"It Won't Always Be Like This" Author Talk with Malaka Gharib & Hannah Bae
2022-10-11 16:00 - 17:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Virtual
This is an online program. Join the 53rd Street Library for a conversation with Malaka Gharib, the award-winning author of I Was Their American Dream, to discuss her latest work It Won’t Always Be Like This. A chronicle of growing up with her Egyptian father’s new family, forging unexpected bonds and navigating adolescence in an unfamiliar country It Won’t Always Be Like This is a touching time capsule of Gharib’s childhood memories—each summer a fleeting moment in time—and a powerful reflection on relationships, values, family, and what happens when it all collides. Malaka will be joined by freelance journalist and fellow author Hannah Bae for what will be an unforgettable discussion on the power of identity and belonging.

Where Do We Come From? Maud Newton, author of Ancestor Trouble, in conversation with Laila Lalami
2022-10-18 17:00 - 19:00 | Virtual
WHERE DO WE COME FROM?
Maud Newton, author of Ancestor Trouble, in conversation with Laila Lalami
5pm PT / 8pm ET, Tuesday, October 18, 2022, online event
Ever since her mother explained that she’d married her father so they would have smart children, Maud Newton has felt vexed by her kin. As an adult, she spent years researching her genealogy, uncovering, among other things, ten of her grandfather’s marriages, an accused witch, and her ancestors’ roles in slavery and genocide. Her journey took her into the realms of genetics, epigenetics, and the debates over intergenerational trauma. She mulled over modernity’s dismissal of ancestors along with psychoanalytic and spiritual traditions that center them. Searching, moving, and inspiring, Ancestor Trouble is one writer’s attempt to use genealogy—a once-niche hobby that has grown into a multi-billion-dollar industry—to expose the secrets and contradictions of her own ancestors, and to argue for the transformational possibilities that reckoning with our ancestors offers all of us. Read more about Ancestor Trouble.

Book Event: Nine Quarters of Jerusalem by Matthew Teller (hybrid)
2022-10-30 11:30 - 12:30
Please click here to register for this event.

This is a Hybrid Event, meaning you can attend virtually via Zoom or, in person, at the Palestine Museum US, in Woodbridge, CT, USA. You can register on Zoom and decide later how you want to attend.
Doors open at 2:30; the program begins at 3:00 PM US EDT; 10:00 PM Palestine Time.
Author Matthew Teller will be on site at the Paelstine Museum US to talk about the book and sign copies for buyers.

About the Book
This unique, absorbing biography of Jerusalem brings to light its overlooked histories and diverse contemporary voices.
In Jerusalem, what you see and what is true are two different things. The Old City has never had “four quarters” as its maps proclaim. And beyond the crush and frenzy of its major religious sites, many of its quarters are little known to visitors, its people ignored and their stories untold. Nine Quarters of Jerusalem lets the communities of the Old City speak for themselves. Ranging from ancient past to political present, it evokes the city’s depth and cultural diversity.
Matthew Teller’s highly original “biography” features the Old City’s Palestinian and Jewish communities, but also spotlights its Indian and African populations, its Greek and Armenian and Syriac cultures, its downtrodden Dom Gypsy families, and its Sufi mystics. It discusses the sources of Jerusalem’s holiness and the ideas—often startlingly secular—that have shaped lives within its walls. It is an evocation of place through story, led by the voices of Jerusalemites.

Matthew Teller
Photo Credit Andrew Shaylor

About Author
Matthew Teller writes for the BBC, The Guardian, Times of London, Financial Times, and other global media. He has produced and presented documentaries for BBC Radio and has reported for the BBC’s From Our Own Correspondent program from around the Middle East and beyond. He is the author of several travel guides, including the Rough Guide to Jordan. His most recent book is Quite Alone: Journalism from the Middle East 2008–2019.

