Lion’s Honey: The Myth of Samson

In “Lion’s Honey”, award-winning writer David Grossman takes on one of the most vivid and controversial characters in the Bible. Revisiting Samson’s famous battle with the lion, his many women and his betrayal by them all, including the only one he ever loved. Grossman gives us a provocative new take on the story and its climax, Samson’s final act of death, brining down a temple on himself and three thousand Philistines. In exhilarating and lucid prose, Grossman reveals the journey of a single, lonely and tortured soul who never found a true home in the world, who was uncomfortable in his very body and who, some might say, was the precursor of today’s suicide bombers.

Reviews of Lion’s Honey: The Myth of Samson

"Original and very clever." The Times "The story strikes numerous sparks in Israeli history, and one of the pleasures of the book is where he locates the precise settings of the biblical narrative in Israel and Palestine." Independent "What he does is to deal with an old, neglected text in a way that rekindles interest in and fascination for it." Spectator "His tone is both informal and didactic, the result both enriching and entertaining," TLS"