Wolves of the Crescent Moon by Yousef Al-Mohaimeed, Anthony Calderbank (Translator)

The Barnes & Noble Review

This 2003 novel from Saudi Arabia has already garnered comparisons to Gabriel García Márquez and the school of magic realism but, delivered in a poetic translation by Anthony Calderbank, the effects produced by Al-Mohaimeed's tale more closely resemble the shaggy metaphysical surrealism of Haruki Murakami. Cosmic coincidences insusceptible to logical parsing, along with life-or-death choices for the protagonists result in spiritual transformations. But here the supernatural events always prove to have mundane explanations. A woman hangs her laundered underwear out to dry beneath the gaze of the full moon and thereafter immaculately conceives a daughter. Or so family and neighbors believe, not being privy to the photo of a handsome man she secretly weeps over. This modern reduction of the miraculous to the commonplace, abetted by the assaults of contemporary civilization against human nature, drives the novel as both thesis and complaint. Even the streets of the city declaim injustice: "…the quarter of al-Mazlum, an old name that means 'he who has been severely wronged.' " The sufferings of the three protagonists are exemplary: Turad, a Bedouin exiled to modern Riyadh, was once a daring desert bandit -- but now must serve as coffee boy to jeering office workers. Tawfiq was stolen from his idyllic Sudanese village to become a eunuch and slave. And orphaned Nasir Abdullah enjoys a brief mansion idyll before being kicked back to the streets. The lives and fates of these three intertwine in eerie synchronicity. Despite an attempt at uplift in the final chapter, Al-Mohaimeed's novel paints a disturbing picture of a Middle Eastern society suffering from anomie and resentment: not the freshest news, but boldly delivered. --Paul DiFilippo

From the Publisher

An extraordinary novel from a leading voice among the new generation of Middle Eastern writers

Banned in Saudi Arabia , this provocative, gorgeously written novel confirms what The Washington Post reported about its award-winning author: "Yousef Al-Mohaimeed is taking on some of the most divisive subjects in the Arab world . . . in a lush style that evokes Gabriel García Márquez." The story of three men-a Bedouin missing an ear, an orphan missing an eye, and a eunuch-Wolves of the Crescent Moon is a novel of almost overpowering sensuality about people who have been denied sensual experience. As their paths converge in a narrative of graphic immediacy and aching lyricism, they discover the miraculous power of stories to deliver them from the nightmares of their lives to the beauty of a new day.

Publishers Weekly

Three tales of Arab outcasts make up this fresh-voiced debut novel by Saudi Arabian author Al-Mohaimeed. A one-eared Bedouin tribesman named Turad quits his humiliating 13-year job as a low-level ministry servant and ends up at the Riyadh bus station with a plan to flee, but no destination in mind. While he figures out where he wants to go, two additional voices join the narrative. One is the memory of Turad's elderly co-worker at the ministry, Tawfiq, whose sad story begins when he was a child and his Sudanese village was attacked by slave traders. Tawfiq was later captured, raped, castrated and performed the services of a eunuch until he grew too old to be of use. The other voice is from a discarded official file Turad finds at the bus station. It involves a one-eyed orphan named Nasir, who is sexually abused by the staff at the orphanage where he grows up and is eventually denied his ambition of becoming a soldier. Al-Mohaimeed's work, assisted by Calderbank's faultless translation, beautifully captures the frustrations and resentments of his tormented characters. (Jan.)

Andrea Kempf - Library Journal

In his short, poetic debut, Saudia Arabian-born Al-Mohaimeed explores the lives of three misfits in his native country's capital of Riyadh. First, there is Turad, a Bedouin who lost an ear; next is Tawfik, a former Sudanese slave who was castrated; and finally, Nasir, an orphan who is missing one eye. As Turad, who was fired from his job after being humiliated at work, sits in the bus station, trying to buy a ticket to anywhere, he contemplates their lives, which have intersected at various times. Myths-like the story of a young woman impregnated by the moon after she hung her underwear to dry by its light or the tale of rival Bedouin thieves wrestling until they become like brothers-meld with the realities of the underbelly of society in Saudi Arabia, where Al-Mohaimeed's protagonists have no status and little opportunity. His exploration of men who have lost pieces of themselves yet struggle to survive swirls with a richness of language and imagery. Banned in Saudi Arabia and deserving of a large audience, it is recommended for most literary fiction collections.

Kirkus Reviews

A modern-day Three Wise Monkeys, Al-Mohaimeed's novel, banned in Saudi Arabia, concerns a trio of disabled Saudis who accidentally converge in Riyadh and tell their stories. This is the author's first book-length U.S. publication. Turad, a Bedouin missing an ear, waits in a Riyadh bus station not knowing where he is going, but only that he must escape his current "hell," perhaps find a hell of a different name. He recalls, in spurts, the details of his life-his father's grief when his older brother ran away with a gypsy girl, his foray into highway robbery to bring money home to his family, his shame about his ear and his stilted, humiliating career as a servant in a ministry office. While half-heartedly trying to decide upon a destination, he discovers an old government file that someone has left, which chronicles in legal terms the life of another misfit, a young man orphaned and mutilated as an infant, leaving him with one eye. The baby, who received the government-issued name Nasir, was placed in an orphanage, where he was arguably sexually abused by a Filipino caretaker, before being rejected by the armed forces. Nasir's story stirs Turad's memory, and he recalls the stories of a former colleague, a Sudanese man named Amm Tawfiq, who had once been a driver for the palace and spoke of Nasir. Like Turad and Nasir, Amm Tawfiq is also missing something essential-as a younger man, he was tricked by a group of slave traders, and after a long and arduous journey with them, was viciously raped and castrated. Seemingly the most life-altering of the three wounds, the castration appears to affect Amm Tawfiq less profoundly than the other two are affected by their traumas. In each case, though,mutilation becomes an effective frame for conveying the characters' collective pain and solitude. A subtle exploration of loss.

What People Are Saying

Nuruddin Farah
An irresistible novel. (Nuruddin Farah, author of Links and Knots)

Hanan al-Shaykh
At last an authentic voice from Saudi Arabia. (Hanan al-Shaykh, author of Women of Sand and Myrrh)

Uzodinma Iweala
Brave and brilliant . . . A novel that sneaks up on you with its power to make you see, hear, and live the complexities of another world. (Uzodinma Iweala, author of Beasts of No Nation)

Product Details

• ISBN: 0143113216
  
• ISBN-13: 9780143113218
• Format: Paperback, 192pp
• Publisher: Penguin Group (USA)
• Pub. Date: December 2007
• Sales Rank: 260,715