Author Danny Ramadan at Elliott Bay Book Company
2022-11-11 19:00 - 20:00 | Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 10th Avenue, Seattle, 98122, United States
Down from his Vancouver home where, in addition to writing, Danny Ramadan has been an activist and advocate, in particular for LGBTQ+ refugees from Syria and the Middle East. The author of an award-winning Canadian children’s book, Salma the Syrian Chef, and a debut novel that was shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award, The Clothesline Swing, he is here tonight with his new novel, The Foghorn Echoes (Canongate Books). Set between a Damascus riven by war and Vancouver, with time spanning a decade, this is an extraordinary book of hard-sought love between two young men.
”The Foghorn Echoes is a deeply moving book about conflict both internal and external, the ways in which cold accidents – of birth, of place, of time – can leave a human being at war with their own desires, their own sense of self. Danny Ramadan is a gifted, sensitive excavator of the things that break people and put them back together, the past as weight and lightness. In this novel he has created a world of immense sensory and emotional precision, at once true in its living details and yet electric with the presence of ghosts.” – Omar El Akkad.
”The Foghorn Echoes bristles. It burns bright. It shouts into the dark with a voice that hovers between a melody and a lamentation. Danny Ramadan writes in these pages with a spellbinding urgency, stripping bare some of the most painful and fundamental truths about displacement and grief, about rage and betrayal. In the process, he reminds us again and again that even the worst of memories contain redemptive powers. This novel is a tender and impassioned love story for a country, for a people, and for all those who refuse to disappear quietly into the land of the forgotten.” – Maaza Mengiste.
Danny RamadanFriday Nov 11 2022 7:00pm – 8:00pm
Live/In-Person at Elliott Bay Book Company.
1521 10th Ave. Seattle, WA 98122

Authors: Peter Cole and Iman Mersal (Virtual)
2022-11-29 17:00 - 18:00 | Virtual
If only this evening could be staged in the same room, as we range around a good part of the world in hosting three poets – Peter Cole and Iman Mersal virtually at 5 p.m. – and another, Naveen Kishore in store at 7 p.m. Between them, the U.S., Israel/Palestine, Egypt, Canada, and India, with their poetic and literary concerns extending beyond whatever borders those nationalities might pose. This 5 p.m virtual program returns poet/translator/editor Peter Cole to Elliott Bay to read from his newest collection, Draw Me After (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), and it helps introduce an overdue major collection of one of the world’s major poets, Iman Mersal with her new book, The Threshold (translated from the Arabic by Robyn Creswell / Farrar, Straus & Giroux).
Peter Cole’s Draw Me After very much has ‘drawing’ in it, with work by Terry Winters, which he dares from, so to speak.
“‘Waking the letters from their slumber’: that’s Peter Cole’s mad, sublime task in these phantasmagoric poems. Every line of this book breaks the literal—the letters—into visionary scenes where sorrow marries joy and blessings almost rhyme with curse. A revelation.” —Rosanna Warren.
“Peter Cole shows himself in Draw Me After to be our great master of ekphrasis. Visually, sonically, rhythmically, semantically, his are some of the most inventive, witty, profound, and genuinely beautiful lyric poems of our moment.” —Marjorie Perloff.
Peter Cole has written several previous books of poems, including Hymns & Qualms and Rift, and he has also translated widely from Hebrew and Arabic works—both medieval and modern. With Adina Hoffman, he has co-written Sacred Trash: The Lost and Found World of the Cairo Geniza and also published books as Ibis Editions. He is the recipient of many honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in Literature, the PEN Award for Poetry in Translation, a National Jewish Book Award, and a MacArthur Fellowship. He divides his time between Jerusalem and New Haven.
Joining us, we believe, from Edmonton, where she is a professor of Arabic language and literature at the University of Alberta is Iman Mersal. The Threshold, translated by Robyn Creswell, draws from several of her noted earlier books of poetry ranging back nearly thirty years and coming up to the present – A Dark Alley Suitable for Dance Lessons, Walking as Long as Possible, Alternative Geography, and Until I Give Up the Idea of Home. Her most recent book, the prose work Traces of Enayat (all of these, we’re giving translated titles), received the Sheikh Zayed Book Award for Literature in 2021.
“The publication of Iman Mersal’s The Threshold is a major literary event. Long recognized throughout the Arab world and in Europe, Mersal is one of the strongest confessional (or postconfessional) poets we now have, in any language: her poems are fueled by a mordant wit, sensual vibrancy, and feminist brio. Impatient with pieties—whether political, erotic, or poetic—she writes, like Louise Glück, with emotional intensity and analytic coolness. This is poetry of earned and perfect pitch: the notations of an impassioned mind. I read The Threshold straight through; it will become a permanent companion.” —Maureen N. McLane. “Undeceived, ironic, daring, Iman Mersal’s poems are animated by a singular sensibility. They deal candidly with real life—migration, dying parents, emotional entanglements—and discover general truths among the fine particulars. Robyn Creswell’s translation is deft and subtle, and the Anglophone world is lucky to have it.” —Nick Laird.

