Book Reviews

“A Tunisian Revolt” — the Rebel Power of Arab Comics

“A Tunisian Revolt” — the Rebel Power of Arab Comics

Writer-translator Nada Ghosn talks to the illustrator of a new graphic novel recounting one of Tunisia's earliest uprisings,...

21 FEBRUARY 2022 • By I. Rida Mahmood
Poetic Justice: 70+ Contemporary Poets of Morocco

Poetic Justice: 70+ Contemporary Poets of Morocco

Amazigh Moroccan poet El Habib Louai reviews a recent anthology that has warmed the hearts of English-reading Moroccans...

31 JANUARY 2022 • By El Habib Louai
Hananah Zaheer’s “Lovebirds”? Don’t Be Fooled by the Title

Hananah Zaheer’s “Lovebirds”? Don’t Be Fooled by the Title

Mehnaz Afridi reviews the new book of short stories by a Pakistani American writer determined to disrupt her...

31 JANUARY 2022 • By Lorraine Ali
Arabic and Latin, Cosmopolitan Languages of the Premodern Mediterranean and its Hinterlands

Arabic and Latin, Cosmopolitan Languages of the Premodern Mediterranean and its Hinterlands

Justin Stearns, a scholar of the pre-modern Muslim Middle East, reviews the new book by Karla Mallette on...

24 JANUARY 2022 • By Nouha Homad
Meditations on The Ungrateful Refugee

Meditations on The Ungrateful Refugee

Rana Asfour shares her thoughts on the widely-celebrated book from Dina Nayeri, who writes that escaping and becoming...

15 JANUARY 2022 • By Rana Asfour
Gaza Melancholic

Gaza Melancholic

Author and SOAS professor Gilbert Achcar reviews the latest book from Gaza scholar Sara Roy.

10 JANUARY 2022 • By Basil Al-Adraa
Temptations of the Imagination: how Jana Elhassan and Samar Yazbek transmogrify the world

Temptations of the Imagination: how Jana Elhassan and Samar Yazbek transmogrify the world

Rana Asfour provides an intimate look at two new Arab novels in translation, from Lebanese and Syrian authors.

10 JANUARY 2022 • By Rana Asfour
Recovering/Remembering Love, Sex and Trauma

Recovering/Remembering Love, Sex and Trauma

Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi follows her novels "Fra Keeler" and "Call Me Zebra" with a story set...

13 DECEMBER 2021 • By Jordan Elgrably
From Jerusalem to a Kingdom by the Sea

From Jerusalem to a Kingdom by the Sea

Rana Asfour reviews a new memoir about the legendary Dajani family, charged by a Turkish sultan with watching...

29 NOVEMBER 2021 • By Rana Asfour
Three Banned Saudi Novels Everyone Should Read

Three Banned Saudi Novels Everyone Should Read

Despite its repressive regimes, Saudi Arabia has produced a number of world-class novelists — several of whom have...

22 NOVEMBER 2021 • By Rana Asfour
Diary of the Collapse—Charif Majdalani on Lebanon’s Trials by Fire

Diary of the Collapse—Charif Majdalani on Lebanon’s Trials by Fire

A.J. Naddaff reviews the latest work of creative nonfiction by Lebanon's Charif Majdalani, as his nation teeters on...

15 NOVEMBER 2021 • By A.J. Naddaff
The Vanishing: Are Arab Christians an Endangered Minority?

The Vanishing: Are Arab Christians an Endangered Minority?

Hadani Ditmars reviews Janine di Giovanni's ambitious new travelogue on beleaguered Christian communities in Iraq, Gaza, Syria, and...

15 NOVEMBER 2021 • By Mohja Kahf
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