This is a story of ordinary people trying to do what’s right in extraordinary times. A new era beckoned in the Middle East in 1920. Gone was the old, corrupted Ottoman rule, succeeded now by a British authority promising peace, prosperity and order—with the pledge of a better life in Palestine for its Arab inhabitants, plus a homeland there for the Jews. But the next twenty-eight years beheld rapidly worsening strife, with ill feeling all around. The bitterest of triangles provoked fearsome and widening bloodshed. In This Storied Land, you’ll meet people pitting their best against each day’s turmoil: Rivka, a Jewish farmer—Avram, her militant husband—Leila, her confidante, an Arab laundress—Nellie, her friend, a nurse—Morris, Nellie’s husband, a British doctor—and all of their children, all born into the seething cauldron that ended in 1948 with the State of Israel’s debut.