary Hebrew literature, she is often credited — along with Edgar Keret — with introducing postmodernism into Israeli prose. Castel-Bloom is the author of thirteen books. She has twice received the Israeli Prime Minister’s Prize.
Dalya Bilu, the translator, lives in Jerusalem. She has received a number of awards for her work, including the London Jewish Book Council’s Award for Hebrew-English Translation.
