A Woman is no Man

A multi-generational story of a Palestinian family who moved to Brooklyn, as told by the mothers, daughters, nieces and aunts in the group.

This is a hard one to write about for me because the subject matters (women’s traditional roles in Arab households, integration into a new country, domestic violence) are all very much worthy of a novel. But I must give it a semi-fail purely on the technical basis that I didn’t get on with the prose, the lack of any nuance in people’s inner monologues and the tendency for the book to repeat itself.

The story is told from different points of view across decades ranging from the 70s to the late 00s, and yet it felt like one voice. Especially in the first half.

Things do pick up as what really went on in the past starts to come into focus, and the last few chapters are really well thought out. There’s a bittersweet, beautiful final flourish that deftly ties the whole ending together. It’s a shame the rest of the book didn’t rock me in the same way.

An eye opening and important story, albeit one I found ultimately frustrating.