Omar El Akkad

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - From award-winning novelist and journalist Omar El Akkad comes a powerful reckoning with what it means to live in a West that betrays its fundamental values " A] bracing memoir and manifesto."--The New York Times "I can't think of a more important piece of writing to read right now. I found hope here, and help, to face what the world is now, all that it isn't anymore. Please read this. I promise you won't regret it."--Tommy Orange, bestselling author of Wandering Stars and There There On October 25, 2023, after just three weeks of the bombardment of Gaza, Omar El Akkad put out a tweet: "One day, when it's safe, when there's no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it's too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this." This tweet has been viewed more than 10 million times. As an immigrant who came to the West, El Akkad believed that it promised freedom. A place of justice for all. But in the past twenty years, reporting on the War on Terror, Ferguson, climate change, Black Lives Matter protests, and more, and watching the unmitigated slaughter in Gaza, El Akkad has come to the conclusion that much of what the West promises is a lie. That there will always be entire groups of human beings it has never intended to treat as fully human--not just Arabs or Muslims or immigrants, but whoever falls outside the boundaries of privilege. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is a chronicle of that painful realization, a moral grappling with what it means, as a citizen of the U. S., as a father, to carve out some sense of possibility in a time of carnage. This is El Akkad's nonfiction debut, his most raw and vulnerable work to date, a heartsick breakup letter with the West. It is a brilliant articulation of the same breakup we are watching all over the United States, in family rooms, on college campuses, on city streets; the consequences of this rupture are just beginning. This book is for all the people who want something better than what the West has served up. This is the book for our time.

An audacious and powerful debut novel about a post-apocalyptic America, for fans of Station Eleven.

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is an urgent and necessary reckoning about what it means to live in the West today. This is a book for those that have tired of moral emptiness. This is a book for everyone who wants something better.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From award-winning novelist and journalist Omar El Akkad comes a powerful reckoning with what it means to live in a West that betrays its fundamental values "[A] bracing memoir and manifesto." The New York TimesI can t think of a more important piece of writing to read right now. I found hope here, and help, to face what the world is now, all that it isn t anymore. Please read this. I promise you won t regret it. Tommy Orange, bestselling author of Wandering Stars and There ThereOn October 25, 2023, after just three weeks of the bombardment of Gaza, Omar El Akkad put out a tweet: One day, when it s safe, when there s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this. This tweet has been viewed more than 10 million times. As an immigrant who came to the West, El Akkad believed that it promised freedom. A place of justice for all. But in the past twenty years, reporting on the War on Terror, Ferguson, climate change, Black Lives Matter protests, and more, and watching the unmitigated slaughter in Gaza, El Akkad has come to the conclusion that much of what the West promises is a lie. That there will always be entire groups of human beings it has never intended to treat as fully human not just Arabs or Muslims or immigrants, but whoever falls outside the boundaries of privilege. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is a chronicle of that painful realization, a moral grappling with what it means, as a citizen of the U. S., as a father, to carve out some sense of possibility in a time of carnage. This is El Akkad s nonfiction debut, his most raw and vulnerable work to date, a heartsick breakup letter with the West. It is a brilliant articulation of the same breakup we are watching all over the United States, in family rooms, on college campuses, on city streets; the consequences of this rupture are just beginning. This book is for all the people who want something better than what the West has served up. This is the book for our time.

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is an urgent and necessary reckoning about what it means to live in the West today. As an immigrant, Omar El Akkad believed the West offered freedom and justice for all. Over the past twenty years he reported on the various Wars on Terror, Ferguson, climate change, Black Lives Matter protests, and more. He won awards for his journalism and his fiction. But now, watching the unmitigated slaughter in Gaza, he comes to the conclusion that much of what the West promises is a lie. This powerful book is a chronicle of Omar's painful realisation, a moral grappling with what it means - as a citizen, as a father - to carve out some sense of possibility during these devastating times. This is a book for those that have tired of moral emptiness. This is a book for everyone who wants something better.

