In the Spider's Room

Description:

WINNER OF THE 2019 PRIX DE LA LITTÉRATURE ARABE
SHORTLISTED FOR THE INTERNATIONAL PRIZE FOR ARABIC FICTION

A sensitive and courageous account of life as a gay man in Egypt and

Hani was out for an evening stroll near Cairo's Tahrir Square when a heavy hand landed on his shoulder. An informant had identified him, and he was thrown into the back of a police truck. There began a seven-month nightmare as he was swept up, along with fifty other men, in the infamous Queen Boat affair that targeted Egypt's gay community.

Finally free, but traumatized into speechlessness, Hani writes down the events of his life--his first sexual desires, his relationship with his mother, his marriage of convenience, and his passion for Abdel Aziz, the only man he ever truly loved.

In the Spider's Room is a bold tale of sexuality and persecution in contemporary Egypt.

Brief description: Born in 1977, Muhammad Abdelnabi is the author of two novels and four short-story collections. His The Ghost of Anton Chekov won first prize in the Emerging Writers category of the Sawiris Cultural Award for short-story collections in 2011. In the Spider's Room was shortlisted for the 2017 International Prize for Arabic Fiction and was joint winner of the 2017 Sawiris Cultural Award for novels in the Emerging Writers category. He lives near Banha in Egypt.

Review Quotes:

"This beautifully written and poetic book moved me to tears; it is an ode to freedom and a real act of bravery."--The Guardian

"Beautiful and immensely enjoyable . . . to read In the Spider's Room is to enter a powerful story."--Mada Masr

"Written from the perspective of one of the victims of the infamous 2001 Queen Boat scandal, when 52 men were arrested and put on trial in Egypt during a raid on a gay party, In the Spider's Room is an intense depiction of living in a society that fears and rejects any form of queerness. Unflinching, claustrophobic, and suffocating, Abdelnaby does not shy away from exploring what happens when one is presented with no avenues for expressing their desires and sense of self."--Saleem Haddad, author of Guapa