Najwa Barakat

I really enjoyed reading this book despite being thoroughly confused for most of the story. I had to take a break after a particularly rough moment in the timeline, but when I came back to it it turned out I'd been through the hardest of the content already. The timeline confusion was a deliberate construct, and it was done very well and to good effect, but the whole story was disorientingly light considering how disturbing the actual content was. It worked in the end, as really the whole point of the story, and made me really want to read an actual history of the region and the violence. I wish the book had included some kind of historical note or context at the end, or reference books to move to if readers wanted more information, but that's not the point of the story and not the job of the author. Worth reading; hard to process.… (mer)

Ooof, I just couldn't get into this book. It took me forever to finish just because I never felt like picking it up and when I did I would barely read 2 or 3 pages before giving up. It is a confusing tale of mental illness that jumps continuously through time and space without explanation and you don't truely understand what's going on until the epilogue. There were some striking scenes and satisfactorily surprising revelations, but overall I did not enjoy the writing and I had no interest in following the lives of the characters. Looking at other reviews many people seemed to find the story compelling and enjoyed the journey the author took you on, but for me I wish I had spent the time with a different book.… (mer)