Synopsis:
Winner of The best Omani novel, 2010
Celestial Bodies is set in the village of al-Awafi in Oman, where we encounter three sisters: Mayya, who marries Abdallah after a heartbreak; Asma, who marries from a sense of duty; and Khawla who rejects all offers while waiting for her beloved, who has emigrated to Canada. These three women and their families witness Oman evolve from a traditional, slave-owning society slowly redefining itself after the colonial era, to the crossroads of its complex present. Elegantly structured and taut, Celestial Bodies is a coiled spring of a novel, telling of Oman's coming-of-age through the prism of one family's losses and loves.
Review:
'The great pleasure of reading Celestial Bodies is witnessing a novel argue, through the achieved perfection of its form, for a kind of inquiry that only the novel can really conduct.' --The New Yorker
'Alharthi... pushes past stereotypical narratives of Muslim women defying patriarchy, instead illustrating the difficulties of balancing tradition and newfound freedoms. It's a tale that perhaps could have been written only in a strange new place itself.' --Naina Bajekal, Time
'Al-Harthi renders the complicated dynamics of modern Oman, which only outlawed slavery in the 1970s. --Refinery29
'A richly imagined, engaging and poetic insight into a society in transition and into lives previously obscured.' --The Man Booker International Prize judges
'A beautifully written and very moving story.' --Nicola Sturgeon
'Fascinating.' --The Guardian
'Brings a distinctive and important new voice to world literature.' --The Irish Times
'Compelling...' --Women in Translation
`Blends the rhythms of daily life with magic and legend.'--Muhammad Barrada
`Delivers the reader immediately into the world of the marginal, forgotten, most subaltern sectors of society.'--Ibrahim al-Hajari
`This novel is interesting as a lens through which to view an important time in the transition of Omani society' --The Wee Review
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