Peter Cole and Iman MersalTuesday Nov 29 2022 5:00pm – 6:00pm
Virtually Hosted by Elliott Bay Book Company.
Registration/Information

Author Amal Ghandour [afikra Conversations]
2023-01-16 07:00 - 08:00
Amal Ghandour is a Lebanese-Jordanian author and blogger (Thinking Fits), with a career that spans more than three decades in the fields of research, communication, and community development. Her book, About This Man Called Ali (2009), was named the first biography of a modern Arab artist by the renowned Historian Philip Mansel. Ghandour describes her new book, This Arab Life, A Generation’s Journey Into Silence (October 11, 2022), “as a memoir that is not of an individual but of the generation that came of political age in the 1980s in the Levant.” This Arab Life, she adds, “is an intimate rendition of the times that shaped us; the way we internalized our parents’ myriad dejections and disappointments; the pragmatism and silence that defined us; and the dispiriting inheritance we inexorably bequeathed our own children.” Ghandour holds an MS in International Policy from Stanford University and a BSFS from Georgetown University. Among her works: Aeon, The Daily Beast, Washington Independent Review of Books, Midanmasr, Canvas.

Madafeh - Book Event - Fida Jiryis - author of the book "Stranger in My Own Land"
2023-01-29 09:00 - 11:00 | Virtual
After the 1993 Oslo Accords, a handful of Palestinians were allowed to return to their hometowns in Israel. Fida Jiryis and her family were among them.
This beautifully written memoir tells the story of their journey, which is also the story of Palestine, from the Nakba to the present—a seventy-five-year tale of conflict, exodus, occupation, return and search for belonging, seen through the eyes of one writer and her family. Jiryis reveals how her father, Sabri, a PLO leader and advisor to Yasser Arafat, chose exile in 1970 because of his work. Her own childhood in Beirut was shaped by regional tensions, the Lebanese Civil War and the 1982 Israeli invasion, which led to her mother’s death. Thirteen years later, the family made an unexpected return to Fassouta, their village of origin in the Galilee. But Fida, twenty-two years old and full of love for her country, had no idea what she was getting into.
Stranger in My Own Land chronicles a desperate, at times surreal, search for a homeland between the Galilee, the West Bank and the diaspora, asking difficult questions about what the right of return would mean for the millions of Palestinians waiting to come ‘home’.

Fida Jiryis

About Fida Jiryis
Fida Jiryis is a Palestinian author living in Ramallah. She grew up in Lebanon and Cyprus, the daughter of Palestinian intellectual and leader, Sabri Jiryis. As her family fled Israel’s oppression and wars, Fida’s life has spanned the full spectrum of the Palestinian people’s forced fragmentation: in Israel, the West Bank and the diaspora. Her writings include several collections of Arabic short stories; a contribution to the book, Kingdom of Olives and Ash, a Washington Post bestseller; and Ha-Cluv (The Cage), a Hebrew translation of her short stories published this year. Her most recent book, Stranger in My Own Land, describes her and her family’s remarkable life journey which is, in many respects, the story of Palestine.

“When We Were Arabs – Memory, Erasure and Cultural Connections” Workshop
2023-02-16 15:00 - 18:00 | Virtual
Diverse expressions of historical memory persist and gain meaning despite nationalist projects to minimize diversity in pursuit of an imaginary homogeneity that in truth exists practically nowhere in the world. The fact that such attempts at erasure are responsible not only for cultural amnesia, but for denial of common cultural experiences that would foster acceptance instead of rejection. This workshop will place two works of historical memory into conversation. Coincidentally, two authors representing two culturally related but geographically distant societies gave their books the same title: When We Were Arabs to invoke that claim of identity (Cuando Fuimos Arabe). They are Emilio González Ferrín, University of Seville, and journalist Massoud Hayoun based in Los Angeles. This conversation, moderated by educator Dr. Rabiah Khalil, will explore the persistence of memory and affirm the value of recognizing shared roots and accepting the richness of our diversity.
This program is sponsored by Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, Alwaleed bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding, the Arab American National Museum and Montgomery College Office of Advancement and Community Engagement
This program is made possible by a Title VI grant from the United States Department of Education, which is funding a National Resource Center on the Middle East at Georgetown University, and by support from the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies at Georgetown and the Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding.
For more questions, e-mail Dave Serio at DSerio@accesscommunity.org

