Love Is an Ex-Country: A Memoir (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781948226585)

Queer. Muslim. Arab American. A proudly Fat femme. Randa Jarrar is all of these things. In this "exuberant, defiant and introspective" memoir of a cross-country road trip, she explores how to claim joy in an unraveling and hostile America (The New York Times Book Review).

Randa Jarrar is a fearless voice of dissent who has been called "politically incorrect" (Michelle Goldberg, The New York Times). As an American raised for a time in Egypt, and finding herself captivated by the story of a celebrated Egyptian belly dancer's journey across the United States in the 1940s, she sets off from her home in California to her parents' in Connecticut.

Coloring this road trip are journeys abroad and recollections of a life lived with daring. Reclaiming her autonomy after a life of survival--domestic assault as a child, and later, as a wife; threats and doxxing after her viral tweet about Barbara Bush--Jarrar offers a bold look at domestic violence, single motherhood, and sexuality through the lens of the punished-yet-triumphant body. On the way, she schools a rest-stop racist, destroys Confederate flags in the desert, and visits the Chicago neighborhood where her immigrant parents first lived.

Hailed as "one of the finest writers of her generation" (Laila Lalami), Jarrar delivers a euphoric and critical, funny and profound memoir that will speak to anyone who has felt erased, asserting: I am here. I am joyful.

Author: Randa Jarrar
ISBN-10: 1948226588
ISBN-13: 9781948226585
Publisher: Catapult
Language: English
Published: 02/02/2021
Pages: 240
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 0.87lbs
Size: 8.30h x 5.70w x 1.00d

Review Citation(s):
Kirkus Reviews 12/01/2020
Booklist 12/01/2020 pg. 14
Library Journal 01/22/2021 pg. 1