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A review by coffeekitaab
As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow by Zoulfa Katouh
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
π
Salama Kassab is a pharmacy student when the cries for freedom break out in Syria. She lives with her parents in her home that she shares with her older brother, Hamza, who dreams of securing residency at the local hospital as a junior doctor.
Now, Salama volunteers at at the same hospital in Homs, treating the wounded who flood through the doors in their masses everyday. Secretly, Salama yearns to escape her beloved country; circumstances have made it unsafe moreso for her best friend and sister-in-law, Layla, and Layla's unborn child.
Salama is torn between her loyalty to her country, leaving behind her home, her family, her history and identity and escaping to a land of strangers, the treatment there unknown, crossing turbulent waters, with no guarantee she will even reach her destination anyway. When she crosses paths with a boy she was meant to meet one fateful day, Salama starts to doubt her resolve in leaving home at all.
π
This was a enormously moving and very difficult book to read but one that is all the same instilled with hope. That's the message that the author wanted to convey. I would urge everyone to read it, checking the trigger warnings beforehand, but it really is important that everyone reads this. I am angered, upset, ashamed and broken. Before reading, I couldn't imagine the experiences and human emotions faced by casualties, victims, orphans, the displaced and survivours of lands torn by conflict, the nature of the world we live in results in a degree of separation but - #LemonTrees comes closest to it. Each page paints a very vivid reality before your eyes. We owe it to them to know their story and urge others to make themselves aware. As much as this is a YA novel, it deals with mature topics with poignancy and is certainly not a tale of fiction.
With respect, the rating is only for the platform otherwise this is beyond a rating and I laud the efforts of #ZoulfaKatouh at writing an impactful, heartfelt and heartbreaking debut.
π " I'll tell God everything"
π "The thing is hearing about the ocean's rage is different from being caught in the middle of the angry waves"
Salama Kassab is a pharmacy student when the cries for freedom break out in Syria. She lives with her parents in her home that she shares with her older brother, Hamza, who dreams of securing residency at the local hospital as a junior doctor.
Now, Salama volunteers at at the same hospital in Homs, treating the wounded who flood through the doors in their masses everyday. Secretly, Salama yearns to escape her beloved country; circumstances have made it unsafe moreso for her best friend and sister-in-law, Layla, and Layla's unborn child.
Salama is torn between her loyalty to her country, leaving behind her home, her family, her history and identity and escaping to a land of strangers, the treatment there unknown, crossing turbulent waters, with no guarantee she will even reach her destination anyway. When she crosses paths with a boy she was meant to meet one fateful day, Salama starts to doubt her resolve in leaving home at all.
π
This was a enormously moving and very difficult book to read but one that is all the same instilled with hope. That's the message that the author wanted to convey. I would urge everyone to read it, checking the trigger warnings beforehand, but it really is important that everyone reads this. I am angered, upset, ashamed and broken. Before reading, I couldn't imagine the experiences and human emotions faced by casualties, victims, orphans, the displaced and survivours of lands torn by conflict, the nature of the world we live in results in a degree of separation but - #LemonTrees comes closest to it. Each page paints a very vivid reality before your eyes. We owe it to them to know their story and urge others to make themselves aware. As much as this is a YA novel, it deals with mature topics with poignancy and is certainly not a tale of fiction.
With respect, the rating is only for the platform otherwise this is beyond a rating and I laud the efforts of #ZoulfaKatouh at writing an impactful, heartfelt and heartbreaking debut.
π " I'll tell God everything"
π "The thing is hearing about the ocean's rage is different from being caught in the middle of the angry waves"
Content Warnings
Moderate: Emotional abuse, Grief, Sexual assault, Blood, Child death, Death, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Medical content, Medical trauma, Mental illness, Murder, Police brutality, Sexual harassment, Violence, and War
Minor: Rape