Welcome to Heavenly Heights

FROM THE PUBLISHER

A group of American Jews leave the United States, not just to move to Israel, but to live in Heavenly Heights, a settlement on the West Bank. The days are woven together by the religious rituals that set the order for their lives but do not completely prepare them for the spontaneous acts of violence they must face. To survive they create their own culture in a hostile society. Viewed through the pinhole of one ragged apartment building's door, Miller's prose illuminates the families, friendships, loves, sorrows, and religious faith that make up a completely unique American dream.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

For Orthodox Jews, Israel is not merely a country, but "the Land of Israel, the biblical promised portion"-in other words, "home." The families in Miller's first novel are mainly immigrants from the U.S. who now live in a small settlement in an embattled area outside Jerusalem, motivated by the conviction that it's their responsibility to reclaim the land of the biblical patriarchs. Miller convincingly portrays the faith that leads people to leave their comfortable homes in American suburbs and relocate to a dangerous place where car and bus bombs are always a threat, and random shootings are common. The plot follows several women, all residents of one apartment house, over the space of a year of changing weather, national crises and dramatically altered lives. Enlivened by Miller's fresh and spirited eye for imagery, the narrative builds a web of cumulative quotidian details that convey the culture shock of primitive living where water supplies are chancy, construction is often shoddy, the bureaucracy is overwhelming, and men stow their weapons in the foyer of the shul, next to the stack of prayer books. The characters are nicely nuanced, but quick shifts in chronology sometimes impede the narrative flow. In the end, the psychological landscape is the most impressive part of this often engrossing novel. But outside of portraying the settlers' fundamental religious convictions, Miller never really develops the other side of the argument-that the West Bank communities are provocative to their Arab neighbors. In the end, readers must decide for themselves whether the appealing characters are idealists or zealots, "heroes or just plain crazy," as one character muses. Agent, Lisa Bankoff. Author tour. (Jan.) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

KLIATT - Kristen LeBlanc Ivory

This debut novel tells the story of an American Jewish family—Mike and Tova and their children Esther (11), Yoni (3) and Avi (an infant)—who leave Baltimore to go "home" to Israel. "Number 4," the apartment building where they reside in Heavenly Heights on the violent West Bank, becomes the eye through which the reader views the family's experiences. Tova, the main character, is hesitant, reluctant to uproot her family for unfamiliar territory, and takes her cues from those around her, mainly her husband. Observant of others, Tova is keenly aware of the effect the move has on her family, particularly Esther. Ironically, she is not so in tune with her own feelings, and it is only when she returns to the US that she realizes the impact Heavenly Heights has had on her, and the strength of the relationships she has forged there. Miller takes some time to engage the reader in her characters, using historical flashbacks to provide insight into their current situations. Non-Jewish readers may have some difficulty with references to Jewish customs and the prevalent use of Hebrew. While Miller doesn't delve much into the politics behind the Israeli-Palestine conflict, she gives the reader a feel for the dangers of daily life in Jerusalem, where war rages everywhere and death lurks around every corner. Such timely subject matter should be of interest to older YAs and adult readers alike. KLIATT Codes: SA—Recommended for senior high school students, advanced students, and adults. 2003, St. Martin's Griffin, 230p., Ages 15 to adult.

Library Journal

Miller's first novel chronicles the lives of a group of Americans, newly immigrated to Israel with a variety of baggage-emotional as well as material. Religiously observant Jews, they have come to settle not in Jerusalem proper but in a West Bank settlement called Heavenly Heights. A quote from Psalm 137-"We will raise Jerusalem above our chiefest joy"-is the bulwark that sustains the group through countless travails. The young families form friendships, the children play simple games, marriages have their ups and downs, the cycle of Jewish holidays is observed, and a culture of sorts develops. Miller mainly conveys the story from the perspective of several wives who often gather on the balcony of one of the apartments in Building Number Four (where they all live) to pass the time while the husbands are at Sabbath prayer service. Kentucky-born Debbie, a convert to Judaism, sings country songs and quotes her granny while tending to her large brood of children. Tova, newly arrived from Baltimore, has given up a life of material plenty to lead a more spiritual one with her zealous husband, as well as her children. Random West Bank violence, the family tensions, and the stress of living in such close quarters are only hinted at in their attempts at cheerful banter. Miller artfully presents a sobering yet sympathetic view of a parochial lifestyle, an intimate cameo replete with its values, problems, and hopes. For most fiction collections.-Molly Abramowitz, Silver Spring, MD Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

An Orthodox Jewish family makes aliyah to the Promised Land and braves it out among a hardscrabble survivors' community-in Miller's low-simmering, blandly written, but warm-spirited PEN Discovery Award debut.

Tova Zissie ("good and sweet"), who teaches English in Baltimore to Russian immigrants, and her financial project manager husband, Mike, decide it's time to reverse exile and return "home" to Jerusalem: they will be heroes among their Orthodox community, "spirited keepers of the flame." In fact, they end up in a sheltered West Bank community called Heavenly Heights among a disparate group of mostly American exiles like themselves. The story tracks the newly arrived family's first shaky year trying to feel at home on this physically vulnerable site near the Jordanian border and amid a strange conglomeration of fairly impoverished but fiercely religious settlers. Tova, conflicted at first, finds a new friend in the outspoken Kentucky convert Debra, who always brings the conversation among the wives and mothers around from American gadgets to men and sex, which makes them blush violently. Other dramas include a doomed friendship between wayward teenager Yossi and a son of the upstanding Rabbi Altman, whose wife is confined to a wheelchair with MS; the shady family financial dealings back in the States that Mr. Stanetsky, widower and owner of the building, must settle, though he simply wants another wife; and the crowing of Ahouva, the young, pretty mother of five children in six years, about her latest appliance brought with her American parents. The point of view shifts as Miller delves into back stories of some of these characters, and the tale never gets to a climax so much as toa mild-moving denouement that mirrors the tenants' interminable state of waiting, preparedness-and chauvinism.

Precarious lives and eternal holidays patiently observed among West Bank settlers.