The Angel of History: A Novel

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About The Angel Of History: A Novel

Product Description “There are many ways to break someone’s heart, but Rabih Alameddine is one rare writer who not only breaks our hearts but gives every broken piece a new life.”—Yiyun Li Following the critical and commercial success of An Unnecessary Woman, Alameddine delivers a spectacular portrait of a man and an era of profound political and social upheaval. Set over the course of one night in the waiting room of a psych clinic, The Angel of History follows Yemeni-born poet Jacob as he revisits the events of his life, from his maternal upbringing in an Egyptian whorehouse to his adolescence under the aegis of his wealthy father and his life as a gay Arab man in San Francisco at the height of AIDS. Hovered over by the presence of alluring, sassy Satan who taunts Jacob to remember his painful past and dour, frigid Death who urges him to forget and give up on life, Jacob is also attended to by 14 saints. Set in Cairo and Beirut; Sana'a, Stockholm, and San Francisco; Alameddine gives us a charged philosophical portrait of a brilliant mind in crisis. This is a profound, philosophical and hilariously winning story of the war between memory and oblivion we wrestle with every day of our lives. “Rabih Alameddine is one our most daring writers—daring not in the cheap sense of lurid or racy, but as a surgeon, a philosopher, an explorer, or a dancer.”—Michael Chabon Review A Washington Independent Review of Books, Literary Hub, and Shelf Awareness Best Book of the Year “Alameddine, entrancing and unflinching, is in easy command of his bricolage narrative, and he leavens its tragedy with wit.” ― New York Times Book Review “An elegy for a lost generation of gay men [and] a structurally inventive bildungsroman . . . The Angel of History marks the triumph of memory over oblivion.” ― Bookforum “The narrative spans every corner of the globe to reveal a razor-sharp mind in turmoil, reflecting a wider consciousness of the social unrest around him.” ― Harper’s Bazaar online “ The Angel of History takes place in a single day, but it reads like an epic . . . a sprawling fever dream of a novel, by turns beautiful and horrifying, and impossible to forget . . . Alameddine is a writer with a boundless imagination . . . [his] writing is so beautiful, so exuberant . . . When Alameddine aims for the heart, he doesn’t miss, and he hits hard . . . The Angel of History isn’t just a brilliant novel, it’s a heartfelt cry in the dark, a reminder that we can never forget our past, the friends and family we’ve loved and lost. It’s a raw love letter from those who survived a plague to those who didn’t.” ―NPR.org “A remarkable novel, a commentary of love and death, creativity and spirituality, memory and survival . . . brilliant . . . [it] hits an emotional nerve.” ― Los Angeles Review of Books “Excellent, lissome . . . the novel is a work of social and cultural memorialization . . . The Angel of History suggests that to be alienated―from past love and from the past itself―is to open the door to memory and creation . . . to read Alameddine’s prose is to see loss, if not mastered, then at least made into lively and living art.” ― San Francisco Chronicle “Laced with literary references . . . a kaleidoscopic storytelling style, and philosophical humor.” ― New Yorker “A poignant act of remembering by one AIDS survivor to a new generation . . . an evocative religious and sexual elegiac with both dark and stirring comedy . . . a poetic combination of Mapplethorpean imagery and religious symbolism. It’s uncomfortable and enlightening; an experiment in merging the present with the past, in merging a gay life characterized by assimilation with a gay life celebratory of its deviancy. It dances between the ecstasy of sexual release and the ecstasy of religious rapture . . . an unforgettable novel. The Angel of History is cathartic tale of outsiders and insiders and what’s lost in becoming each.” ― PopMatters “This is a story of one life and