Noteworthy Passages: Crescent Star

Crescent Star by Nicholas Maes
Publisher: Dundurn
Pub. Date: February 21st, 2011
Pages: 272
Age Level: 13+
Source: For review from publisher.

Synopsis via Goodreads
Avi Greenbaum is Jewish and lives in West Jerusalem. Moussa Shakir is Palestinian and lives in East Jerusalem. Both are 15 years old, live without their fathers, adore their older brothers, and belong to the same soccer club. Avi commemorates the Holocaust and celebrates Israeli independence, while Moussa mourns on Nakba Day, marking the expulsion of Palestinians from their homes and land in 1948. Their lives are parallel lines: they have everything in common and nothing at all. Each is oblivious to the other's existence.

As Avi and Moussa go about their daily routines in the spring of 2006, they face reminders of the conflict that has dogged the region for the past three generations; the security wall, suicide bombings, police operations, and the looming shadow of war. While navigating this legacy of suspicion and violence, they must decide what their own roles in the stalemate will be.

Noteworthy Passages

Moussa's Grandma; pg. 111
She watched her oldest sister fall. When recounting the tale, she would pause at this point and ask her audience the very same question: if it takes so long to fashion a human, how can everything so terribly precious, all the love and dedication invested, vanish in less time it takes a child to swallow.

Moussa's brother, Douad; pg. 165
"This city, this whole area which seems so peaceful in the moonlight, is plagued with insanity and I will not come back. I will not raise my children here. The soil isn't good enough. Once it was blessed but now it is cursed. I won't come home. I will die elsewhere."

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I thought both of these passages were very profound and probably the best parts of the book. For more on my thoughts, you can check out my Review.

As always, thanks for stopping by.









PLEASE NOTE: This is a feature hosted here at my blog in which I present you with selected passages or quotes that I deem Noteworthy from a book I've just reviewed. My hopes are of course, that these passages will make you want to pick the book up and read it. This feature was started and created by me in January in hopes of making my blog more unique. That being said, I would like to kindly request that you do not use this feature as it was intended to be for my blog only and is not a meme. If you see some one else using it, please know it is without my permission. Thank you.