The Almond Tree Review (Novel)

Title: The Almond Tree

Genre: Adult Fiction

Put on the song: Heal the World

Rating:




This is a Good Reads First Reads review.

Blurb:

Gifted with a mind that continues to impress the elders in his village, Ichmad Hamid struggles with the knowledge that he can do nothing to save his Palestinian friends and family. Ruled by the Israeli military government, the entire village operates in fear of losing homes, jobs, and belongings. But more importantly, they fear losing each other. On Ichmad's twelfth birthday, that fear becomes a reality. With his father imprisoned, his family's home and possessions confiscated, and his siblings quickly succumbing to the dangers of war, Ichmad begins the endless struggle to use his intellect to save his poor and dying family and reclaim a love for others that was lost when the bombs first hit."The Almond Tree" capitalizes on the reader's desire to be picked up and dropped off in another part of the world. It tackles issues that many Americans only hear about on World News or read about at The Huffington Post, such as the Israeli Palestinian conflict, the scholasticide that is being imposed upon the Palestinians in Gaza and the current Gaza blockade. But even more, it offers hope.

Review:

I went into THE ALMOND TREE with an open mind really. It isn't exactly my type of book. Nonetheless, I enjoy most, if not all, types of fiction. I must say, though, when I was trying to pin down the precise genre for this book, I found it rather difficult. It's not exactly commercial, but neither is it literature. THE ALMOND TREE is one of those in-between books, that's a little difficult to pigeon-hole.

PROS	CONS
Interesting protagonist Incredibly simple writing style Easy-to-read Fast Paced	Predictable plot (The entire plot's in the blurb, really) Optimism vs Realism (Personal Opinion) Fast Paced

Honestly, it's a passably good book. For a debut, it really isn't too shabby. You can check out all the raving reviews it has on Good Reads too, but for me, it didn't pass into the realm of good-good, it as more of an averagely good book. I'd read it for the fun of it, but I might not be enticed to buy it.

The characterization's executed well, for the most part. Our protagonist, Ichmad Hamid, is flawed in a very real way. We see him grow from a scared, petulant little boy, to a man who makes difficult choices. Some choices might annoy you, especially the ones he make as a boy, because we know they'd lead to bad things. But that's all right, because that makes him real. Kids don't always make good decisions. It's through making the wrong ones that we grow and learn. Ichmad learnt things the hard way.

Of course, for all those Mary-Sue haters out there, be warned. Ichmad is the male counterpart of a Mary Sue, he's a Gary Stu. Frankly, that's all right for me. If he wasn't, there wouldn't be much of a story to tell, would there? The entire premise of the story is that he's special, he's smart, mathematically gifted, and wise beyond his years. If he wasn't all those things, he wouldn't have been able to accomplish all those things he had in the book. (Ahem, winning a noble prize for one.)

The side-characters are multi-faceted as well, and that's a very good sign. His brother, Abbas, his mother, his professor, who later becomes his friend. They think like human beings, not story book characters, it makes things more realistic, perhaps. His father, Ichmad's role model, is something of the kind and wise one. He's a very, very likable character, but in my opinion, that likability lost him some points on the reality scale. Call me jaded and weary, but purely good, open-minded, forgiving human beings are a dang rare find.

Setting-wise, it was crafted quite nicely. War-torn poverty, hatred, fear, muddy tents, scavenging in rubbish heaps, mockery, triumph, school-life, clean apartments and everything money can buy. It progresses roughly in that manner. The story spans almost the whole Ichmad's life, and really, he's been to a lot of places, experienced a lot of things, in his entire life. The simplistic writing style somehow does manage to capture the essence of each setting in a very personable way, and this heightens the enjoyment of the story.

Now the pacing, might be where I'll quibble, just a little. At the start, Ichmad's pretty young, roughly ten, I believe, and at the end of the book, he's well over sixty. That's fifty years worth. In between, I lost track of his age. So all of a sudden, he's thirty odd, and I'm like, 'What? When did he hit thirty?' It's a fairly action (I use this term loosely, so don't expect him to go off gunning down people) packed story, and it starts off with a bang too. Literally. (His younger sister got blown up in a mine field.)

What I couldn't wrap my head around, is how Abbas does a hundred and eighty degree turn about at the last parts. (I mean, sure, his son died.) Maybe it was glossed over a little, which made it less convincing for me, but someone who had been wrapped up in hatred all his life wouldn't let go of it over one (It isn't trivial, mind you, but I just didn't think it significant enough) such incident. In any case, I would've thought that he'd just hate more, not less. I thought the 'happy ending' was somewhat overdone. You don't need to give me happy-happy endings in books like this. A conclusive ending's good enough.

That wraps up my feelings for THE ALMOND TREE. Personally, I wouldn't call it an amazing, spectacular, wonderful read. But it was enjoyable, it took me all of two hours to complete, and that gives it brownie points. It does say a lot about humanity, and hope, and while I'm not quite as optimistic as the author might be, it didn't come off to me as saccharine. Rose tinted, probably, but hell, it's fiction, I guess anything goes in fiction.

(One other minor point: Chapter 33 to 35 was printed twice in the copy I'd received, while Chapter 36 and 37 were noticeably absent. Nonetheless, I could piece the story together, and it didn't affect my reading. Much.)