In Riyadh, against the events of the second Gulf War and Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait, we learn the story of Munira—with the gorgeous eyes—and the unspeakable tragedy she suffers as her male nemesis wreaks revenge for an insult to his character and manhood. It is also the tale of many other women of Saudi Arabia […]
Beheadings, both literal and metaphorical are the subject of the six stories in Heads Ripe Plucking. The narrative takes us from the most archetypal beheading in Arabo-Islamic history, that of al-Husayn, the grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, via the torture of communists in Nasser’s detention camps, and the meanderings of a Cairene teenager unwittingly caught […]
A warm, inspired portrait of an extended Arab family in an Arab-America community. All of these related stories are set in an Arab (Lebanese and Syrian) neighborhood in Toledo, Ohio, and many of the characters appear and reappear in more than one story–all of which range in time from the 1930s to the present.
Memory in the Flesh, the first novel written by an Algerian woman to become a bestseller in Arabic, centres on Algeria’s struggle against foreign domination, capturing four decades of that nation’s tumultuous history. This award-winning novel is told in the narrative voice of Khaled, a former revolutionary and painter who has lost his left arm […]
First published in 1940 and now translated into English, this work comrises three novellas of love and death in the Eygptian countryside. The stories offer the reader an insight into the intimate geographical and psychological spaces of the different Eygptian classes and upbringings.
Khan al-Khalili tells the story of the Akifs, a middle-class family that has taken refuge in Cairo’s historic neighborhood during the Second World War. Through the eyes of Ahmad, the eldest Akif son, Naguib Mahfouz presents a richly textured vision of the Khan al-Khalili. As Ahmad interacts with the people of this market district, a […]