The Hidden Light of Objects - Hardcover

Al-Nakib, Mai

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 999219541X ISBN 13: 9789992195413

Publisher: Bloomsbury USA, 2015

Synopsis

For fans of Alice Munro and Lorrie Moore.

A young girl, renamed Amerika in honour of the US role in the liberation of Kuwait, finds her name has become a barometer of her country’s growing hostility towards the West. A middle-aged man dying from cancer looks back on his extramarital affairs and the abiding forgiveness of his wife.

The headlines tell of war, unrest and religious clashes. But if you look beyond them you will see life in the Middle East as it is really lived--adolescent love, the fragility of marriage, pain of the most quotidian kind. Mai Al-Nakib’s luminous stories unveil the lives of ordinary people--and the power of objects to hold extraordinary memories.

About this title

About the Author

Mai Al-Nakib was born in Kuwait in 1970. She holds a PhD in English literature from Brown University and teaches postcolonial studies and comparative literature at Kuwait University. The Hidden Light of Objects is her first collection of short stories. She lives in Kuwait, and is currently writing her first novel.

Review

“The old world and the new. The strife in the Gulf, once peaceful and reflective. East and West, Arabic and English, the poetry of the heart, the eye of the hawk; all these elements produce the lustrous pearls of Mai Al-Nakib's short stories.” ―Hanan al-Shaykh, author of Beirut Blues

“Through a richly nuanced and generous lens, Al-Nakib's gracefully intertwined stories celebrate the living desire that connects us to home--wherever in the world that might be--as well as to the past and to each other. A powerful voice already in full mastery of her powers. The most original first collection of short fiction I have read in years.” ―A. Manette Ansay, author of Vinegar Hill

“These moments examined, small and beautiful and finely drawn, evoke a world of loss, of longing, and remembrance. Mai Al-Nakib's debut collection, The Hidden Light of Objects, reveals the life before and after, old and new, innocent and wise . . . Beautiful.” ―M. Evelina Galang, author of Angel de la Luna and The Fifth Glorious Mystery

“Mai Al-Nakib's The Hidden Light of Objects brings forth both the light and the shadows of the contemporary Middle East in clean-edged prose that startles us, not with sudden violence or polemic, but with the ineluctable force of human desire. Kuwait itself becomes a character, full of contradictions, in this multifaceted set of stories and vignettes. Superb.” ―Lucy Ferriss, author of The Lost Daughter and A Sister to Honor

“With her compassion for an old, vanished world and her exceptional eye for the bruised landscape of the modern Middle East, Al-Nakib should be heralded as an exciting new literary voice.” ―The National

“A collection of stories set mainly in the Middle East and centered on the themes of memory and longing . . . In the midst of tragedy, memory offers the characters escape. Objects, whether stumbled upon or carefully guarded, are the keys that allow them to unlock doors into their own glittering pasts.” ―Annie Atherton, Shelf Awareness

Edition details

• Publisher: Bloomsbury USA
• Publication date: 2015
• ISBN 10: 999219541X
• ISBN 13: 9789992195413
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256