{"product_id":"chicago-a-novel-isbn-9780061452567","title":"Chicago: A Novel","description":"From Alaa Al Aswany, the author of the highly-acclaimed \u003cem\u003eThe Yacoubian Building,\u003c\/em\u003e comes a story of love, sex, friendship, hatred, and ambition set in the midwestern city with a cast of American and Arab characters achingly human in their desires and needs. \u003cem\u003eChicago\u003c\/em\u003e offers an illuminating portrait of America—a complex, often contradictory land in which triumph and failure, opportunity and oppression, licentiousness and tender love, small dramas and big dreams, coexist. | \u003cblockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003eThe author of the highly acclaimed \u003cem\u003eThe Yacoubian Building\u003c\/em\u003e returns with a story of love, sex, friendship, hatred, and ambition set in Chicago, with a cast of American and Arab characters achingly human in their desires and needs.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/blockquote\u003e\u003cp\u003eEgyptian and American lives collide on a college campus in post-9\/11 Chicago, and crises of identity abound in this extraordinary and eagerly anticipated new novel from Alaa Al Aswany. Among the players are a sixties-style anti-establishment professor whose relationship with a younger African-American woman becomes a moving target for intolerance; a veiled PhD candidate whose belief in the principles of her traditional upbringing is shaken by her exposure to American society; an émigré whose fervent desire to embrace his American identity is tested when he is faced with the issue of his daughter's \"honor\"; an Egyptian informant who spouts religious doctrines while hankering after money and power; and a dissident student poet who comes to America to finance his literary aspirations but whose experience in Chicago turns out to be more than he bargained for.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003ePopulated by a cast of intriguing, true-to-life characters, \u003cem\u003eChicago\u003c\/em\u003e offers an illuminating portrait of America—a complex, often contradictory land in which triumph and failure, opportunity and oppression, licentiousness and tender love, small dramas and big dreams, coexist. Beautifully rendered, \u003cem\u003eChicago\u003c\/em\u003e is a powerfully engrossing novel of culture and individuality from one of the most original voices in contemporary world literature.\u003c\/p\u003e | \u003cp\u003e“Al Aswany’s rich tableaux of everyday lives and devastating social commentary have made him a wildly popular novelist in his native Egypt and the best-selling Arab writer both in the Middle East and abroad. . . Aswany does share the legendary author [Mahfouz]’s talent for constructing simple stories about Egyptian life that convey universal truths in defense of human dignity.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eTime magazine (international edition)\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Egyptian author Al Aswany weaves a vivid tapestry of clashing cultures in post 9\/11 Chicago. . . . The characters are beautifully realized [and] each of the story lines is individually compelling.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“...Al Aswany’s knack for making the personal political.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York magazine\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“While the book explores political points, it’s ultimately a pluralist drama, complete with cliffhangers.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eWashington Post Express\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Aswany sensitively probes the nature of courage and patriotism. . . . [T]he story moves in surprising directions, and the ambiguity of life is well reflected in an unabashedly untidy conclusion. - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Intricately laced. . . . A multifold, piercing, and at times disturbing peek behind the veil of discretion and between the lines of dogma. . . . In CHICAGO, it is modern Egypt that comes into fuller view from characters pondering their culture from a great distance.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSeattle Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“A fascinating window into a world closed to many Americans.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eSanta Fe New Mexican\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“There’s a forceful energy to his characters. . . . Al Aswany proves himself to be a magnificent cultivator of their tales.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMinneapolis Star Tribune\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“[The characters] engage a reader’s sympathies and should expand an American reader’s perspective.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eBoston Sunday Globe\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Al Aswany is hardly a subtle writer, but there’s a forceful energy to his characters, whom he hammers into shape with short, blunt chapters. . . . The friction between freedom and tradition makes Al Aswany’s cast unpredictable in their actions. Tied still to another world, with only each other as reliable sounding boards, they each live in their own private Chicago—a city made up less from the skyscrapers and tourist sites the city advertises to the world than the affairs and sorrows that bloom in their shadows. Here, once again, Alaa Al Aswany proves himseld to be a magnificent cultivator of their tales.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNewark Star Ledger\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“In his second novel, the author offers an insightful, often amusing portrait of the Egyptian experience in post-9\/11 America. American readers will find it a fascinating (and sometimes humourous) window into how Egyptians think and act among themselves. . . . In \u003ci\u003eChicago\u003c\/i\u003e, Al Aswany sharoly crticizes the Egyptian establishment, teling the world that the day of change is approaching and that oppressive Arab regimes cannot stay in power much longer. For this alone, \u003ci\u003eChicago\u003c\/i\u003e is a necessary book, bringing to light government injustice tha tmany thousands of Western tourists and businesspeople never see.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“Al Aswany writes about his Egyptian characters with charm, gentle humor, and genuine conviction.” - \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eNew York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Harper","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":44889163071717,"sku":"NP9780061452567","price":25.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/1842\/7735\/files\/9780061452567.jpg?v=1730230655","url":"https:\/\/k12savings.com\/es\/products\/chicago-a-novel-isbn-9780061452567","provider":"K12savings","version":"1.0","type":"link"}