The Stars Shine Brighter
A Father and Son in Gaza
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- Pre-Order
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- Expected Sep 8, 2026
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- $10.99
Publisher Description
A Palestinian journalist’s extraordinary account of family, survival, and resilience amid the ongoing genocide.
On the morning of October 7, 2023, Rami Abou Jamous is already packed. A respected francophone journalist from Palestine, he quickly grasps what the scale of the Israeli response will be. His emergency bag containing passports, clothes, medical supplies, and cash is never far away—Rami is the father of a two-year-old son, Walid, whom he must protect at all costs, physically and psychologically.
He decides to create a bubble around this little boy that fear, anxiety, and sadness will not be able to penetrate. Explosions are fireworks, drones are birds in full flight, and Walid keeps smiling. Through a series of forced moves from Gaza City to Rafah to Deir al-Balah, from a large, modern apartment to a refugee tent, Rami fights to preserve the safety and dignity of his family and neighbors.
A declaration of a father’s love for his son, The Stars Shine Brighter plunges the reader into the everyday reality of one of the worst humanitarian disasters of our time. A unique and priceless testimony about supporting others when everything around you is collapsing.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
"In front of the whole world's eyes and with complete impunity, this ‘Gazacide' is taking place and no one is doing anything," observes Palestinian journalist Jamous in his heartrending debut memoir of survival in war-torn Gaza. He centers his account around the experience of being a new father trying to protect his two-year-old son Walid both physically and emotionally from the brutality around him. "As if in a movie, I've been playing a part for a year, acting the clown to spare him the realities of our life," Jamous explains as he narrates teaching his son to clap for "fireworks" that are actually bombs. Forced to leave their apartment after his wife and son nearly died in an attack on the building next door, Jamous chronicles their odyssey through multiple refugee cites, living as a family of six with his wife, Walid, and his three stepsons in a tent he wryly calls "the Villa." Despite offers from friends to help him and his family escape Gaza, Jamous feels that "as a journalist, my conscience couldn't bear the burden of guilt if I left.... I hope that our son will be proud of this choice someday." This is a powerful testament to the sacrifices Palestinian journalists continue to make to report on the atrocities committed against their homeland.
