Ghassan Zeineddine Reflects On, Transcends the Identity Zeitgeist
Youssef Rakha is more interested in what it means to be a contemporary Arab-Muslim independently of the West than an American Arab.
Review
The Limits of Empathy in Rabih Alameddine’s Refugee Saga
The Wrong End of the Telescope a novel by Rabih Alameddine Grove Atlantic (Sept 2021) ISBN 9780802157805 Dima Alzayat When in 2018 director Lena Dunham announced she had been hired by producers Steven Spielberg and J.J. Abrams to adapt Marissa Fleming’s nonfiction book, A Hope More Powerful than the Sea:…
Shelf Life: The Irreverent Nadia Wassef
For a brutally honest look at what it’s been like to run a business and raise a family in Cairo these past twenty years, read Diwan’s founder Nadia Wassef’s “Shelf Life” How a labor of love consumes, challenges and fills her life with questions whose answers are often on the…
Palestinian Akram Musallam Writes of Loss and Memory
The Slovak-Palestinian writer khulud khamis (sic) of Haifa appreciates the spiralling storytelling of her compeer, Akram Musallam of Ramallah.
Reading Egypt from the Outside In, Youssef Rakha’s “Baraa and Zaman”
Baraa and Zaman: Reading Egyptian Modernity in Shadi Abdel Salam’s The Mummy , by Youssef Rakha Palgrave 2020 ISBN 9783030613532 Sherifa Zuhur Baraa and Zaman: Reading Egyptian Modernity in Shadi Abdel Salam’s The Mummy by Youssef Rakha is a surprising book, constructed as a series of separate paragraphs, like prose…
Egypt Dreams of Revolution, a Review of “Slipping”
Mohamed Kheir’s oneiric novel takes readers on a journey around Egypt after the failed Arab Spring.
Heba Hayek’s Gaza Memories
Shereen Malherbe reviews a new book from a first-time Gazan author based in London.
Open Gaza: Architectures of Hope
Hadani Ditmars reviews the new tome from Terreform and AUC Press that gives Gazans hope for a better future, if they can build it.
A Response to “Gaza: Mowing the Lawn” 2014-15
California poet and activist Tony Litwinko reacts to the painted images in "Gaza: Mowing the Lawn" from Jaime Scholnick.
“Hot Maroc” Satirizes Marrakesh, Moroccan Society
El Habib Louai on the Moroccan novel that sizes up and lampoons a country coming into its own in the internet age.
The Unfinished Presidency of Jimmy Carter
Maryam Zar reviews the new biography from Kai Bird, examining the one-term president who went on to change the world.
ISIS and the Absurdity of War in the Age of Twitter
Jessica Proett reviews Salar Abdoh's empirical novel set during the days when ISIS was running loose across Iraq and Syria.
A New Book on Music, Palestine-Israel & the “Three State Solution”
TMR reviews a new book on Palestinian and Israeli musicians looks at the border zones and interstices of the conflict.
Wasta on Steroids: Speculative Finance & the Housing Market
Mischa Geracoulis discovers the film Push and explores the incredible greed and inequity of the speculative housing market.
Spare Me the Empathy Tantrum: Rafia Zakaria’s “Against White Feminism”
Myriam Gurba reviews a book that argues that some "white feminists accept the benefits conferred by white supremacy at the expense of people of color."