March Book Club: Gaza Chapter

MARCH BOOK: Robin Yassin-Kassab's "The Road From Damascus" 

We have been hosting a book club chapter for the last two years in Ramallah and are finally able to host a chapter in Gaza. If you would like to join, email us in advance at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Reading can be a wonderful experience but being able to share with others your excitement or disappointment can make it that much better! Some books even afford the chance to talk to the author at the end of the discussion.

There is no cost (except for a deposit that is returned to you) and we encourage you to use our copies of books (although you can buy your own).

Robin Yassin-Kassab's "The Road From Damascus"

Discussion Date: March 13, 2012

Time: 3:30 - 4:30 pm 

Location: Almat'haf Hotel and Cultural House, Gaza

About the Author: Robin Yassin Kassab was born in West London in 1969 from a Syrian father and English mother. He grew up in Scotland and graduated from Oxford University. His first novel is The Road From Damascus which was published by Hamish Hamilton "Penguin" in 2008. He worked and lived in Pakistan as a journalist and taught English in four Arab countries.

Overview of the Book: It is the summer of 2001 and Sami Traifi has escaped his fraying marriage and minimal job prospects to visit Damascus. In search of his roots and himself, he instead finds a forgotten uncle in a gloomy back room, and an ugly secrect about his beloved father...

APRIL BOOK: "Kartography" by Kamila Shamsie 

Kamila Shamsie's Kartography

About the Author: Kamila Shamsie was born in 1973 in Pakistan. She has a BA in Creative Writing from Hamilton College in Clinton New York, where she has also taught Creative Writing, and a MFA from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. She also writes for The Guardian, The New Statesman, Index on Censorship and Prospect magazine, and broadcasts on radio. Kartography (2004), explores the strained relationship between soulmates Karim and Raheen, set against a backdrop of ethnic violence. Broken Verses was published in 2005 andBurnt Shadows in 2008 in the UK and 2009 in the USA. She lives in in London and Karachi.

Overview of the Book: Raheen and her best friend, Karim, share an idyllic childhood in upper-class Karachi. Their parents were even once engaged to each others' partners until they rematched in what they call "the fiancée swap." But as adolescence distances the friends, Karim takes refuge in maps while Raheen searches for the secret behind her parents' exchange. What she uncovers reveals not just a family's but a country's turbulent history-and a grown-up Raheen and Karim are caught between strained friendship and fated love. A love story with a family mystery at its heart, Kartography is a dazzling novel by a young writer of astonishing maturity and exhilarating style. Shamsie transports us to a world we have not often seen in fiction-vibrant, dangerous, sensuous Pakistan. But even as she takes us far from the familiar, her story of passion and family secrets rings universally true.