THE ANATOMY OF EXILE is a complex portrayal of an immigrant family facing cultural, economic and personal challenges

The Anatomy of Exile

By Zeeva Bukai

Delphinium Books: Jan. 14, 2025

326 pages, $28.00

Zeeva Bukai’s debut novel, The Anatomy of Exile, concerns issues and experiences that are of universal relevance. And yet it seems particularly poignant and timely in light of the events of the last year and a half. The story, which follows the lives of the Abadi family, is bookended by the Six-Day War of 1967 and the Yom Kippur war of 1973. Both have a life-altering impact on the characters.

Tamar, an Israeli Jew, is married to Salim Abadi, an Arab Jew from Syria whose family immigrated to Israel. They have three children (Ruby, Rachel, and Ari) and live more or less contentedly in Tel Aviv. Everything changes when Hadas, Salim’s beloved sister and Tamar’s best friend, is shot and killed in what is believed to be a terror attack. When they learn the shocking truth behind her murder, Salim is determined to leave the chaos of Israel for the United States. He is convinced that in five years he can earn the kind of money that will allow them to return and buy a place in one of Israel’s beach communities. Hadas’s death has convinced him that it’s now or never.

Despite the objections of Tamar and their children, the family moves to Brooklyn, where they rent an apartment in a mostly immigrant community. Ironically, their neighbors include a Palestinian family from Israel, Ibrahim and Radwa Mahmoudi and their two teenage sons. The two couples establish a tentative friendship, believing that in the melting pot of 1968 America they can be friends. Salim is particularly happy to be able to speak Arabic with Ibrahim.

The family’s exile in Brooklyn both shapes and reveals each member’s desires and destinies, many of which conflict with those of other family members. Before long, they find themselves at odds with each other over matters large and small. Salim works two jobs, leaving Tamar alone much of the time. The younger children, Rachel and Ari, soon become more American than Israeli.

Teenage Ruby straddles the two worlds, pulled toward American attitudes and activities while continuing to possess some deeply rooted Israeli/Middle Eastern impulses. But her close friendship with Faisal, who is the same age and shares her Israeli background, begins to concern Tamar. While the adults tread lightly across the political and cultural minefield, Tamar, bedeviled by her experiences in Israel, believes the teens’ friendship will lead to trouble of one kind or another. To add to the complications, Tamar wants to return to Israel but Salim has one plan after another that he believes will eventually provide them with financial independence.

These real and (possibly) imagined conflicts create a situation in which it seems there is no good solution. Who is right about their future? Should they become Americans or go home to Israel? The family is divided. Ruby, who has essentially become Israeli American, is the only member who can see the advantages of both options. But Salim and Tamar view her differently. Something has to give.

In The Anatomy of Exile, Zeeva Bukai turns and turns the characters’ lives like a jeweler examining the many facets of a diamond. As the tension builds, the characters make their choices, with consequences both expected and unexpected. It’s a classic immigrant tale, a coming-of-age story, and an intimate portrayal of a good marriage that becomes troubled. It’s also a story about two cultures with a long history that has often involved conflict and whose destiny is intertwined. It’s an absorbing novel that will have you biting your nails in the second half and thinking about the characters long after you have finished.

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Zeeva Bukai was born in Israel and raised in New York City. Her stories have appeared in McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern, jewishfiction.net, Image Journal, December Magazine, The Jewish Quarterly and elsewhere. Her honors include a fellowship at the New York Center for Fiction, residencies at Hedgebrook Writer’s Colony, and Byrdcliff AIR program in Woodstock NY. She has received The Master’s Review fiction prize, the Curt Johnson Prose Award, and the Lilith Fiction Award. Her work has been anthologized in Frankly Feminist: Short Stories by Jewish Women from Lilith Magazine (2022) and Out of Many: Multiplicity and Divisions in America Today (2018). She holds an MFA from Brooklyn College and is the Assistant Director of Academic Support at SUNY Empire State University. She lives in Brooklyn with her family.