The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother)
by Rabih Alameddine
Summary
In a Beirut apartment, sixty three year old Raja — a gay philosophy teacher who describes himself as gullible — lives with his demanding octogenarian mother, who regards his desire for privacy as a personal affront. When an invitation to an American writing residency arrives in the wake of cascading national disasters — the civil war, the 2019 liquidity crisis, COVID-19, and the 2020 port explosion — Raja is forced to recount, in nonlinear nested stories, the very betrayals and catastrophes he wishes to escape. Alameddine holds grief and absurdity in the same breath, producing a novel that is, improbably and defiantly, very funny.
Historical Context & Significance
Alameddine's win was celebrated as a landmark for Arab American literature; the novel's tonal balance — comic yet saturated with catastrophe — drew comparisons to José Saramago and Naguib Mahfouz.