When the Grey Beetles Took Over Baghdad - Softcover

Mona Yahia

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1870015851 ISBN 13: 9781870015851

Publisher: Peter Halban Publishers Ltd, 2003

Synopsis

Lina is trying to lead a normal girl's life in Baghdad, but being Jewish in an Arab country is not easy as politics keep intruding. Violent government coups are almost annual events and it's difficult for a child to understand what's going on or who to believe. The need for secrecy means Lina cannot tell her best friend that her family is just waiting for the right moment to flee. It is the 1960s and Lina is part of the dwindling Jewish community

About this title

About the Author:

Born in Baghdad in 1954, Mona Yahia escaped in 1970 and went to live in Israel. In 1985 she moved to Germany to study fine arts and has remained there ever since.

From Publishers Weekly:

Born in Baghdad in 1954 and a refugee to Israel with her family in 1970, Yahia makes her impressive debut with this sharp recollection of the virulently anti-Semitic Iraq of the l960s through the eyes of a teenaged Jewish girl. Thirteen-year-old Lina identifies herself as Iraqi first, albeit a member of a minority, and is more curious than fearful about the word "persecution," often whispered in the Jewish community in the aftermath of the 1967 Six Day War. The definitions she learns won't be subtle: her older brother, Shaul, will be imprisoned for drawing a Star of David on a chalkboard; her father will lose his accounting job; and her swimming teacher and a schoolmate will be tortured and publicly executed on trumped-up charges by the new Baath regime. The only hope of evading the security police, who often drive gray Volkswagen Beetles, is to make the dangerous flight through Iran. As Lina's family gradually plans their escape, she experiences the whims and pangs of growing up, a first love, sibling rivalry. The novel's beginning feels choppy as the narrative jumps from scene to scene of Lina's early childhood, but the vividly realized detours enrich the reader's understanding of Lina's suffering at her country's betrayal. (Apr.)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Peter Halban Publishers Ltd
• Publication date: 2003
• ISBN 10: 1870015851
• ISBN 13: 9781870015851
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 416