Book Launch and Activist Gathering
2023-03-04 16:00 - 18:00 | Cherry Street Village, 720 25th Avenue, Seattle, WA, United States
“Greater than the Sum of Our Parts” is by Nada Elia, local author and activist, and is newly published by Pluto Press. Nada’s book launch provides an opportunity to connect with fellow activists, expand our knowledge of each other’s struggles, and hear from Nada about this important book!

WHEN: Saturday, March 4, 4:00-6:00 pm
WHERE: Cherry Street Village, 720 25th Avenue Seattle, WA 98122

Please Register here! (If you can’t make it but would still like a copy of the book, you can get one here!)

ABOUT THE EVENT:

Today, there is a growing understanding that Palestinian liberation is connected to numerous other struggles for safety, dignity, freedom, and self sovereignty. This book launch and gathering will be an opportunity to hear more about and celebrate the launch of GREATER THAN THE SUM OF OUR PARTS. Equally important, It will be a much-needed opportunity to meet and network with fellow activists and organizers, so we can expand our knowledge of each other’s struggles, and better show up for each other.

ABOUT THE BOOK:

How is the struggle for Palestinian freedom bound up in other freedom struggles, and how are activists coming together globally to achieve justice and liberation for all?
In this bold book, Palestinian activist Nada Elia unpacks Zionism, from its hypermilitarism to incarceration, its environmental devastation and gendered violence. She insists that Palestine’s fate is linked through bonds of solidarity to other communities crossing racial and gender lines, weaving an intersectional feminist understanding of Israeli apartheid throughout her analysis. She also looks deeper into the interconnectedness of Palestine with Black, migrant, and queer movements, and with other indigenous struggles against settler colonialism, including that of Native Americans.
Greater than the Sum of Our Parts is a powerful and hopeful account, highlighting the role of the Palestinian diaspora, youth, and women, and inspired by activists across the world.

Hosted by: Dunya Productions-Seattle

The Shape of Home Anthology Virtual Author Talk
2023-03-20 15:30 - 17:00 | Virtual
Join us to chat with several authors published within The Shape of Home anthology and learn how they came up with their story ideas, what their writing process is, and more!

Email rocyouth@clpvd.org for the Zoom link

Stories to Broaden Understanding: Diana Abu-Jaber
2023-04-11 16:00 - 17:00 | Virtual
Author Diane Abu-Jaber will be taking about her newest book, Fencing with the King.

Born to an American mother and a Jordanian father, Diana Abu-Jaber now teaches writing and literature at Portland State University in Oregon. She is the author of the highly-acclaimed memoirs Life Without a Recipe and The Language of Baklava as well as the novels Crescent and Birds of Paradise. Abu-Jaber will be talking about her newest book, Fencing with the King, which has been described as a “mesmerizing breakthrough novel of family myths and inheritances.”
In partnership with Montgomery County Middle Eastern American Advisory Group, Office of Community Partnerships and Baltimore Luxor Alexandria Sister City Committee.
Registration required. As part of County Government, MCPL does not collect personal information other than for the purpose of providing programs or services.
The Zoom link to participate in the program will be sent to registrants 24 hours before the event.
NEW: You will need to be signed into Zoom to attend this program via the web.
To sign in, you must first create a free account: https://zoom.us/signup
Once you are signed in on Zoom, return to this page and click on the link below to join the program.

Inclusion Talk Series: How Does It Feel To Be A Problem
2023-04-25 14:00 - 16:00 | Virtual
Join Compass Family Services as we honor and commemorate Arab American Heritage Month (AAHM) with a seminar from author Moustafa Bayoumi.
Moustafa is the author of the critically acclaimed How Does It Feel To Be a Problem?: Being Young and Arab in America (Penguin), which won an American Book Award and the Arab American Book Award for Non-Fiction.

