Customer Reviews

Three Days and a Child.

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Five stories, each unique with its own voice, defying nature, accepting nature, each deeply intent upon capturing the reader in the author's own world. A poet who decides to keep silence, with an extraordinary son, and a graduate student who is charged with the challenge of keeping his former lover's child for three days; a reclusive writer facing a forest he doesn't believe can exist--these are some of the marvelous characters that Yehoshua brings forth. And Israel is the setting drawing us to her wonders. This is a book that should be on every shelf of those who revere the art of fine short stories.

This (I think currently out of print in the states) excellent novella, set in 1960s Jerusalem, buries extensive symbolism and numerology beneath a tense story of a young man who agrees to watch a young couple's young, defenseless child. He's unreliable, and it leads some interesting directions. The writing is very sharp and seems to translate well given the austere style. Check out this little jolt of a story - it's quick and rewards scrutiny.