“Adham” was born multiple times, which is difficult to count. And in each of his births, he carries a different personality and another life, to the point where he can be described as multiple versions of a single human being, or to borrow what he says about himself: “I am all formulations. Open endings and closed beginnings. I am the ultimate formula. I am everyone, women and men, a part.” A masculine part in a feminine personality, and a feminine part in a masculine personality. I am the one who desires immortality.
In this novel, Maha Hassan reaches the height of experimentation in writing, ignoring the rules, surrendering herself to the pleasure of storytelling, to the philosophy and philosophies of her hero, trying to write his biography in his endless births.
"Sophie Perrin" is a French woman who is fond of speed and hates stability. Her sadness is sudden but authentic, her desires are sudden but stem from existential anxiety, and her questions are many but they hide deep wounds.
And Hanifa Kamal, the stubborn Kurdish girl, lived a miserable childhood in Aleppo, which ended in painful torture when her father was forced to choose between two wives, and the decision was to divorce her mother and move them away to a distant village.
There is an “umbilical cord” connecting the two, which will only be revealed with “Paola,” who decides to travel from Paris to Aleppo.
In her novel, Maha Hassan takes us to the world of the Kurds in Syria, with all its rituals, customs and traditions, highlighting their suffering in a country in which they live, but which is cruel to them. It moves between two cultures: the West and the East, and in doing so it raises the question of identity, its true component, and the question of belonging and its meaning.
“Amazing is a hidden treasure in Aleppo,” says one of the novel’s heroines. In her work, Maha Hassan tries to bring this amazement through writing and memories to re-draw Aleppo and its ancient popular neighborhoods, its rituals of living, the simplicity of its people, and their small dreams, before the war comes and destroys all of this in its path.
Relying on a unique technique inspired by the names of Arab and international novels and the titles of the chapters, the heroes of “The Amazing Neighborhood” tell us their story from “Zarqa’s Imagination” and “Beirut Nightmares” to the house of “Sleeping Beauties.”
It is a story about love, childhood memories, intentional killing, the emotional placenta, and the role of literature in our lives