An Evening Celebrating Arab American Authors
2023-04-27 15:00 - 16:00 | Virtual
Join us on Thursday, April 27 at 6 p.m. ET on Zoom as we celebrate the vibrant Arab American creative community during Arab American Heritage Month with a panel of three phenomenal authors: Reem Assil, author of Arabiyya; Sarah Cypher, author of The Skin and Its Girl; and Malaka Gharib, author of It Won’t Always Be Like This.

The conversation will be moderated by Lana Barkawi, Executive & Artistic Director of Mizna, a critical platform for contemporary literature, film, art, and cultural production centering the work of Arab and Southwest Asian and North African artists. Assil, Cypher, and Gharib will discuss their books—a cookbook, a novel, and a memoir—the ways we celebrate heritage, grappling with perception and misperception, and the varied homages to lineage, love, and resilience from across the diaspora.

When you register for your free ticket to this conversation, you will also have the option to buy any of the featured authors’ books from our independent bookstore partner, Moon Palace Books, based in Minneapolis, MN.

Sign up to reserve your spot today. We can’t wait to see you there.

Nad of Nadide, by Wagih Abu-Rish
2023-05-13 18:30 - 20:00 | Nook and Cranny Books, 324 15th Ave E #101, Seattle, WA, 98112, United States
NAD OF NADIDE BY WAGIH ABU-RISH

Join us Saturday, May 13 at 6:30pm to celebrate the launch of Nad of Nadide by local author Wagih Abu-Rish!
From the author of Replenishing the Sea of Galilee, comes a story of love, determination, and political intrigue.
Wagih Abu-Rish is a Palestinian-American author and activist. During a long and varied professional career, he was a foreign journalist in Beirut, Lebanon, and an ad executive on Madison Avenue in New York. He studied journalism at the University of Houston and the University of Oregon.

Book Talk with Dr. Jenny Lynn Kelly
2023-05-22 16:00 - 18:00 | Virtual
We are writing to invite you to a special virtual event and ask you to mark your calendar to join us on May 22, 2023, at 7:00PM EST for a book talk with Dr. Jenny Lynn Kelly. Dr. Kelly is a former Eyewitness Palestine delegate, faculty member at the University of California Santa Cruz, and author of the recently-released Invited to Witness: Solidarity Tourism Across Occupied Palestine. The event will be hosted via Zoom and donors of an eligible amount will receive a signed copy of Dr. Kelly’s book, so keep an eye out for the registration link coming soon!

Town Hall Seattle: Raja Shehadeh — 'We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I: A Palestinian Memoir'
2023-05-24 18:00 - 20:00 | Town Hall, 1119 8th Ave, Seattle, WA, 98101, United States
About the event. . .
In his life, Aziz Shehadeh was many things — among them a lawyer, a political detainee, and the father of activist and author, Raja Shehadeh.
Raja’s latest book, We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I, is a subtle psychological portrait of a complicated father-son relationship. Set against the backdrop of continuing political unrest, Raja describes his failure as a young man to recognize his father’s courage as an activist, and, in turn, his father’s inability to appreciate Raja’s own efforts in campaigning for Palestinian human rights. Then in 1985, Aziz Shehadeh is murdered, and Raja undergoes a profound and irrevocable change.
We Could Have Been Friends acts in part as the story of Palestine’s continual fight against multiple foreign powers, but at its core presents a poignant unraveling of a complex father-son relationship, unlike many we have seen before.

Book Reading Event with Wagih Abu-Rish
2023-05-27 16:00 - 19:00 | Cherry Street Village, 720 25th Avenue, Seattle, WA, United States
Book Reading Event with
Wagih Abu-Rish
The latest novel by Wagih Aburish is a story of love,
determination, and political intrigue: Nad of Nadide
reveals that love, whether between two of the same
ethnicity, or between lovers who never expected to
cross ethnic boundaries, is one worth fighting for, at
the cost of defying all norms and challenges.
Wagih’s debut novel is a sweeping story of love, loss,
and the power of loyalty in the face of conflicting
ideologies and religious beliefs.
“Deftly crafted with impressive attention to historical
detail and context, Replenishing the Sea of Galilee is
an inherently riveting read and one that will prove to be
an enduringly popular and appreciated addition to
community library General Fiction in general, and
Jewish/Palestinian Historical/Cultural Fiction
collections in particular.”
—Midwest Book Review
Cherry Street Village
720 25th Avenue Seattle, WA 98122
May 27, 2023 | 4-7pm
Appetizers, discussion, Q&A

