Leon Uris's novels "Exodus" and "Trinity" moved me, captivated me, and kept me up late at night. I expected his latest, "The Haj," to have the same effect, and I was very disappointed that it didn't.

The story failed to capture my interest until I was almost halfway through it, and I never got fully caught up in it. The writing is surprisingly poor; many of the characters never come to life, and Uris continually hits the reader over the head with his prejudices against the Arab world and Islam….

The opening chapters are confused, because Uris jumps around in time and switches viewpoints continually. Granted, in order for a reader to understand the historical events in which the characters are involved, he or she must know something of the history of Palestine. But Uris provides so much information I sometimes wondered if I was reading a novel...