In this contemporary story, Israeli teen Tal contacts a Palestinian boy, “Gazaman,” when he finds the message she has placed in a bottle. An e-mail correspondence begins, and although each is cautious, a strong bond forms and barriers are broken. si

Originally published as Une Bouteille dans la Mer de Gaza in French by L’Ecole des Loisirs France, in 2005. Translated by Adriana Hunter.

A seventeen-year-old from Jerusalem, Tal Levine comes from a family that always believed peace would come to the Middle East. She cried tears of joy when President Clinton and Yitzhak Rabin shook hands with Yasser Arafat in 1993-a moment of hope that would stay with her forever. But when a terrorist explosion kills a young woman at a caf� in Jerusalem, something changes for Tal. One day she writes a letter, puts it in a bottle, and sends it to Gaza-to the other side-beginning a correspondence with a young Palestinian man that will ultimately open their eyes to each other's lives and hearts.