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I was SO excited when my book club picked A Woman Is No Man by Etaf Rum as our latest read, and my anticipation only grew as more and more friends told me how they were flying through it. Still, I didn’t expect how strongly I would feel about this novel, which follows three women in Palestine and Brooklyn as they navigate their relationship to their gender, to their faith, and to each other. Isra, Deya, and Fareeda’s stories are as remarkable as they are ordinary, tracing cycles of violence, abuse, isolation, and oppression while highlighting woman’s capacity for resistance and resilience. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Etaf Rum tells a fictional story that reflects so many realities: it feels like a call to action, a love letter to Arab women and the power of books, and a reckoning with patriarchal societies - a story that speaks to the past and prophesies the future. I cannot image the strength it must have taken to tell a story like this one, to portray the world as she sees it, even if that portrayal sometimes confirms the very worst beliefs people hold about a culture and a people that is different from their own. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ TW: domestic violence, sexual assault, suicide, murder, death of a child, death of a parent ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ID: I’m holding up a hardback copy of A Woman is No Man. There is a sidewalk, grass, and trees visible in the background. via Instagram https://instagr.am/p/CVP_AvxLfUX/