Author Signing with Local Author Wagih Abu-Rish
2023-06-03 13:00 - 16:00 | Barnes & Noble: Northgate, Northgate Mall 401 NE Northgate Way #1100, Seattle, WA, 98125, United States
ABOUT THIS EVENT
Meet local author Wagih Abu-Rish and explore this deeply emotional historical romance. From 1pm to 4pm, the author will be present to showcase his book! Don’t miss out on a chance to explore something new and exciting.

Rainbow Parenting w/ Lindz Amer at Powell's Books
2023-06-03 14:00 - 16:00 | Powell Books, 1005 W Burnside St., Portland, OR, 97209, United States
Lindz Amer
Saturday, June 3 @ 2pm (PT) / Powell’s City of Books
In the face of so many injustices across society for LGBTQ+ people, it can be easy for parents of young children to feel helpless and hopeless. While they may not be able to address every problem across the country, there’s a simple place to start: right at home. Rainbow Parenting (St. Martin’s Griffin) is an essential stepping stone for adults who want to raise and teach kids in a queer-affirming way, but might not know how. Lindz Amer, the founder of Queer Kid Stuff, an award-winning LGBTQ+ educational webseries for children and families, is an indispensable guide, leading readers through practical applications, important LGBTQ+ history, key lessons in intersectionality, pronouns, social justice, and more. Divided by sections that address kids’ individual ages — from infancy to kindergarten — this joyful and approachable book shares a bit of hope and starts with the understanding that anyone can spread queer joy. By giving parents and their kids a vocabulary to express themselves, Rainbow Parenting ultimately aims to create more empathetic adults — and spreads a message of radical acceptance in a world where it’s sometimes dangerous to just be yourself.
Preorder a Signed Edition

Book Reading Event with Amal Sedky
2023-06-03 16:00 - 19:00 | Cherry Street Village, 720 25th Avenue, Seattle, WA, United States
Book Reading Event
Escape to Aswan with Amal Sedky
Cherry Street Village
720 25th Avenue Seattle, WA 98122
May 27, 2023 | 4-7pm
Appetizers, discussion, Q&A

Honoring Palestinian Fathers with PFC
2023-06-17 11:00 - 13:00
Palestinian Feminist Collective (PFC) warmly invites you to join us for our June 2023 Feminist Futures Program. This month we are honoring Palestinian fathers with a virtual event meant to create space for, honor and recognize the complex lived experiences and realities of Palestinian fathers. We will be hosting two incredible speakers: Raja Shehadeh, author of the memoir We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I, and Abeer Otman, postdoctoral scholar, who will unpack how Zionist settler colonialism impinges on Palestinian fatherhood, as well as how fathers defy settler colonialism by showing love, care, and protection for their families and homes. As Palestinian feminists, we will conceptualize: What are the experiences of Palestinian fathers – diverse and complicated? How do we tell these stories of fatherhood? How can we continue to hold them and make space for them in our pursuit of Palestinian liberation?

Abeer Otman’s postdoctoral research investigates father-child connectivity under the settler-colonial context. She has a doctorate in social work from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her doctoral research focused on fathers and fatherhood in a settler colonial context: the case of occupied East Jerusalem (OEJ). As a community and social worker in East Jerusalem for more than ten years, she engages in local activities concerning fulfillment of socio-economic rights, improving physical spaces, developing social and educational services.
Raja Shehadeh is a Palestinian lawyer, human rights activist, and writer. He co-founded the Palestinian human rights organization Al-Haq in 1979. He is the author of several books, including Palestinian Walks, which he won the Orwell Prize in 2008. In addition to his legal work, Shehadeh has written a number of books about Palestine through the lens of his life, including Strangers in the House (2002), Occupation Diaries (2012), and his latest, We Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I: A Palestinian Memoir (2022).

