Ruthie Blum Leibowitz of The Jerusalem Post conducted an interview with mystery author Matt Beynon Rees earlier this week. Rees' third Omar Yussef novel, The Samaritan's Secret, is scheduled for publication next month by Soho Press.
Rees, a former Time Magazine bureau chief based in Jerusalem, sets his mysteries in Palestine, a troubled spot in the world if ever there was one. With his novels, he sets out to explore and expose real-life situations in the Middle East through the format of a literary detective series.
Though much of the interview covers the current situation in Gaza, Rees does offer some insight into his writing. He says, "One of things I do in my novels is focus on those individuals who are prepared to stand up and take risks -- albeit small by our standards, but enormous by theirs. It's not that at the end, some grandiose peace is achieved. The scale is much smaller -- more like episodes in the larger scheme of things, which get resolved."
We reviewed Rees' second Omar Yussef mystery last year, A Grave in Gaza, noting that it was, in our opinion, one of the best mysteries of 2008.
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