Mysteries to Die For Book Club: "The Collaborator of Bethlehem" - Matt Rees

Join Elsie Souza for an international reading journey through the world's most captivating mysteries! The Mysteries to Die For Book Club is led by Elsie Souza, reading murder, mayhem, and marvelous prose. From Nordic noir to British whodunits, each book reveals how crime and storytelling cross borders, and what our favorite detectives can teach us about culture, justice, and the human heart. This month, we're reading Matt Rees's The Collaborator of Bethlehem—a tense, atmospheric mystery set in the West Bank during the Second Intifada, where a murder threatens to ignite an already divided community. When a Palestinian Christian is accused of collaborating with the Israelis and killed, schoolteacher Omar Yussef refuses to accept the easy explanation—especially when one of his former students is arrested for the crime. His search for the truth takes him through Bethlehem's refugee camps, political factions, armed militias, and old family loyalties, where asking the wrong question can be dangerous and nearly everyone has reason to keep quiet. The first book in Rees's Omar Yussef series, The Collaborator of Bethlehem introduces an unusual amateur detective: a middle-aged history teacher armed less with authority than with stubbornness, decency, and an insistence on getting the story right. Both a murder mystery and a portrait of life under occupation, it's a novel about what it takes to pursue justice in a place where truth itself has become dangerous territory. ABOUT THE BOOK: “Matt Rees has taken a complex world of culture clash and suspicion and placed upon it humanity.”—David Baldacci Omar Yussef has taught history in Bethlehem for decades. When a favorite former student, a member of the Palestinian Christian minority, is arrested for collaborating with the Israelis in the killing of a Palestinian guerrilla—a transgression with an inevitable death sentence—Omar is sure he has been framed. When Omar begins to suspect the head of the Bethlehem al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades is the true collaborator, he and his family are threatened, but since no one else will stand up to the violent Martyrs Brigades who hold power over the city, it is up to him to investigate. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Matt Rees is an award-winning crime novelist and foreign correspondent. He is the author of the internationally acclaimed Omar Yussef crime series, including The Collaborator of Bethlehem. He is also the author of Cain’s Field, a nonfiction account of Israeli and Palestinian society. Matt lives in Jerusalem.