A GUARDIAN AND ECONOMIST BOOK OF THE YEAR 2022

'Spectacular... fascinating... astonishing... A literary triumph.' Jake Arnott, Guardian

How do you build a nation?

It takes statesmen and soldiers, farmers and factory workers, of course. But it also takes thieves, prostitutes and policemen.

Nation-building demands sacrifice. And one man knows exactly where those bodies are buried: Cohen, a man who loves his country. A reasonable man for unreasonable times.

A car bomb in the back streets of Tel Aviv. A diamond robbery in Haifa. Civil war in Lebanon. Rebel fighters in the Colombian jungle. A double murder in Los Angeles.

How do they all connect? Only Cohen knows.

Maror is the story of a war for a country's soul – a dazzling spread of narrative gunshots across four decades and three continents.

It is a true story. All of these things happened.

Praise for Maror:

'A bloody beast of a book.' Daily Mail

'This is crime writing in the tradition of Balzac and Dickens and a major achievement, full of sound, fury, drugs and blood... An earthquake of a book.' CrimeTime

'Some write in ink, others in song, Tidhar writes in fire... Maror is a kaleidoscopic masterpiece, immense in its sympathies, alarming in its irreverences and altogether exhilarating.' Junot Díaz

'One of the boldest, most visionary writers I've ever read creates both a vivid political exploration and a riveting crime epic. It's like the Jewish Godfather!' Silvia Moreno-Garcia

'Maror blends the page-turning wit of a hard-boiled detective noir with the stirring intrigue of a multi-national political epic. An ambitious achievement that weaves a tapestry of both story and statement.' Kevin Jared Hosein

'Radiant with [...] the richly nuanced complexity and style of Marlon James' A Brief History of Seven Killings ... Will catch your breath as it presents the history of Israel from unique points of view, with dazzling multi-generational scope.' LoveReading