O Jerusalem

Getting through a series of novels with more than three or four books can be, in many ways, rather tedious. It is entirely easy to simply lose interest in the whole thing if the individual novels are unable to sustain interest, or the reader simply lacks the stamina to see the whole thing through from beginning to end.

Although I do have a personal reading policy about finishing any series I start if I like the first book, I will admit that there are difficulties in seeing this through, especially if the succeeding books turn out to be terrible. This was the case with the Mary Russell series. I enjoyed the first book, The Beekeeper's Apprentice, enough that I went straight into the next book, A Monstrous Regiment of Women, only to be severely disappointed. Despite my misgivings I recalled my personal reading policy and after a few days' break to wash the bad taste of the second novel out of my mind's metaphorical mouth, I picked up A Letter of Mary, and found it a bit more pleasant to read that the last. With my confidence in the series returning, I picked up The Moor, the fourth book in the series, and had most of my goodwill towards the series restored to somewhat-similar levels as they had been after reading the first. It was in these relatively good high spirits that I plunged myself into the fifth book, O Jerusalem.

This novel, unlike the last few, is a story told out of chronology with the rest, detailing Holmes and Russell's adventure in Palestine, mentioned in The Beekeeper's Apprentice. The first book mentions in passing some “job” that Mycroft has asked Holmes and Russell to do while they are in the area, though Russell does not go into detail in the first book. In this one, the reader receives the whole story - and what a story it is.

Of all the Holmes stories, I've always largely favored the more “active” ones, a result of having fallen deeply in love with The Sign of Four. Anytime Holmes gets involved in a case that results in him and his companions either running criminals to ground in thrilling chase scenes, or having their lives put in very grave danger (cruel as that may sound), said story will always receive more attention from me. If those activities necessitate crawling around underground, defusing bombs, or traveling through exotic locales (and I include certain parts of London in this description), then I will most definitely be there for the ride.

O Jerusalem combines all four, and includes a most colorful cast of characters to boot. This story goes back several years in terms of the actual series chronology, to when Russell was only nineteen years old and merely intellectual partner and apprentice to the great detective Sherlock Holmes, not quite Mrs. Holmes. On the run from dangerous bomb threats in London, Russell and Holmes have made their way to Palestine, where they find themselves in the care of two Bedouins, Ali and Mahmoud Hazr, who are also agents in the service of the Crown. As they slowly make their way towards Jerusalem, the Hazrs, Holmes and Russell find themselves caught up in an attempt to uncover a deadly plot involving the stirring up of resentment between Christian, Muslim, and Jew; lots and lots of dynamite; and the ancient city of Jerusalem itself.

The “exotic locales” part of the formula is easily covered: the Holy Land is a mysterious and deadly place: the heart of three major world religions and one of the most disputed patches of land in history. Palestine (as it's called in the story) is also of particularly special significance to Russell, who, being Jewish, views the trip as something of a pilgrimage, and her musings regarding the significance of the areas and locales through which they travel is particularly fascinating - well, at least for me, it is, and likely will be for any history buffs.

Also, what she says about the Holy Land - in particular, the political-social situation - will read very familiar to anyone who has paid attention to what is happening in the Middle East today. The reader will be quick to note, through Russell's observations and musings, that though the novel is set in the early years of the twentieth century, nothing much has really changed, not since the city of Jerusalem was first built, not since the Crusades, and not since today. This state of constancy in terms of political-social relationships, though set in the previous century, will echo familiarly with the reader and will provide a certain, perhaps slightly uncomfortable, sense of immediacy. The Holy Land has existed for thousands of years, but how much, really, has changed? It is a question Russell asks herself due to its relevance at the time, and it still bears relevance today.

Along with the above came a wonderful cast of characters to get attached to. The Hazrs, in particular, will interest the reader - or annoy, depending on one's take on them. In some ways they do seem caricatures of Arabic stereotypes from the period: Ali as the headstrong, war-mongering type of Arab, and Mahmoud as the strong, silent-and-wise desert-prince type. Although the caricaturing might be a result of the fact that Ali and Mahmoud are not really Bedouin, nor really even Middle-Eastern at all to begin with, I do wish their characters had been expanded a bit more. Ali, in particular, could use a bit more character development, since his actions are always so seemingly contrary and difficult to understand at times. While I could simply shrug and point a finger at the first-person narrative point-of-view employed by the novels, which significantly narrows the amount of information - and thus character development - that can be given to other outlying characters, I feel that something could have been done to showcase the Hazr's pasts a bit more, and thus expand on their characters as well.

And then there are the minor characters: the men, women, and children (and, yes, mules) they encounter along the way. I have grown particularly attached to the abbot of an isolated monastery whom Holmes and Russell pay a visit to while inquiring into the murder of a friend and colleague of the Hazrs. I liked what I saw of him, and the impression he left on me was far more striking than some of the other characters previously and later encountered. If the novels do return to this area, I hope that I get to read more about him, and hopefully he will take on a much larger role in the story than what he filled in this one - though hopefully, not as the victim.

But it is the plot, and the resulting adventure that Holmes and Russell have in the Holy Land as a result of it, that really drew me in. Here is political intrigue on a grand scale; here is a mastermind with a deadly and powerful motive, and a decent level of intelligence to back it up; and here is an ancient city, a veritable tinderbox of political, religious, and social tensions, all waiting for a spark to set it all ablaze and let war begin anew. I found the storyline in this one significantly better than the last few books, and indeed it edges up slightly ahead in my eyes over the first. If this had come in second, after The Beekeeper's Apprentice, I would not have been so reluctant to pick up the succeeding books, though I think the rest would have been rather anticlimactic after this.

This novel succeeds in completely restoring my good faith in the series, and makes me look forward to more. Some might think the plot a little too “Indiana Jones” for their tastes, but those who love reading about Holmes (and hopefully, at this stage, Russell too) being put through hellfire, danger, and torture (metaphorically and literally speaking), but to come out of it triumphant heroes, then this novel will certainly be a resounding success.