Mitla Pass

About this book

Gideon Zadok arrives in Israel with every intention to research a new book, mend a broken marriage and improve his dysfunctional family. But as political tensions escalate and his family is evacuated, Zadok asks to follow Israeli paratroopers to secure Mitla Pass and finds himself in the midst of one of the largest global crises of the twentieth century. A sweeping novel of love, passion, and freedom, Mitla Pass stands as an epic look at modern Middle Eastern History and is quite possibly Uris's most autobiographical work. Publisher's Weekly In this semi-autobiographical story, unhappy novelist Gideon Zadok parachutes, on the eve of the 1956 Sinai War, into Mitla Pass with a company of Israeli soldiers to face his past and prove his courage. ''Sour, self-indulgent characters and surprisingly awkward dialogue suggest that only the staunchest Uris fans will enjoy his new novel,'' concluded PW . Library Journal Against the backdrop of the 1956 Sinai War, Uris provides a riveting portrait (possibly autobiographical) of a man caught in personal crisis. Gideon Zadok, best-selling novelist and successful Hollywood screenwriter, has come to Israel with his family to research a new novel and to shore up a crumbling marriage. But he jeopardizes that by starting a passionate affair with a beautiful Auschwitz survivor. Zadok is a man wavering on the edge of a breakdown. As the political crisis escalates, and his family is evacuated, Zadok asks to accompany Israeli paratroopers on a desperate mission to seal off the strategic Mitla Pass.

Themes & subjects

About the author

Leon Uris

3 August 1924 – 21 June 2003

Leon Marcus Uris, novelist, was born in Baltimore, Maryland to William and Anna Uris. His father was a paperhanger who had immigrated from Poland. He was educated in schools in Maryland and Virginia, but he never graduated from high school. He joined the U.S. Marine Corps when he was seventeen and served in the South Pacific and New Zealand during World War II. He worked briefly as a driver for a newspaper, but after 1950 he was a full-time writer. Uris published his first novel, *Battle Cry*, when he was 29. He sold the novel to a film producer and wrote the screenplay. He is well-known for his screenplay, *Gunfight at the OK Corral*. His novel, *Exodus*, was an overwhelming success, and…