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56 of 57 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
They Call The Wind Khazaria, March 14, 2005
The story of the Jewish kingdom of the Khazars is a fascinating piece of history. The Khazars were a collection of semi-nomadic tribes that wandered through the Caucasus region of what is now Russia. Khazaria, loosely thought of as the isthmus-like land mass located between the Black and Caspian Seas, was an ideal site for merchants and wandering traders. Khazaria was buffeted on three sides by the Caliphate's Islamic forces to the south, Byzantium's Greek Christian forces to the southwest, and the barbarian Kievan Rus forces to the north. In an act of geopolitical genius the Khagan, leader of the Khazars, converted to Judaism at some point in the seventh century in order to maintain a neutral balance of power in the region. The Jewish Khazars maintained dominance in the region until near the end of the 10th century at which point the Kievan Russians, who had converted to Christianity and aligned themselves with the Byzantines, overturned the Khazar's rule. The story of the ancient Khazars is an intriguing one that makes for a fascinating historical study. They were the sole independent Jewish state ever to exist outside of contemporary Israel. As can be seen from Marek Halter's Wind of the Khazars, the story of this mysterious Jewish kingdom also makes for fascinating fiction
Wind of the Khazars consists of two parallel plot-lines. The first is set in Khazaria from 939 to 955 a.d. The cast of characters includes Joseph and Attex the young son and daughter of the Khagan. Joseph is, for all appearances, a brave young man and Attex a girl of incredible beauty. As they reach maturity Joseph succeeds his father as Khagan. Pressured by the Greeks he seeks to marry Attex off to the Emperor of Byzantium. Enter Isaac Ben Eliezer who had been sent to Khazazria with a letter from the Chief Rabbi in Cordoba, Spain that sought to confirm the existence of a Jewish kingdom. Attex, as stubborn as she is beautiful resists the arranged marriage. Isaac, once he arrives in Khazaria quickly becomes enamored of Attex's beauty. At the same time Khazaria is under attack from the Rus. As this plot line nears its conclusion the forces of the Khazars do battle with the Rus while jousting diplomatically with the Greeks. Attex is separated from Isaac.
The second plot line is set in the year 2,000. Marc Sofer, a French-Jewish author living in Paris runs into a rather shady Georgian who gives Sofer a rare Khazarian coin. Sofer is soon drawn into a 21st century conflict in which a subversive group known as the New Khazars starts blowing up oil wells in the Caspian and Black Seas. Sofer travel from Paris to Cambridge to Oxford and finally to the Caucuses in search of information and a mysterious woman, as beautiful as Attex, who seems to play a key role in the current day intrigue. The plot lines converge as the novel reaches its climactic moments. The novel's ending was at once both tumultuous and bittersweet.
I enjoyed Wind of the Khazars. I should add that I found some of Halter's writing a bit formulaic. There were times, when Halter was discussing the romantic aspects of each plot ,that the writing seemed suited for a romance novel than for a piece of serious fiction. However, this type of writing was not pervasive and the fast pace of the story line more than made up for any slight deficiencies in the prose.
When it comes to judging the merits of any piece of historical fiction, I am guided by how interested I become in the subject matter after reading the book. I finished Wind of the Khazars with a renewed interest in the history of the Khazars. After reading Wind of the Khazars I feel compelled to dig deeper into the subject matter and ordered additional books on the topic. It is this renewed interest that earned Wind of the Khazars four stars. I recommend it to anyone with any interest in good historical fiction.
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55 of 57 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A proper novel on Khazars, unlike Pavic's Dictionary, October 13, 2003
"The Wind of the Khazars", a translation of Marek Halter's 2001 French bestseller "Le Vent des Khazars", is one of the finest novels about the Jewish kingdom of Khazaria. As it deals with the Caucasus region, including Azerbaijan, the title of the book is appropriate since "Khazri" is the name of the wind that blows across the Absheron peninsula, where the city of Baku is located. The storyline provides readers with a general background on Khazar history and weaves it into an interesting story set in two time periods (the 10th century and the year 2000). Early in the novel, a Mountain Jew gives the main character, Marc Sofer, a silver Jewish Khazar coin with an engraving of a menorah and strange writing that honored Khazar King Bulan. While a coin of this exact configuration does not exist, we can find an interesting parallel in the actual discovery by Swedish numismatist Gert Rispling in 2002 of a silver Khazar coin with the inscription "Moses is God's messenger" (in place of the usual Muslim phrase "Muhammad is God's messenger"). The real coin is part of the "Ard al-Khazar" series, some specimens of which have an undeciphered mintmark. So, in fact, the Khazars did mint their own coins. The historical accuracy in the novel is generally high, however there are some ideas which are either speculative or wrong. For instance, on page 72 we are told that Sarkel was on the banks of the "Varshan", but actually Varshan a.k.a. Warsan referred to the Sulak River and nearby mountains in the north Caucasus (as the map in the front of the novel correctly shows) where the cave of the novel is located. The assertion on page 74 that the Khazars manufactured paper after learning how from Chinese may be true but is hard to prove, since we do not possess the original copies of the King Joseph Reply and Schechter Letter, and the only paper from Khazaria that has been found comes from a burial in Sarkel and may have been imported from Central Asia (or, if made locally, learned from Central Asians rather than directly from Chinese). The circumstance where Joseph's father Aaron is dead but his grandfather Benjamin is still alive as late as 955 is questionable; Aaron and Benjamin were probably both dead by then, as Joseph was now the ruler, and it is unlikely that Benjamin had willingly given up the kaganship as is said on page 15. At the beginning of the story, Sofer encounters a mysterious woman named Sonja who has dark red hair, green eyes, fair skin, high cheekbones, and slightly slanted eyes. He continuously thinks about her, and catches up with her later. Halter tries to connect Sonja's appearance to the Khazars, but unfortunately we do not know exactly what the Khazars really looked like (due to contradictory reports), and only one Arabic chronicle refers to the Khazars as reddish-haired - though the suggestion about red-haired Khazars comes up repeatedly in both medieval and modern tales, from the old German stories about "Red Jews" to Joseph Roth's 1932 novel "Radetzky-Marsch". As readers will discover, Sonja is in fact compared to a fictional 10th-century Khazar-era character, Princess Attex, who also had red hair, and she is deeply involved in preserving the memory of the Khazars. But are Mountain Jews like Sonja really descended from Khazars, as Halter insists in his book and in an article of his? Genetic testing showed that most Mountain Jewish paternal lineages are shared in common with other Jewish communities, suggesting that they are primarily ethnic Judeans from Persia (though a small Khazar contribution can't be ruled out). The case for Khazars' integration with other Jews grew stronger with the recent discovery that Khazarian Jews married and lived with other Jews in Pera, near Constantinople, in the Byzantine Empire. So it is appropriate at the end of the novel when Sofer, an Ashkenazi Jew, wonders whether he has some Khazar ancestry himself. The story is fascinating and the English translation by Michael Bernard reads very well. I recommend it to all fans of historical fiction.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Illuminating, January 9, 2006
Bought the book on a speculation and found that I could not put it down. The prose were a little wanting, as was the second plot line which takes place in contemporary times. However, the first plot line, more historical than not, of the Khazars and their kingdom opened up a new line of study and thought. The handling of the historical aspects was superb and illuminating while the modern story line was a little maudline. Strongly recommended for those interested in Jewish and steppe history.
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