by Sélim Nassib & translated by Alison Anderson ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 15, 2006
An eloquent lament.
A fictional memoir of the intense, symbiotic relationship between an Egyptian poet and the Arab world’s greatest female singer.
In rapt, lyrical prose, Paris-based writer and journalist Nassib spins a rhapsodic narrative out of the indissoluble connection between two creative souls inextricably bound by their art. His nameless protagonists, the poet and the singer, are based on historical figures Ahmad Rami and Om Kalthoum, and their story plays out against the transformative political events of 20th-century Egypt. Returning to his nation in the early 1920s, shortly after Independence Day, the poet is invited to attend a concert at which his words are brilliantly interpreted and sung by a young peasant girl dressed as a Bedouin boy. A spark ignites between the gifted writer and the astonishing performer, and he willingly agrees to write more aching poetry for her to sing. In keeping with the nation’s mood, the singer, whose fame advances rapidly, casts aside the influence of her lowly family to personify the modernism of the new age. Dubbed the “Star of the Orient,” she spends many years unmarried, although gossip about her private life abounds. Over time, their attachment becomes a voracious, destructive factor in the poet’s life. When relations are cool between them, he understands the full measure and pain of the inhuman force uniting them, which also drives a wedge between him and his wife Hoda. The diva performs across the Arab world and at every key national event, coming to embody the country’s progress as it moves through a military coup, the rise of Nasser, then the Suez era. By the time of the Six-Day War, she is over 60, and the defeat causes a collapse, but she rallies and leads the effort to mobilize the country. Her funeral in the 1970s, and Nasser’s assassination, mark the end of hope for “eastern modernism.”
An eloquent lament.Pub Date: Feb. 15, 2006
ISBN: 1-933372-07-9
Page Count: 254
Publisher: Europa Editions
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2006
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by Khaled Hosseini ‧ RELEASE DATE: June 2, 2003
Rather than settle for a coming-of-age or travails-of-immigrants story, Hosseini has folded them both into this searing...
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Here’s a real find: a striking debut from an Afghan now living in the US. His passionate story of betrayal and redemption is framed by Afghanistan’s tragic recent past.
Moving back and forth between Afghanistan and California, and spanning almost 40 years, the story begins in Afghanistan in the tranquil 1960s. Our protagonist Amir is a child in Kabul. The most important people in his life are Baba and Hassan. Father Baba is a wealthy Pashtun merchant, a larger-than-life figure, fretting over his bookish weakling of a son (the mother died giving birth); Hassan is his sweet-natured playmate, son of their servant Ali and a Hazara. Pashtuns have always dominated and ridiculed Hazaras, so Amir can’t help teasing Hassan, even though the Hazara staunchly defends him against neighborhood bullies like the “sociopath” Assef. The day, in 1975, when 12-year-old Amir wins the annual kite-fighting tournament is the best and worst of his young life. He bonds with Baba at last but deserts Hassan when the latter is raped by Assef. And it gets worse. With the still-loyal Hassan a constant reminder of his guilt, Amir makes life impossible for him and Ali, ultimately forcing them to leave town. Fast forward to the Russian occupation, flight to America, life in the Afghan exile community in the Bay Area. Amir becomes a writer and marries a beautiful Afghan; Baba dies of cancer. Then, in 2001, the past comes roaring back. Rahim, Baba’s old business partner who knows all about Amir’s transgressions, calls from Pakistan. Hassan has been executed by the Taliban; his son, Sohrab, must be rescued. Will Amir wipe the slate clean? So he returns to the hell of Taliban-ruled Afghanistan and reclaims Sohrab from a Taliban leader (none other than Assef) after a terrifying showdown. Amir brings the traumatized child back to California and a bittersweet ending.
Rather than settle for a coming-of-age or travails-of-immigrants story, Hosseini has folded them both into this searing spectacle of hard-won personal salvation. All this, and a rich slice of Afghan culture too: irresistible.Pub Date: June 2, 2003
ISBN: 1-57322-245-3
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2003
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by Khaled Hosseini ; illustrated by Dan Williams
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SEEN & HEARD
by Roy Jacobsen ; translated by Don Bartlett & Don Shaw ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 7, 2020
A deeply satisfying novel, both sensuously vivid and remarkably poignant.
Norwegian novelist Jacobsen folds a quietly powerful coming-of-age story into a rendition of daily life on one of Norway’s rural islands a hundred years ago in a novel that was shortlisted for the 2017 Man Booker International Prize.
Ingrid Barrøy, her father, Hans, mother, Maria, grandfather Martin, and slightly addled aunt Barbro are the owners and sole inhabitants of Barrøy Island, one of numerous small family-owned islands in an area of Norway barely touched by the outside world. The novel follows Ingrid from age 3 through a carefree early childhood of endless small chores, simple pleasures, and unquestioned familial love into her more ambivalent adolescence attending school off the island and becoming aware of the outside world, then finally into young womanhood when she must make difficult choices. Readers will share Ingrid’s adoration of her father, whose sense of responsibility conflicts with his romantic nature. He adores Maria, despite what he calls her “la-di-da” ways, and is devoted to Ingrid. Twice he finds work on the mainland for his sister, Barbro, but, afraid she’ll be unhappy, he brings her home both times. Rooted to the land where he farms and tied to the sea where he fishes, Hans struggles to maintain his family’s hardscrabble existence on an island where every repair is a struggle against the elements. But his efforts are Sisyphean. Life as a Barrøy on Barrøy remains precarious. Changes do occur in men’s and women’s roles, reflected in part by who gets a literal chair to sit on at meals, while world crises—a war, Sweden’s financial troubles—have unexpected impact. Yet the drama here occurs in small increments, season by season, following nature’s rhythm through deaths and births, moments of joy and deep sorrow. The translator’s decision to use roughly translated phrases in conversation—i.e., “Tha’s goen’ nohvar” for "You’re going nowhere")—slows the reading down at first but ends up drawing readers more deeply into the world of Barrøy and its prickly, intensely alive inhabitants.
A deeply satisfying novel, both sensuously vivid and remarkably poignant.Pub Date: April 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-77196-319-0
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Biblioasis
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2020
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by Roy Jacobsen & translated by Don Bartlett & Don Shaw
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