This book was ok.
On the upside, the book explored the Arab/Israeli conflict from two different points of views, Le Clezio's descriptions of the refugee experience were heartbreaking and thought-provoking, his writing has a lyrical quality to it that can be lovely to read, and the book explores the "brief encounter" and how it can impact participants long after it actually happened.
The downside? The writing flows but the story does not- it goes from slow meandering to abrupt changes and back again. His lyrical quality sometimes disintegrated into vague insinuations that were frustrating to try to interpret. The story reads as though Le Clezio did not do as much research as he could have- he picked up some interesting facts (i.e. the Palestinian myth of the dejeune (sp?)), read some newspapers so he would get the names right, and wrote a story.