The Covenant
by Naomi Ragen
List Price: $24.95
Pages: 288
Format: Hardcover
ISBN: 0312291191
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Living in Jerusalem, Elise Margulies fears for the lives of her husband and daughter every day. Then comes the day when her worst fears come true. Cancer specialist Dr. Jonathan Margulies drives his young daughter home from her ballet recital. His bullet-ridden car is found empty on the side of the road hours later. Elise, in the last stages of a difficult pregnancy, desperately calls her grandmother Leah in America for help and unknowingly revives a decades-old oath. Over five terror and hope-filled days during which ordinary people join the front lines against terrorism, the ties that bind two generations form a powerful alliance against contemporary evil.
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1. To what do you think the title of this book refers?
2. Leah, Maria, Ariana and Esther all survived Auschwitz. Did their experiences affect them all in the same way, or differently? Explain.
3. Compare the different behavior and coping mechanisms of the four friends in the camps and later in their lives. What characteristics helped each to survive? Did these traits help or hinder them when they returned to normal life?
4. Compare Elise Margulies and her grandmother Leah. In what ways are they similar, different?
5. Leah Rabinowitz experienced the horrors of Nazi Germany. Her granddaughter Elise experiences the horrors of modern day terrorism. How would you compare their experiences? In what ways were their enemies similar, different?
6. Compare how the following Muslim men are portrayed: Ismael Abadi, Musa el Khalil, and Whalid Ibn Saud. How does each view his religious obligations, family loyalties, and aspirations for the future?
7. Julia Greenberg views herself as “a journalist. An objective journalist.” Do you agree or disagree? Why?
8. In what ways are Julia's choices and problems particular to her, and in what ways are they true of
all journalists, especially those covering the war between Israel and the Palestinians? How, in your opinion, does this affect the news we see and read?
9. The Covenant takes place in Israel. Could you see this story taking place in another geographic locale? How would it be the same? How would it be different?
10. If you were writing a sequel to this book, what would happen to Elise Margulies and her children? What would happen to Fatima and her children?
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"While still maintaining her great warmth for characters, The Covenant is as suspenseful as a Mary Higgins Clark as you worry about the fate of characters hour by hour, minute by minute. The Covenant brings the headlines heartbreakingly home and redefines the unlimited boundaries of lifelong friendship."
—Gay Courter, author of The Midwife and Code Ezra
"A thrilling page turning from start to finish, Naomi Ragen's The Covenant is not only a mesmerizing tale with fine drawn characters, it is a story of truth and integrity, a multi-generational novel love, friendship and duty. This is a MUST READ book. It is Naomi Ragen at her finest hour."
—Faye Kellerman, author of Street Dreams
"Naomi Ragen's books are always compulsively readable, and The Covenant is no exception. An emotionally-charged and engrossing book, The Covenant is a tribute to the power of friendship and the strength of love in the face of evil."
—India Edghill, author of Wisdom's Daughter: A Novel of Solomon and Sheba
