People of the Book by Geraldine Brooks

Ms. Brooks writes an intriguing fictionalized account of one of the earliest illustrated Jewish prayer books, the Sarajevo Haggadah. She tells the history of this specific Haggadah (a Jewish text that sets forth the order of the Passover Seder, telling of the Jewish deliverance from slavery in Egypt as described in the Book of Exodus), through the discoveries of Hanna, a young Australian rare book conservationist, hired by the UN to analyzes and stabilizes the Sarajevo Haggadah in the aftermath of the Bosnian War, tracing clues found during the rebinding of this Haggadah.


The clues take the story from 1996 Sarajevo and travels back in time as each clue reveals its meaning and new discoveries are made.  The journey takes the reader to Sarajevo 1938, Vienna 1894, Venice 1609, Barcelona 1492, Seville 1430, as well as stops in North Africa, Israel, the USA and Australia. 


Intertwining of Jewish, Muslim and Christian faiths, Ms. Brooks writes of the both large events such as the German occupation of Yugoslavia, the Catholic Inquisition, the Expulsion of Jews from Spain (Alhambra Decree), as well as the tortured (both literal and figurative) lives of the book's characters.


People of the Book reads like a mystery novel wrapped in a telling of religious persecution throughout the ages.  A page-turner of the first degree.