Houris by Kamel Daoud & The Bastion of Tears by Abdellah Taïa

Extract

[...] This paradox allows some to justify unacceptable behaviors while condemning others. Morality is manipulated according to circumstances, and social norms are full of contradictions." Through Youssef, Abdellah Taïa criticizes these rigid norms that exclude and marginalize. The rigid categories imposed by society force individuals to live in lies and dissimulation. The novel reveals the hypocrisy that reigns in a world where appearances take precedence over truth, pushing each person to adopt roles that do not suit them, simply to survive or be accepted. [...]

[...] Aïssa was forced by a terrorist emir, nicknamed the Hungry Wolf, to document the massacres committed by his troops. Since then, he has become a guardian of memory, refusing to forget these events, despite the national reconciliation law that erases the crimes of terrorists and reintegrates them into society. Aube and Aïssa, two beings deeply marked by war, will walk together. She is the living symbol of the massacres, and he, the unyielding memory of the 'black decade'. Their common quest highlights the horror of an era that Algeria is trying to bury, but whose survivors still bear the scars, visible and invisible, in a society where wounds remain open. [...]

[...] Houris - Kamel Daoud (2024) ; Le Bastion of Tears - Abdellah Taïa (2024) - Summaries I. Summary: Houris by Kamel Daoud In Houris of Kamel Daoud, Dawn is the sole survivor of the massacre of her family, which occurred at the end of the 1990s in the Algerian village of Had Chekala, during the 'black decade'. At the age of five, she narrowly escaped death after being beheaded. Now an adult, she bears the indelible marks of this tragedy on her face: a wide scar that disfigures her smile, difficulties speaking, she is forced to breathe through a tube and the loss of her voice. [...]

[...] The Bastion of Tears, the walls of the old city, remind him of a promise made to Najib, bringing to the surface painful memories. The novel highlights the hypocrisy of Moroccan society, where homosexuality is severely judged, but where behaviors like pedophilia are tolerated, particularly in the hammams where child abuse occurs under everyone's eyes. Homosexuals are publicly despised, but their money is discreetly accepted by those who benefit from it. In this society, the boundaries between what is 'halal' and 'haram' are blurred and ambiguous. [...]