Beirut Noir
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- 12,99 €
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- 12,99 €
Publisher Description
“Haunting” stories about crimes that are “often submerged in the greater tragedy of a beautiful city constantly torn within and without by violence” (Publishers Weekly).
Beirut is a city both urban and rural, a city of violence and forgiveness, memory and forgetfulness, war and peace. This short story collection, rich with moody suspense, brings this Middle Eastern city and its troubled history to vivid life—revealing the vast maze of the city that can’t be found in tourist brochures or hazy, nostalgic depictions of Beirut.
Featuring brand-new stories by Rawi Hage, Mohamad Abi Samra, Leila Eid, Hala Kawtharani, Marie Tawk, Bana Baydoun, Hyam Yared, Najwa Barakat, Alawiyeh Sobh, Mazen Zahreddine, Abbas Beydoun, Bachir Hilal, Zena El Khalil, Mazen Maarouf, and Tarek Abi Samra.
“The Lebanese authors featured in the collection draw from a much broader palette of Beirut life, and, true to the genre, they tap into their city’s dark past and uncertain present. Some stories are absurd and humorous, but almost all are haunted in some way by a nagging memory, a war, a death.” —The National
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Humaydan writes in her introduction to this haunting anthology that "all of the stories are somehow framed by the Lebanese civil war, which lasted from approximately 1974 until 1990." The war's pervasive dislocations and disruptions have a wide range of voices. In Leila Eid's "Beirut Apples," the narrator notes, "There was no need to count the years here... our lives were made of gunfire, random bullets shot by depraved snipers." In Hala Kawtharani's "The Thread of Life," a doctor is inured to the horrific injuries he treats, until he becomes obsessed with a woman in a coma. The narrator of Zena el Khalil's "Maya Rose" is a stillborn baby, whose soul rises above the battle-scarred land below. The crimes in this Akashic noir volume are often submerged in the greater tragedy of a beautiful city constantly torn within and without by violence. Three of the 15 selections were originally written in English.