'Deserves to be an instant classic. I haven’t loved a book this much in a long time . . . What Strange Paradise . . . reads as a parable for our times . . . Such beautiful writing . . . This is an extraordinary book' – The New York TimesFrom the widely acclaimed author of American War, Omar El Akkad, a beautifully written, unrelentingly dramatic and profoundly moving novel that brings the global refugee crisis down to the level of a child’s eyes. More bodies have washed up on the shores of a small island. Another over-filled, ill-equipped, dilapidated ship has sunk under the weight of its too-many passengers: Syrians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Palestinians, all of them desperate to escape untenable lives in their homelands. And only one had made the passage: nine-year-old Amir. Amir is a Syrian boy who has the good fortune to fall into the hands not of the officials, but of Vänna: a teenage girl. She is native to the island, and lives inside her own sense of homelessness in a place and among people she has come to disdain. And though Vänna and Amir are complete strangers and don’t speak a common language, Vänna determines to do whatever it takes to save him. In alternating chapters, we learn the story of Amir’s life and of how he came to be on the ship; and we follow the duo as they make their way towards a vision of safety. But as the novel unfurls, we begin to understand that this is not merely the story of two children finding their way through a hostile world. Omar El Akkad’s What Strange Paradise is the story of our collective moment in this time: of empathy and indifference, of hope and despair – and of the way each of those things can blind us to reality, or guide us to a better one.'Imaginative, touching, and necessary' – Yiyun Li, author of Wednesday's Child'Omar El Akkad writes with such emotional precision, power, and grace' – Tommy Orange, author of There There

A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR - From the widely acclaimed, bestselling author of American War--a beautifully written, unrelentingly dramatic, and profoundly moving novel that looks at the global refugee crisis through the eyes of a child. "Told from the point of view of two children, on the ground and at sea, the story so astutely unpacks the us-versus-them dynamics of our divided world that it deserves to be an instant classic." --The New York Times Book Review More bodies have washed up on the shores of a small island. Another overfilled, ill-equipped, dilapidated ship has sunk under the weight of its too many passengers: Syrians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Palestinians, all of them desperate to escape untenable lives back in their homelands. But miraculously, someone has survived the passage: nine-year-old Amir, a Syrian boy who is soon rescued by V nna. V nna is a teenage girl, who, despite being native to the island, experiences her own sense of homelessness in a place and among people she has come to disdain. And though V nna and Amir are complete strangers, though they don't speak a common language, V nna is determined to do whatever it takes to save the boy. In alternating chapters, we learn about Amir's life and how he came to be on the boat, and we follow him and the girl as they make their way toward safety. What Strange Paradise is the story of two children finding their way through a hostile world. But it is also a story of empathy and indifference, of hope and despair--and about the way each of those things can blind us to reality.

Starting in 1999 with the publication of The Definitive Annotated Alice, the Norton and Liveright annotated books have become the leading series of classic, illustrated works in the English language. The long-anticipated publication of The Annotated Arabian Nights extends this tradition with a strikingly modern translation—the first of Shahrazad’s tales into English by a woman—as well as erudite notes that will illuminate the stories for both dedicated readers and newcomers. Yasmine Seale’s translations from both Arabic and French capture the musicality and rhythm of the Nights’ poetry and prose, while Paulo Lemos Horta’s annotations wrestle with the extraordinarily complex origins and history of the stories, showing that, far from being inventions of French antiquarians or English explorers, they have clear antecedents in Arabic folklore and tradition. This stunningly illustrated edition selects core stories as well as treasured later additions such as “Aladdin” and “Ali Baba” to offer an unparalleled account of a cornerstone of world literature that can be treasured by children, students and literature-lovers alike.

