The Nobel prize in literature is reserved for authors whose bodies of work span decades and demonstrate not only a proficiency for the written word, but also an understanding of human nature and emotion that goes beyond convention. Last year the prize was awarded to Jean-Maire Gustave Le Clezio of France, an author who not only pens best-sellers but is also regarded highly throughout the literary community as being a “true” artist of the highest order. An author of over forty works in the last forty years, his novels, such as Onitsha (1991), Diego et Frida (1993), and most recently The Prospector (2008), delve into the human experience with confidence and vigor. Wandering Star (first published in 1992, re-released in 2004 by Curbstone Press) however, is a novel that despite the rest of the author’s catalog, falls flat too often to ignore, though not so often as to be unforgivable.

Wandering Star weaves together two discrete stories that follow two discrete girls, one Jewish and one Palestinian, who meet once, briefly and by chance. The two girls’ stories are tied together not by plot, but by substance within their own stories. Both girls are (wait for it) wandering stars in search of a homeland– Esther seeks to escape the Nazis and the Holocaust as Nejma experiences the horror of the Palestinian refugee camps. It’s a story of suffering and dark times with moments of love, kindness, and the beauty of nature shining through it all.

My first impression was that the book would’ve benefited from more editing. I found two typos on page six, and it’s not like I was combing through looking for them. There are also several inconsistencies in the story line, and too many minor plots got dropped into nothingness. I have to question the translation (provided by C. Dickson).

I got the sense LeClezio didn’t like Nejma as much as he did Esther. Nejma’s story seemed underdeveloped, and ended abruptly.

Wandering Start contains lots and lots (and lots) of prose between spats of unfulfilling dialogue. The language is beautiful (seriously, beautiful), but tough, and dense, like Henry James, but prettier, and oh-so French. The book feels timely considering it was written almost twenty years ago, but it’s not really, and the quasi-insights (“diet” insights, if you will) offered to me often left me feeling empty, a feeling I’m not accustomed to from Le Clezio.

The narration jumps between an omniscient storyteller who cares little for the characters’ feelings or thoughts and passages that read like personal diaries. The author’s voice was more than a bit too strong everywhere; the protagonists are female and the story is related from many different points of view, but it was hard to forget that just one male was writing it. The characters felt plastic, almost unrealistic, which is very atypical for Le Clezio who usually has characters so full of life and humanity.

It’s an amazing story told with the utmost beauty against the most wretched pain, and Le Clezio does a masterful job writing in a way that neither moralizes nor politicizes the very real suffering that Esther and Nejma experience. If you’ve never read anything from this author before, though, start with something else (anything else, really), because this book was not as inspired or thoughtful as a reader would expect from a Nobel Prize winner, or even from Le Clezio, pre-Nobel.

Sliding scale rating: 5.5-7.5 out of 10.