Fate’s Open Arms
About the Book
The story stretches over a period of two decades and tells the story of Roy Cohen, an Israeli boy, who immigrates with his family to the land of the free leaving behind the land of milk and honey. Roy is thrown unprepared into the embracing arms of a rich American teenage society of the 1980s and attends Beverly Hills High School. He does very well in his acclimation process thanks to his talents in sports and music and falls in love with a breathtaking beautiful, Jewish, teenager. Roy joins a successful youth rock-band and fulfills some of his childhood dreams. All goes well until he finds out a traumatic truth about the love of his life which obliges him to give her up. His world falls apart. He decides to leave everything behind and join the Israeli Defence Forces.
The story is told by Roy himself as he travels back to Israel, some 13 years later, seated in his designated seat inside a 747 Jumbo-Jet airplane, reminiscing, after finding out what has happened to his high school sweetheart. The story begins in Israel of 1982 and ends in Israel of 2009.
Apart from being a powerful and moving love story, the reader gets a taste of what it means to be an immigrant boy in America, a Jew with the historical awerness and the enormous weight of history on his shoulder, an Israeli citizen in an embattled coutry and an IDF soldier. All of this from a personal, first-hand, testimony of a real Israeli boy, turns a man, who undergoes all the difficult stages of puberty and maturity in sometimes the most difficult of circumstances. The reader also gets a glimpse into the world of Judaism, Zionism and Anti-Semitism.
To watch the author’s presentation of the book on YOUTUBE, go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4KGcluy-_48
Book-Author Autobiographical Connection
Although the book is fiction, many details are autobiographic. The author did live for two years in Los Angeles and did attend Beverly Hills High School, where most of the story takes place. The author was also a soccer player, playing in his youth in Israeli semi-professional soccer teams, so the game, which is described the book, is well known to him.
The author is also a musician and a guitarist who played in different groups during the years and is a very active musician until this very day (go to: www.ofermazar.com), so he knows all the necessary details about bands and musical instruments mentioned in his book. The author served his mandatory military service in the IDF during the first Palestinian Intifada and saw the events unfold in front of his eyes. The author holds a Ph.D. degree and studied many years in the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He knows the university and its Mount Scopus campus well enough to describe it. The author has published a book in Hebrew about the triangle of relations Israel-U.S.-Egypt, as mentioned also in the book. Finally, the author is also an Israeli career diplomat and served in the past as Consul of Israel in three countries. He knows well the consular work, which an aspect of it is mentioned in the book.
About the Author
Ofer Mazar was born in Jerusalem, Israel, on August 1967. He was raised in Israel’s capital until his parents decided in 1980 to move their lives for couple of years to Los Angeles, where the husband of his aunt served as the Israeli Consular Officer. Being under his uncle’s guardianship, the author went to schools in the Beverly Hills district. The author completed his 8th grade in Beverly Vista Elementary School and went on to spend his freshman year in Beverly Hills High School. This short, but very vivid period in his life was the inspiration for Fate’s Open Arms.
The author returned to Israel with his family during the summer of 1982, completed his high school education and went on to serve his mandatory service in the IDF, witnessing the outbreak of the first Palestinian Intifada. After his army service, the author turned to the academy, studying and completing his Master’s degree in Political Science and then going on to complete his Ph.D. degree in the field of American Studies, in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Scopus. The author has joined the ranks of the Israeli Ministry of Foreign affairs in 1990 and ever since serves as a professional career diplomat. He served as the Consul of Israel in Thailand, Norway and Italy.
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Ofer Mazar's Author Website 