Online Class: Spotlight on Enter Ghost by Isabella Hammad With Heba F. El-Shazli
2023-06-20 10:00 - 12:00 | Virtual
Isabella Hammad’s new novel, Enter Ghost, features an actor’s return to Palestine via the staging of Shakespeare’s Hamlet in the West Bank which reflects the turmoil within Palestinian society. If you enjoyed her first debut novel, The Parisian, then please join us on another journey into Palestinian society and a quest for self-healing, political knowledge, and a painful awakening. One Tuesday, June 20th, from 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. EDT
Online

Mona Awad with Kira Jane Buxton — 'Rouge: A Novel'
2023-09-18 19:00 - 20:30 | Third Place Books – Seward Park, 5041 Wilson Ave S, Seattle, WA, 98118, United States
Third Place Books is thrilled to welcome Mona Awad to our Seward Park store! Awad will be discussing Rouge, her new novel which holds up a warped mirror to our relationship with mortality, our collective fixation with the surface, and the wondrous, deep longing that might lie beneath. She will be joined in conversation by Kira Jane Buxton, the staff-favorite author of Feral Creatures and Hollow Kingdom. This event is free and open to the public.
For important updates, registration is highly recommended in advance. This event will include a public signing and time for audience Q&A. Sustain our author series by purchasing a copy of the featured book!
Click here for more about our COVID-19 policies for in-person events.
Having trouble accessing Eventbrite? Click here.
https://www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/mona-awad-kira-jane-buxton

Mona Awad in Conversation With Leni Zumas [Portland]
2023-09-21 19:00 - 21:00 | Powell Books, 1005 W Burnside St., Portland, OR, 97209, United States
Mona Awad in Conversation With Leni Zumas
Thursday, September 21 @ 7pm (PT) / Powell’s City of Books
From Mona Awad, author of Bunny, comes a horror-tinted, gothic fairy tale about a lonely dress shop clerk whose mother’s unexpected death sends her down a treacherous path in pursuit of youth and beauty. Can she escape her mother’s fate — and find a connection that is more than skin deep? For as long as she can remember, Belle has been insidiously obsessed with her skin and skincare videos. When her estranged mother Noelle mysteriously dies, Belle finds herself back in Southern California, dealing with her mother’s considerable debts and grappling with lingering questions about her death. The stakes escalate when a strange woman in red appears at the funeral, offering a tantalizing clue about her mother’s demise, followed by a cryptic video about a transformative spa experience. With the help of a pair of red shoes, Belle is lured into the barbed embrace of La Maison de Méduse, the same lavish, culty spa to which her mother was devoted. There, Belle discovers the frightening secret behind her (and her mother’s) obsession with the mirror — and the great shimmering depths (and demons) that lurk on the other side of the glass. Snow White meets Eyes Wide Shut in Awad’s surreal descent into the dark side of beauty, envy, grief, and the complicated love between mothers and daughters. With black humor and seductive horror, Rouge (S&S/Marysue Rucci Books) explores the cult-like nature of the beauty industry — as well as the danger of internalizing its pitiless gaze. Brimming with California sunshine and blood-red rose petals, Rouge holds up a warped mirror to our relationship with mortality, our collective fixation with the surface, and the wondrous, deep longing that might lie beneath. Awad will be joined in conversation by Leni Zumas, author of Red Clocks.

Palestine Writes Conference (in Philadelphia)
2023-09-22 - 2023-09-24
Palestine Writes is the only North American literature festival dedicated to celebrating and promoting cultural productions of Palestinian writers and artists. Born from the pervasive exclusion from or tokenization of Palestinian voices in mainstream literary institutions, Palestine Writes brings Palestinian cultural workers from all parts of Historic Palestine and our exiled Diaspora together with peers from other marginalized groups in the United States.

Book Tour: Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire
2023-09-30 | SWANA Rose Culture + Community Center, 2942 NE MLK Jr. Boulevard, Portland, OR, 97203, United States
LIGHT IN GAZA: WRITINGS BORN OF FIRE
book tour
Edited by our friends at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Light in Gaza brings together sixteen essays and poems by twelve Palestinian writers. The book includes political essays, personal narratives, economic analysis, and poetry. It imagines what the future of Gaza could be, while reaffirming the critical role of Gaza in Palestinian identity, history, and struggle for liberation. Writer and contributor Yousef M. Aljamal, a Palestinian refugee from Al-Nusierat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip will be the featured speaker.

