{"id":7748,"date":"2019-02-04T07:34:44","date_gmt":"2019-02-04T12:34:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=7748"},"modified":"2019-02-04T07:34:53","modified_gmt":"2019-02-04T12:34:53","slug":"death-in-shangri-la","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=7748","title":{"rendered":"****Death in Shangri-La"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"India,<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

By Yigal Zur, translated by Sara Kitai \u2013 Israeli thriller writer Yigal Zur skillfully uses both an exotic setting and ongoing political turmoil to create a high level of tension in this fast-paced thriller. Published in Israel in 2012, Death in Shangri-La<\/a><\/em> <\/a>is the first of Zur\u2019s novels to be translated into English, and quite smoothly at that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A trip to India after their military commitment has become\nrite of passage for many Israeli young adults. When one young Israeli seems\nbent on abandoning a future law career and immersing himself in the life of an\nashram somewhere in Sikkim, his father, arms dealer Willy Mizrachi, is\noutraged. He complains about it to his acquaintance, former security agent\nDotan Naor, familiar with India from his days working for Israeli state\nsecurity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Dotan counsels him to accept his son for who he is, Willy\nis determined to bring him home. In an action that will have deadly\nconsequences, Willy wagers that within a year, he\u2019ll have his son happily back\nhome, with a wife and baby. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few months later, Dotan learns Willy has been murdered in\nDelhi, just as news reports are filled with stories of terrorist attacks on\nIsraeli young people in north India\u2014backpackers, guest house visitors,\nhoneymooners. Most of the novel is told by Dotan in first-person. However, the\nattacks are told from the points of view of the Israelis and their would-be\nrescuers, which effectively conveys the situational chaos. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Shortly after Dotan learns about Willy, security agency agents\nvisit his Tel Aviv apartment hoping he will cooperate in unraveling Willy\u2019s\nmurder. Dotan at first refuses, but when a posthumous letter from Willy arrives\nsaying he\u2019s being watched, the clues it contains convince him to take the job. The\nfemale agent, Maya Kfir, will accompany him. (You anticipate where that\nrelationship is going.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The action moves to India, and Zur wonderfully evokes a\nsense of place. His descriptions of the street life, the seedy hotels where\nDotan and Maya stay, the markets, the food, are terrific. The elements of the\nsetting are not just pasted on, they are well worked into the plot. Could this\nstory have taken place anywhere else? Probably not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the course of trying to untangle Willy\u2019s death, Dotan and\nMaya land in the heart of the current terrorist trouble spot and must draw on\nDotan\u2019s contacts with Indians on both sides of the law. The Muslim terrorists,\ndrug runners, Tibetan freedom fighters, the Indian army\u2014all have their agendas\nand guns manufactured in Israel. Are they Willy\u2019s deadly legacy? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main part of the story takes place in a highly\ncompressed few days and the propulsive action keeps the pages turning. My only\ncomplaint is Dotan\u2014a man in his forties, not a teenage boy\u2014is obsessed with the\nsexual conquest, past, present, or future, of practically every woman in the\nstory. When he quickly develops a supposedly sincere, if highly predictable,\nrelationship with Maya, it\u2019s hard to take seriously.\n\nThis is the middle one of three thrillers about\nDotan Naor. I hope the others will be translated too, and soon! \n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Photo: Mario Lapid, creative commons license<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/a><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases\u2014a few pennies to put in a jar to pay my WordPress bills. When you buy the book through the link on my website, you help me fill the jar. Thank you!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Yigal Zur, translated by Sara Kitai \u2013 Israeli thriller writer Yigal Zur skillfully uses both an exotic setting and ongoing political turmoil to create a high level of tension in this fast-paced thriller. Published in Israel in 2012, Death … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4837,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"****Death in Shangri-La - a former Israeli intelligence agent is on a mission in India to find a friend's son. Propulsive action in a superbly described setting.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[440,126,32],"tags":[1496,431,323,1495],"class_list":["post-7748","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-adventure","category-reading-2","category-thriller","tag-death-in-shangri-la","tag-india","tag-terrorism","tag-yigal-zur"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/28380918_b5a4cba08f_z.jpg?fit=640%2C439&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-20Y","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7748"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7749,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7748\/revisions\/7749"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4837"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7748"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7748"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}