By Eman Omar Mortal Designs is a beautiful translation of Reem Bassiouney’s Arabic novel (Ashiaa Raae’a). It is a love story born in the midst of all kinds of struggle; from social class and cultural differences, generation and gender clashes, power struggles and finally the dilemma of an internal struggle. The novel was translated by Melanie Magidow and was published in January of 2016 by The American University Press. On such a recent release, Mortal Designs has received one critic review by Library Bookwatch, which said, “Mortal Designs is a deftly written and truly memorable novel that showcases author Reem Bassiouney’s truly impressive storytelling talent. Very highly recommended for personal, community, and academic library Literary Fiction collections.” Reem Bassiouney is an award-winning Egyptian novelist. She is a professor of sociolinguistics at the American University in Cairo, having taught at Cambridge, Oxford, and Utah. She writes widely on gender and linguistics. She has written several novels and a number of short stories and won the 2009 Sawiris Foundation Literary Prize for Young Writers for her novel Dr. Hanaa. The story is set in pre-revolution Egypt with plenty of reflections on previous eras in Egypt’s modern history. The two…
‘Mortal Designs’: A Story of Love, Struggle and Sacrifice Amidst Corruption
May 23, 2016
