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Great Translations: Waking Lions by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen
Eitan, a young Israeli doctor speeding on a deserted road at night, strikes and kills a pedestrian — an undocumented Eritrean immigrant. Knowing that medical help cannot possibly arrive in time to repair his split skull, the doctor flees the scene. He dropped his wallet and this sets up a blackmail scenario by the immigrant’s wife, Sirkit. She demands a lot to keep his secret.
The Setting: We’re in modern-day Israel in Beersheba, a desert city about an hour and a half drive from Tel Aviv. Eitan is kind of in exile, sent to this hospital because of a conflict with his former supervisor in the big city. There’s a lot of local color in the story but we don’t get a pretty picture of life in Israel where, according to this book, illegal immigrants provide an underground workforce for all the low-paid jobs. The owner of the restaurant next to the make-shift clinic regularly rapes his undocumented female workers. Are there really bouncers outside fancy restaurants in Tel Aviv to keep the beggars out?
We’re told most of the Eritreans come to Israel by foot across the desert through Egypt. Many are shot by Egyptian border guards on the way. (See map below)
The Story: The doctor’s wife, Liat, is a police detective. The tension builds because guess what case she has been assigned? Although her supervisors…
