Track Changes - Hardcover

Kashua, Sayed

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0802147895 ISBN 13: 9780802147899

Publisher: Grove Press, 2020

Synopsis

Hailed as “an unusually gifted storyteller with exceptional insight” (Jewish Tribune), Bernstein award-winning writer Sayed Kashua presents his masterful fourth novel Track Changes which follows an Arab-Israeli man as he reckons with the weight of his past, his memories, and his cultural identity.

Having emigrated to America years before, a nameless memoirist now residing in Illinois receives word that his estranged father, whom he has not spoken to in fourteen years, is dying. Leaving his wife and their three children, he returns to Jerusalem and to his hometown of Tira in Palestine to be by his family’s side.  But few are happy to see him back and, geographically and emotionally displaced, he feels more alienated from his life than ever. 

Sitting by his father’s hospital bed, the memoirist begins to remember long-buried traumas, the root causes of his fallout with his family, the catalyst for his marriage and its recent dissolution, and his strained relationships with his children—all of which is strangely linked to a short story he published years ago about a young girl named Palestine. As he plunges deeper into his memory and recounts the history of his land and his love, the lines between truth and lies, fact and fiction become increasingly blurred.

Track Changes is a stunningly original, poignant, and captivating exploration of alienation, love, country, and memory by one of the most important writers at work today.

About this title

About the Author

SAYED KASHUA is the author of the novels Dancing Arabs, Let It Be Morning, which was shortlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, Second Person Singular, winner of the prestigious Bemstein Prize, and Native. He writes a weekly column for Haaretz and is the creator of the prize-winning sitcom Arab Labor. Now living in the United States with his family, he teaches at the University of Illinois.

Review

Praise for Second Person Singular

“A master of subtle nuance in dealing with both Arab and Jewish society.”—New York Times

“Part comedy of manners, part psychological mystery... Issues of nationalism, religion, and passing collide with quickly changing social and sexual mores.”—Boston Globe

“Kashua keenly dissects issues of identity and class...The themes are universal.”—Los Angeles Times

Praise for Let it be Morning

“Kashua goes beyond the front page headlines and horrific newspaper photos of Middle East violence to show a different view of what being an Arab is all about.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“Sharp, powerful, and uncompromising... one of the most potent and impressive novels written in Hebrew in the last several years.”—Haaretz

“Fascinating... Reading Kashua is a reminder of how little fiction from the Middle East we read and how welcome it would be to see more.”—Washington Times

 

About this edition

• Publisher: Grove Press
• Publication date: 2020
• ISBN 10: 0802147895
• ISBN 13: 9780802147899
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 224