A Land Like You

A Land Like You

Tobie Nathan2023
A riveting and revealing tale of an Egypt caught between tradition and modernity, multiculturalism and nationalism, oppression and freedom. Cairo 1925, Haret al-Yahud, the old Jewish Quarter. Esther, a beautiful young woman believed to be possessed by demons, longs to give birth after seven blissful years of marriage. Her husband, blind since childhood, does not object when, in her effort to conceive, she participates in Muslim zar rituals. Zohar, the novel's narrator, comes into the world, but because his mother's breasts are dry, he is nursed by a Muslim peasant--also believed to be possessed--who has just given birth to a girl, Masreya. Suckled at the same breasts and united by a rabbi's amulet, the milk-twins will be consumed by a passionate, earth-shaking love. Part fantastical fable, part realistic history, A Land Like You draws on ethno-psychiatrist Tobie Nathan's deep knowledge of North African folk beliefs to create a glittering tapestry in which spirit possession and religious mysticism exist side by side with sober facts about the British occupation of Egypt and the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Free Officers' Movement. Historical figures such as Gamel Abdel Nasser, Anwar Sadat, and King Farouk mingle with Nathan's fictional characters in this engaging story.
Sign up to use

This book appears on the shelf History

My Name Is Red
My Name Is Red by Orhan Pamuk
Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy
Fifty Things that Made the Modern Economy by Tim Harford
Twilight of Democracy
Twilight of Democracy by Anne Applebaum
A Million Years in a Day
A Million Years in a Day by Greg Jenner
Lives of the Stoics
Lives of the Stoics by Ryan Holiday
A Spy Among Friends
A Spy Among Friends by Ben Macintyre

This book appears on the shelf Classics

Crime and Punishment
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Lord of the Flies
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Great Expectations
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Dracula
Dracula by Bram Stoker
The Great Gatsby
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Lust, Caution
Lust, Caution by Eileen Chang

This book appears on the shelf For school

A Wizard of Earthsea
A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin
Animal Farm
Animal Farm by George Orwell
The Great Gatsby
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Maus
Maus by Art Spiegelman
Persepolis
Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
Macbeth
Macbeth by William Shakespeare