Sami, a retired doctor, lives with his son and grandchildren in Brooklyn. But Sami keeps losing his way. Every day he sinks deeper into dementia and old memories of life in Iraq before the war.

Omar arrives in the US with a fake identity and no friends or family. Having run away from the Iraqi army, he has been branded a deserter and his ear brutally cut off. Omar carries this mark of shame with him and refuses to talk about the past. He dreams of getting his ear, and his dignity, back.

When their paths cross at least one of them knows that they have met before - if only he could remember where. Exploring the aftermath of war and how the past haunts new beginnings, Notes from a Lost Country creates a moving portrait of life in exile.

About the Author
Sinan Antoon is a poet, novelist, and translator. He left Iraq in 1991 after the Gulf War. Antoon received his PhD from Harvard in 2006 and currently lives in New York, where he is associate professor of Arabic literature at NYU. He is the cofounder and co-editor of the e-zine Jadaliyya (http://www.jadaliyya.com/) which is published in Arabic and English. His novel Index (Yale UP, 2015) was longlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction and The Pomegranate Alone (The Corpse Washer, Yale UP, 2014) was awarded The Arabic Literature Prize 2017 and the World Arab Institute-Lagardere.


Book Information
ISBN 9781849251235
Author Sinan Antoon
Format Hardback
Page Count 240
Imprint Saqi Books
Publisher Saqi Books
Weight(grams) 350g
Dimensions(mm) 216mm * 135mm * 23mm