A review by districtreads
In Praise of Hatred by Khaled Khalifa

1.0

Decided not to come back to this book. Either something is very much lost in translation, or the writing style was just not up to par. I was really interested in possibly learning more about my country of heritage - I'm half Syrian - but there was too much unnecessary sexuality (what woman thinks about her chest that way, no matter how repressed? is it necessary to talk about a preteen's breasts that much?) and the narrative voice was simply lacking. The kiss of death? I was BORED.

I would be interested to read this in the original Arabic, because the premise seems incredibly unique and needed, and I see that it did win a prize for Arabic fiction - but I'm done with the English version.