A review by misspalah
The Baghdad Clock by Shahad Al Rawi, Luke Leafgren

challenging emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

‘As for what's attached to history, you are the children of a long, disconnected history. Your countries live through the ages as islands separate from each other. The history of pain alone is the sole river flowing through your time. You and sadness form an eternal friendship, and whenever its river dries up, you fill it up again with your tears. To tell the truth, I don't know if it is you who are chasing sadness, or whether sadness is following you. You are masters at producing sorrow but ignorant of the alphabet of joy. Look at your songs and your music. Look at your tears when you laugh. Look at your poems and your proverbs. With you, even love is an allusion to sadness, absence, anguish and separation.'

'What's the solution?' 'Geography is a fate that cannot be escaped, but history is made. Adapt to your geography and change your history?' 'How do we change history? Do you mean falsify it?' ‘Not at all.

• The Baghdad Clock by Shahad Al-Rawi

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What an evocative and poignant writing! A stellar debut, i must say. The fact that this was translated from Arabic to English but the translator managed to retain the poetic element in it really blew my mind. Both the expression and description flowed smoothly. When author describing her neighborhood, her childhood memories, her pain and longingness caused by the Gulf War - the sanctions, people abandoned their hometown, the sudden disappearance ; it was so vivid. The story drawn from the author’s experience of growing up in the year 1991. We followed the POV of a young girl with her close friend , Nadia - navigating their daily life, observing the community where they lived, falling in love with Ahmad and Farouq while they were in teenagehood, passing the exams and enrolling into the university. BUT the book also was sprinkled with philosophical discussion and rhetoric questions that i was honestly taken aback by it (in a good way). Then, we also explored some aspect of magical realism whereby our MC actually can explored other people’s dream. She used to see Nadia’s dream all the time although she never told her that. Another magical realism aspect that existed in the story is the existence of soothsayers in the community. Not many trusted them given the constraint by the religion and societal stigma but the fact that it was integrated in the story is fascinating. Not all prediction of the soothsayers came true but it might hold some value for those who came wanting to know what will happen in the future.  Its not all rainbows in their lives unfortunately as the war is getting worse and the relationship were strained because they were separated by distance and inability to keep in touch at their convenience. Since its the 90s, there is a mention of Honor Killing as someone in their neighborhood got killed by her brother for being in a car with a man. Overall, an emotional read! One can see how an innocent little girls grew up too fast, get hardened by the impact of war which eventually left their home country only to feeling longing to those precious old memories.