Summary
In her exciting debut, Laila Lalami evokes the grit and enduring grace that is modern Morocco and offers an authentic look at the Muslim immigrant experience today.
The book begins as four Moroccans illegally cross the Strait of Gibraltar in an inflatable boat headed for Spain. There’s Murad, a gentle, educated man who’s been reduced to hustling tourists around Tangier; Halima, who’s fleeing her drunken husband and the slums of Casablanca; Aziz, who must leave behind his devoted wife to find work in Spain; and Faten, a student and religious fanatic whose faith is at odds with an influential man determined to destroy her future.
What has driven these men and women to risk their lives? And will the rewards prove to be worth the danger? Sensitively written with beauty and boldness, this is a gripping book about people in search of a better future.
Details
- Title Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits
- Author Laila Lalami
- Binding Paperback
- Edition [ Edition: First
- Pages 188
- Volumes 1
- Language ENG
- Publisher Mariner Books, Wilmington, Massachusetts, U.S.A.
- Date 2006-10-02
- ISBN 9780156030878 / 015603087X
- Weight 0.45 lbs (0.20 kg)
- Dimensions 8 x 5.4 x 0.6 in (20.32 x 13.72 x 1.52 cm)
- Reading level 870
- Library of Congress subjects Psychological fiction, Immigrants
- Library of Congress Catalog Number 2006011376
- Dewey Decimal Code FIC
Excerpt
LARBI AMRANI DIDN’T consider himself a superstitious man, but when the prayer beads that hung on his rearview mirror broke, he found himself worrying that this could be an omen. His mother had given him the sandalwood beads on his college graduation, shortly before her death, advising him to use them often. At first Larbi had carried the beads in his pocket, fingered them after every prayer, but as the years went by he’d reached for them with decreasing regularity, until one day they ended up as decoration in his car. Now they lay scattered, amber dots on the black floor mats. He picked up as many as he could find and put them in the cup holder, hoping to get them fixed later. He eased the Mercedes down the driveway and into the quiet, tree-lined street. Traffic was unusually light, even when he passed through the crenellated fortress walls at Bab Rouah.
WHEN LARBI GOT HOME that night, there was a nice surprise waiting for him on the consolea rare letter from his son, Nadir, who was studying electrical engineering in Québec. Larbi stepped inside the living room and sat on one of the leather sofas, moving a white-and-pink silk cushion out of the way. Two years ago, Larbi’s daughter, Noura, had taken up silk painting and, besides cushions, had made scarves, handkerchiefs, and watercolors. The results of her labor were scattered around the house. Larbi had thought that she’d taken a serious interest in decorative arts, but it turned out to be nothing more than a high school fad, and all the brushes and bottles of paints she’d insisted on buying were now in a plastic bag somewhere under the kitchen sink.
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without permission in writing from the publisher.
online at www.harcourt.com/ contact or mailed to the following address:
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Media reviews
"Lalami skillfully limns the dark recesses of the Muslim world and creates true-to-life characters . . . With subtlety and grace [she] explores the emotional complexities of the culture they’re trying to escapeone that bears more resemblance to ours than we may imagine."People
"Moroccan-born Lailai Lalami’s thrilling debut novel follows four desperate people . . . fleeing Morocco in a flimsy boat across the dangerous Strait of Gibraltar in a death-defying bid for freedom in Spain, a narrative journey that the popular morrishgirl.com blogger Lalami handles with a keen sense of history, hope, and panache."Elle
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