The Arsonists' City

The Arsonists' City - Paperback

$18.99
$18.99
Skip to product information
The Arsonists' City
  • The Arsonists' City
The Arsonists' City - Paperback

The Arsonists' City - Paperback

by Hala Alyan
$18.99
$18.99

Book Overview

"Feels revolutionary in its freshness." --Entertainment Weekly

"The Arsonists' City delivers all the pleasures of a good old-fashioned saga, but in Alyan's hands, one family's tale becomes the story of a nation--Lebanon and Syria, yes, but also the United States. It's the kind of book we are lucky to have."--Rumaan Alam

A rich, sprawling family saga, a personal look at the legacy of war in the Middle East, and an indelible rendering of how we hold on to the people and places we call home

The Nasr family is spread across the globe--Beirut, Brooklyn, Austin, the California desert. A Syrian mother, a Lebanese father, and three American children: all have lived a life of migration. Still, they've always had their ancestral home in Beirut--a constant touchstone--and the complicated, messy family love that binds them. But following his father's recent death, Idris, the family's new patriarch, has decided to sell.

The decision brings the family to Beirut, where everyone unites against Idris in a fight to save the house. They all have secrets--lost loves, bitter jealousies, abandoned passions, deep-set shame--that distance has helped smother. But in a city smoldering with the legacy of war, an ongoing flow of refugees, religious tension, and political protest, those family secrets ignite, imperiling the fragile ties that hold this Lebanese-American family together.

In a work of literary fiction teeming with wisdom, warmth, and characters born of remarkable human insight, award-winning author Hala Alyan shows us again that "fiction is often the best filter for the real world around us" (NPR).
ISBN9780358695233
Author Hala Alyan
PublisherHarper Perennial
GenreLiterature
FormatPaperback
PublishedAugust 2022
LanguageENG- English
Pages464
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Cultural Heritage Family Life Fiction Literary

1% fer Each of the Seven Seas

Every purchase sends 7% of our profits to The Ocean Cleanup. No fine print, no opt-in — just how we sail.

Whoever Ye Be, Welcome Aboard

Queer lit, music, art, philosophy, fiction — stories for every kind of soul. Come as ye are, matey.

More by Hala Alyan

The Twenty-Ninth Year

The Twenty-Ninth Year - Paperback

The Twenty-Ninth Year - Paperback

By Hala Alyan

About Hala Alyan

Hala Alyan is the author of the novels Salt Houses--winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Arab American Book Award, and a finalist for the Chautauqua Prize--and The Arsonists' City, a finalist for the Aspen Words Literary Prize. She is also the author of five highly acclaimed collections of poetry, including The Twenty-Ninth Year and The Moon That Turns You Back. Her work has been published by The New Yorker, The Academy of American Poets, The New York Times, The Guardian, and Guernica. She lives in Brooklyn with her family, where she works as a clinical psychologist and professor at New York University.

You may also like