Staircase of a Thousand Steps
by Masha Hamilton
List Price: $13.00
Pages: 288
Format: Paperback
ISBN: 0425185303
Publisher: Blue Hen Books
In a remote desert village of storytellers and seers, the accidental revelation of long-held secrets, including a forbidden love affair, unravels a young girl's world.
Staircase of a Thousand Steps lifts the veil from a mystical land, where jasmine and dung mix and the inconceivable is embraced as commonplace.
In a Middle Eastern village that traces its history back to Abraham, the men gather nightly beneath a tree named Moses' Finger, and the women meet at a place where "the earth breathes."
But the midwife Faridah possesses transcendent wisdom and a dangerous scorn for tradition. And the shepherd Harif, seer and village outsider, weaves stories in an effort to protect his fragile status. While Harif's granddaughter, Jammana, struggles between the allure of the ancient world and the tensions of a modern age.
Through an ancestral gift, Jammana experiences the memories of those closest to her-Faridah, Harif, and her mother, Rafa. But as she unwittingly uncovers the village's secrets, old grudges move like a slow burn across the fields and ignite.
Set in Transjordan just before the 1967 war with Israel, Staircase of a Thousand Steps braids a chorus of voices into a poetic, haunting tale of loyalty, longing, and accidental betrayal.
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1). Although the book is set in a highly politicized region, the novel isn't political. What does Hamilton gain be focussing her book on character and plot rather than politics? How would you define a "political novel"?
2). Medicine plays a critical role in this novel, as does the theme of healing. What wounds run throughout this community, and what, in the end, is the source of (and the process through which) the characters find ways to heal?
3). Hamilton weaves many themes and threads into this novel: old versus new, tradition versus modernity, individuality versus community. What themes emerge as primary?
4). How is this novel similar to other books about traditional communities facing the rising tide of modernism? How is it unique?
5). Staircase of a Thousand Steps addresses gender conflicts in a variety of sub-plots. What are these sub-plots, and how do they work together to move the novel forward? Were you surprised to see traditional male roles questioned in the story? Where do the village women ultimately gain their power and voice?
6). Is this novel a loose re-telling of Romeo & Juliet?
7). At times the novel reads like a fable. Magical elements pepper the book, and Hamilton's use of time is somewhat fluid, though the story definitely takes place in 1967. How does this affect one's reading of the story? Do you feel that in a sense the story is timeless? What makes it so?
8). Harif is a shepherd. Faridah is a midwife. How do characters roles and/or jobs illuminate the story?
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" . . . [an] engaging first novel. . . . Hamilton is a natural storyteller. . . ."—Publishers Weekly
"Former AP Middle East correspondent Hamilton writes with striking clarity, using words as carefully as the Bedouin use water to bring a disappearing world to vibrant life. Here, in a luminous debut, are the voices, real and rarely heard, of traditional Arab women."—Kirkus Reviews
" . . . delightfully compelling."—Booklist
