Books
‘I am an American’: The Ripple Effects of the War on Terror
Shahrazad: Imagination as the Woman’s Weapon
‘The Art of the Hajj’ Transports Us to Far-Away Places and Times
'Imam al-Ghazali: A Concise Life'
Syrian Poet Abu l’Ala: Ancient Visions of Hell, Paradise, and Forgiveness
By Lynne Rogers
The Epistle of Forgiveness, Volume One: A Vision of Heaven and Hell
By Abu l-Ala al-Ma’arri
NYU Press, 2013
Section
Dreaming at the Crossroads of Cultures: Mirages
Mirages
By Issa Makhlouf, translated into English by Alicia F. Lam
The Post-Apollo Press, 2015
Issa Makhlouf, an expatriate poet, possesses an anthropologist’s eye, a philosopher’s soul, a journalist’s sense of detail – and a heart rooted in the mountains and valleys of Lebanon.
Love and Loss: An Iran-Iraq Story
For those unaccustomed to witnessing the daily, random bombardments of cities during a bloody conflict like the eight-year Iran-Iraq War, it would be hard to imagine the lives of those who actually endured those experiences. The novel “A Portal in Space” (Center for Middle Eastern Studies, University of Texas at Austin, 2015), by Mahmoud Saeed, allows readers to feel, share, and interact with the ordinary people living in war-plagued Basra, Iraq. You cannot help but feel connected to the characters as they struggle to cope with their worries, fears, and despair.