Relative Taboo (Paperback)

Aref F. Husseini

ISBN 10: 2386600963 / ISBN 13: 9782386600968

Published by Les Editions El Amir, 2025

About this Item

Paperback. There is a thin, invisible thread, stretching across decades, that binds the destinies of women in societies that barter a woman's freedom and life for unwritten laws. In this novel, we meet Huriya, a woman constantly attempting to break free from the shackles of a community that tracks every step women take, judging them from behind the walls of rigid traditions. The story begins with a morning phone call that shatters her solitude, forcing open long-locked boxes of memory to reveal stories spanning seventy years-from the tale of her grandmother, Huriya the Elder, and her brother Ismail in the villages of Jerusalem, to her own complex reality as an educated, rebellious woman living under the weight of occupation and contemporary social shifts.Between the ancient alleys of Jerusalem and the military checkpoints that choke the breath, threads of love, loss, and betrayal intertwine. The narrative moves with a tone that fluctuates between the mystery of beginnings and the inspiration of defiance, raising burning questions about the concept of a "Relative Taboo"-that elastic morality tailored by the powerful to fit their own interests and authority. This is not just a story about marriage, divorce, or political conflict; rather, it is a deep dive into the psychology of Eastern society, and the battle of awareness and freedom that women fight against an inheritance etched into their very bones. Written in a refined, deeply human literary style, the novel steers clear of dry preaching, making the reader a partner in decoding the truth whose other face has long lived in darkness. "When truth has two faces and one of them lives in darkness, freedom becomes a battle that must be taken, never given." This item is printed on demand. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9782386600968

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Relative Taboo (Paperback)
• Publisher: Les Editions El Amir
• Publication Date: 2025
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 2386600963
• ISBN 13: 9782386600968
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

In 'Relative Taboo', Jerusalem reveals itself not through monuments or headlines, but through the intimate voice of Huriya, a woman shaped by the city’s wounds and its stubborn beauty. What is spoken publicly rarely matches what unfolds in private; what is condemned aloud is often practiced in silence. Between these fractures, Huriya carves out her testimony—of love shadowed by occupation, of desire struggling against suffocation, of a life lived beneath layers of expectation and unspoken rules.

Moving through the Old City’s stone alleys and the neighborhoods beyond its ancient walls, Huriya narrates a Jerusalem trembling with history yet aching under the weight of the present. Her observations—at once tender, ironic, and unsparing—reveal a world where laughter is a form of defiance, where sorrow becomes a daily inheritance, and where a woman’s longing for freedom becomes an act of quiet resistance.

A companion to 'Shabbos Goy' and 'Half Ashkenazi' yet luminous as a standalone work, 'Relative Taboo' forms the second movement in a triptych that captures the pulse of a divided city and the souls who endure it. Through Huriya’s fierce humanity, Aref F. Husseini offers a portrait of Jerusalem as intimate as it is universal—where love and loss, dignity and despair, rebellion and tenderness all coexist in the same breath.

A haunting, courageous novel that transforms the personal into the political, and the political into a profoundly human song.