Brought to you by Penguin.
LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION
A gripping, intimate story of one heartbreaking day in Palestine that reveals lives, loves, enmities, and histories in violent collision
Milad is five years old and excited for his school trip to a theme park on the outskirts of Jerusalem, but tragedy awaits: his bus is involved in a horrific accident. His father, Abed, rushes to the chaotic site, only to find Milad has already been taken away. Abed sets off on a journey to learn Milad's fate, navigating a maze of physical, emotional, and bureaucratic obstacles he must face as a Palestinian.
Interwoven with Abed's odyssey are the stories of Jewish and Palestinian characters whose lives and pasts unexpectedly converge: a kindergarten teacher and a mechanic who rescue children from the burning bus; an Israeli army commander and a Palestinian official who confront the aftermath at the scene of the crash; a settler paramedic; ultra-Orthodox emergency service workers; and two mothers who each hope to claim one severely injured boy.
A Day in the Life of Abed Salama is a deeply immersive, stunningly detailed portrait of life in Israel and Palestine, and an illumination of the reality of one of the most contested places on earth.
'A deeply immersive portrait of daily life in Israel and the West Bank' The Best Books to Understand the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Financial Times
'Brims over with just the sort of compassion and understanding that is needed at a time like this ... when facts have become weapons in this seemingly endless conflict, this is a book that speaks with deep and authentic truth of ordinary lives trapped in the jaws of history' Observer
©2024 Nathan Thrall (P)2024 Penguin Audio
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Creators
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Publisher
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Awards
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Release date
November 16, 2023 -
Formats
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OverDrive Listen audiobook
- ISBN: 9781802066012
- File size: 193934 KB
- Duration: 06:44:01
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Languages
- English
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Reviews
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Starred review from August 7, 2023
Journalist Thrall (The Only Language They Understand) offers a unique window onto the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in this captivating profile of Abed Salama, a Palestinian phone company worker and political activist, on the day in February 2012 when his five-year-old son, Malid, was among the seven people killed in a traffic accident near Jerusalem. The driver of the semitrailer that crashed into the bus carrying Malid’s kindergarten class was blamed for the accident and sentenced to 30 months in prison, but investigators failed to spell out other factors that made the accident and its aftermath worse, such as badly maintained Palestinian infrastructure (the road was congested and poorly lit); the barrier wall dividing Jerusalem from surrounding Palestinian neighborhoods (checkpoints delayed first responders); and a bureaucratic system intended to restrict Palestinians like Salama (because his ID indicated that he had served time in prison—a stint resulting from his affiliation with the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine—Salama was unable to cross into Jerusalem in search of his son). Through extensive interviews and research, Thrall reconstructs the day of the accident, interweaving stories of Jewish and Palestinian people involved, including a doctor and a teacher who helped rescue some of the children. But he also dives into the past, recounting Salama’s and the rescuers’ life stories and the history of the construction of the barrier wall. It’s a heart-wrenching portrait of an unequal society.
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