I Remember Fallujah

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In this poignant first novel of memory, identity, and generational trauma, a child of political refugees tries to uncover the past his dying father kept secret, painting a powerful, layered portrait of Iraq from the 1950s to the 2000s. As a young man in the early 1970s, Rami fled his home to escape Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship. In France, he built a new life and had a family, working hard to become a successful immigrant. He barely speaks of his time over there, and his son, Euphrates, feels it like a wall between them. When the now elderly Rami is hospitalized with a fatal cancer, Euphrates sees his last chance to learn more about this enigmatic man, and himself. Shifting between past and present, I Remember Fallujah brings to vivid life Rami’s coming-of-age in a land devastated by violent conflict. His memories of the city, which became a stronghold for Hussein’s Ba’ath Party, reveal the courageous acts of resistance, as well as