Saturday, September 30
Time: TBD
Location: SWANA Rose Culture and Community Center
2942 NE MLK Jr. Boulevard Portland, OR 97203
Light in Gaza Book Talk

Book Tour: Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire
2023-10-01 14:00 - 15:30 | Portland State University, Smith Memorial Student Union Parkway North, 1825 SW Broadway, Portland, OR, 97201, United States
LIGHT IN GAZA: WRITINGS BORN OF FIRE
book tour
Edited by our friends at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Light in Gaza brings together sixteen essays and poems by twelve Palestinian writers. The book includes political essays, personal narratives, economic analysis, and poetry. It imagines what the future of Gaza could be, while reaffirming the critical role of Gaza in Palestinian identity, history, and struggle for liberation. Writer and contributor Yousef M. Aljamal, a Palestinian refugee from Al-Nusierat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip will be the featured speaker.

Sunday, October 1, 2-3:30 p.m.
Portland State University, Smith Memorial Student Union Parkway North, Room 101
1825 SW Broadway, Portland, OR, 97201
Students United for Palestinian Equal Rights (SUPER)-Portland State presents
Gaza’s Role in the Palestine National Movement

Book Tour: Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire
2023-10-02 19:00 - 21:30 | New Traditions, 300 5th Ave SW, Olympia, WA, 98501, United States
LIGHT IN GAZA: WRITINGS BORN OF FIRE
book tour
Edited by our friends at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Light in Gaza brings together sixteen essays and poems by twelve Palestinian writers. The book includes political essays, personal narratives, economic analysis, and poetry. It imagines what the future of Gaza could be, while reaffirming the critical role of Gaza in Palestinian identity, history, and struggle for liberation. Writer and contributor Yousef M. Aljamal, a Palestinian refugee from Al-Nusierat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip will be the featured speaker.

Monday, October 2, 7:00-9:00 p.m.
New Traditions Fair Trade
300 5th Ave SW, Olympia, WA 98501
The Rachel Corrie Foundation for Peace and Justice & JVP-Tacoma present
Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire, with speakers Yousef Aljamal and Jennifer Bing

Book Tour: Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire
2023-10-03 12:00 - 13:30 | Tacoma Community College, 6501 South 19th Street, Tacoma, WA, 98466, United States
LIGHT IN GAZA: WRITINGS BORN OF FIRE
book tour
Edited by our friends at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Light in Gaza brings together sixteen essays and poems by twelve Palestinian writers. The book includes political essays, personal narratives, economic analysis, and poetry. It imagines what the future of Gaza could be, while reaffirming the critical role of Gaza in Palestinian identity, history, and struggle for liberation. Writer and contributor Yousef M. Aljamal, a Palestinian refugee from Al-Nusierat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip will be the featured speaker.

Tuesday, October 3, 12:00 p.m.
Tacoma Community College
6501 South 19th Street, Tacoma, WA 98466. Building 11, Room 119
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP)-Tacoma & the Rachel Corrie Foundation present
Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire, with speakers Yousef Aljamal and Jennifer Bing

Book Tour: Light in Gaza: Writings Born of Fire
2023-10-04 12:00 - 13:00 | Seattle Pacific University, 3307 3rd Ave W, Seattle, WA, 98119, United States
LIGHT IN GAZA: WRITINGS BORN OF FIRE
book tour
Edited by our friends at the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Light in Gaza brings together sixteen essays and poems by twelve Palestinian writers. The book includes political essays, personal narratives, economic analysis, and poetry. It imagines what the future of Gaza could be, while reaffirming the critical role of Gaza in Palestinian identity, history, and struggle for liberation. Writer and contributor Yousef M. Aljamal, a Palestinian refugee from Al-Nusierat refugee camp in the Gaza Strip will be the featured speaker.

Wednesday, October 4, 12:00-1:00 p.m.
Seattle Pacific University
3307 3rd Ave W., Seattle, WA 98119, Eaton Hall 112
Middle East Studies Event: Panel on Health and Medicine in Gaza