'Deserves to be an instant classic. I haven’t loved a book this much in a long time . . . What Strange Paradise . . . reads as a parable for our times . . . Such beautiful writing . . . This is an extraordinary book.' – New York TimesFrom the widely acclaimed author of American War, Omar El Akkad, a beautifully written, unrelentingly dramatic and profoundly moving novel that brings the global refugee crisis down to the level of a child’s eyes. More bodies have washed up on the shores of a small island. Another over-filled, ill-equipped, dilapidated ship has sunk under the weight of its too-many passengers: Syrians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Palestinians, all of them desperate to escape untenable lives in their homelands. And only one had made the passage: nine-year-old Amir, a Syrian boy who has the good fortune to fall into the hands not of the officials, but of Vänna: a teenage girl, native to the island, who lives inside her own sense of homelessness in a place and among people she has come to disdain. And though Vänna and Amir are complete strangers and don’t speak a common language, Vänna determines to do whatever it takes to save him. In alternating chapters, we learn the story of Amir’s life and of how he came to be on the boat; and we follow the duo as they make their way towards a vision of safety. But as the novel unfurls, we begin to understand that this is not merely the story of two children finding their way through a hostile world. Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise is the story of our collective moment in this time: of empathy and indifference, of hope and despair – and of the way each of those things can blind us to reality, or guide us to a better one.

A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR - From the widely acclaimed, bestselling author of American War--a beautifully written, unrelentingly dramatic, and profoundly moving novel that looks at the global refugee crisis through the eyes of a child. "Told from the point of view of two children, on the ground and at sea, the story so astutely unpacks the us-versus-them dynamics of our divided world that it deserves to be an instant classic." --The New York Times Book Review More bodies have washed up on the shores of a small island. Another overfilled, ill-equipped, dilapidated ship has sunk under the weight of its too many passengers: Syrians, Ethiopians, Egyptians, Lebanese, Palestinians, all of them desperate to escape untenable lives back in their homelands. But miraculously, someone has survived the passage: nine-year-old Amir, a Syrian boy who is soon rescued by V nna. V nna is a teenage girl, who, despite being native to the island, experiences her own sense of homelessness in a place and among people she has come to disdain. And though V nna and Amir are complete strangers, though they don't speak a common language, V nna is determined to do whatever it takes to save the boy. In alternating chapters, we learn about Amir's life and how he came to be on the boat, and we follow him and the girl as they make their way toward safety. What Strange Paradise is the story of two children finding their way through a hostile world. But it is also a story of empathy and indifference, of hope and despair--and about the way each of those things can blind us to reality.

For fans of Exit West and The Underground Railroad and from the widely acclaimed author of American War comes a profoundly moving novel examining the global refugee crisis through a child's lens.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER - A second American Civil War, a devastating plague, and one family caught deep in the middle--this gripping debut novel asks what might happen if America were to turn its most devastating policies and deadly weapons upon itself. From the author of What Strange Paradise "Powerful ... as haunting a postapocalyptic universe as Cormac McCarthy created] in The Road." --The New York Times Sarat Chestnut, born in Louisiana, is only six when the Second American Civil War breaks out in 2074. But even she knows that oil is outlawed, that Louisiana is half underwater, and that unmanned drones fill the sky. When her father is killed and her family is forced into Camp Patience for displaced persons, she begins to grow up shaped by her particular time and place. But not everyone at Camp Patience is who they claim to be. Eventually Sarat is befriended by a mysterious functionary, under whose influence she is turned into a deadly instrument of war. The decisions that she makes will have tremendous consequences not just for Sarat but for her family and her country, rippling through generations of strangers and kin alike.

En dag vil alle hele tiden ha vært i mot dette er en essaysamling skrevet som en reaksjon på hendelsene i Gaza etter 7. oktober 2023. Den er et nødvendig oppgjør med hva det vil si å leve i Vesten i dag. Som innvandrer trodde den prisbelønte forfatteren og journalisten Omar El Akkad at Vesten betydde frihet og rettferdighet for alle. Gjennom de siste tjue årene har han rapportert om de ulike krigene mot terror, opptøyene i Missouri, Black Lives Matter-protestene og mye mer. Men nå, mens han ser på den uhemmede slaktingen i Gaza, har han kommet til den konklusjon at mye av det Vesten lover, er løgn. Denne boken er for deg som har fått nok av moralsk tomhet. En bok for alle som ønsker seg en bedre verden.