Naeem Murr

Here they are.

They're completely connected at the center of all of this incredible disconnection of horror, of war.

And I think those themes of the

Paradise is always with us, right?

Paradise is always with us.

There's a moment where Jack is in Gaza

And he feels that paradise beneath the surface.

He can smell the honeysuckle.

He can look out at the sea at this beautiful view.

And for a moment, he feels that right underneath, he could imagine sort of, you know, Israeli children like dropping their guns and Palestinian children dropping their stones.

And just for a second, he can feel this connectedness that is always there, pressuring out the sacred, always pressuring up through the profane.

And of course, then he can smell

tear gas and he can smell you know the burning tires and you know the the profane disconnected world sort of returns and that for me is sort of the whole substance and material of the book is about the sacred trying to pressure up through the profane world and that struggle to connect which is the only thing that connect us to sort of the sacred to the Edenic world in some way so I think

all of the relationships in some ways reflect and refract that struggle.

Thank you, Beth.

It was great.