Alaa is haunted by his grandmother's memories of being displaced from Jaffa and becoming a refugee in her homeland after the Nakba. Ariel, Alaa's neighbour and friend, is a liberal Zionist, critical of the military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza yet faithful to the project of Israel. When he wakes up one morning to find that all Palestinians have suddenly vanished, Ariel begins searching for clues to the secret of their collective disappearance.

That search, and Ariel's reactions to it, intimately reveal the fissures at the heart of the Palestinian question. Between the stories of Alaa and Ariel are the people of Jaffa and Tel Aviv - cafe patrons, radio commentators, flower-cutters - against whose ordinary lives these fissures and questions play out.

'In this immensely readable novel, Ms. Azem does not resolve for us the calamity of Palestine's occupation by Israel. But stylishly and with jeweled virtuosity she makes us understand that acts of great and humane imagination will be required, and with this potent book points where and how we must all go.' Richard Ford

What if all Palestinians vanished from their homeland overnight?

About the Author
Ibtisam Azem is a Palestinian novelist, short story writer, and journalist based in New York. She has published two novels in Arabic: The Sleep Thief (2011) and The Book of Disappearance (2014). Her first short story collection, I Wish I Were a Hoopoe, is forthcoming in Arabic in the summer of 2024. The Book of Disappearance has been translated into English, Italian, and German. Azem holds an MA in Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies with minors in German and English Literature from Freiburg University, as well as an MA in Social Work from NYU. Sinan Antoon is a poet, novelist, and translator. He holds degrees from Baghdad, Georgetown, and Harvard, where he specialized in Arabic literature. He has published five novels and three poetry collections. His most recent work is Postcards from the Underworld (Seagull 2023). His translation of Mahmoud Darwish's In the Presence of Absence won the 2012 American Literary Translators' Award. He is an associate professor at New York University.

Reviews

'Unquestionably powerful.' Words Without Borders

'A wonderful book, showing ... what the Palestinians have suffered and continue to suffer.' The Modern Novel

'A masterpiece which immediately leads the reader to ponder the historical foundations of the 1948 Nakba, as well as the Zionist intentions and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from the land where they belong.' Middle East Monitor

Book Information
ISBN 9781916751026
Author Ibtisam Azem
Format Paperback
Imprint And Other Stories
Publisher And Other Stories
Weight(grams) 130g