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The House of Youssef
The House of Youssef is a collection of short stories set in Western Sydney. The stories explore the lives of Lebanese migrants who have settled in the area, circling around themes of isolation, family and community, and nostalgia for the home country. In particular, House of Youssef is about relationships, and the customs which complicate them: between parents and children, the dark secrets of marriage, the breakable bonds between friends. The stories are told with extreme minimalism — some are only two pages long — which heightens their emotional intensity.
The collection is framed by two soliloquies. The first expresses the longing of an old man for the homeland he will never return to. The second is the monologue of a woman, who could be his wife, addressed to her daughter, about life and its disappointments. The two central sequences are composed of vignettes which focus on moments of domestic crisis, and which combine, in the title sequence, to chart the demise of a single family. Kassab portrays the lives of ordinary people — simple, unglamorous, down-to-earth. Her understated style isolates small details and the anxieties that lurk within them. The tiny shifts in a normal day are an entire world to the people at the centre of her stories.
The collection is framed by two soliloquies. The first expresses the longing of an old man for the homeland he will never return to. The second is the monologue of a woman, who could be his wife, addressed to her daughter, about life and its disappointments. The two central sequences are composed of vignettes which focus on moments of domestic crisis, and which combine, in the title sequence, to chart the demise of a single family. Kassab portrays the lives of ordinary people — simple, unglamorous, down-to-earth. Her understated style isolates small details and the anxieties that lurk within them. The tiny shifts in a normal day are an entire world to the people at the centre of her stories.
288 pages, Paperback
First published September 3, 2019
8 people are currently reading
363 people want to read
About the author
Yumna Kassab
9 books37 followersYumna Kassab was born and raised in Western Sydney. She completed most of her schooling in Parramatta, except for two formative years when she lived in Lebanon with her family. She went on to study medical science at Macquarie University and neuroscience at Sydney University. She currently teaches in regional New South Wales.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews
February 11, 2020
This is deeply minimalist prose, telling the stories if 1st and 2nd generation Lebanese migrants in Sydney. The first section is a series of unconnected shorts - 2-3 pages long and capturing small, key moments in people's lives. Just as I started to fade a bit on the concept, it shifted into the middle section - a long set of linked stories outlining the gradual disintegration of a migrant family from various perspective. This was the strongest part of the book for me. The last two stories are long monologues from older 1st generation migrants reflecting on their decisions and their families. The whole thing is incredibly assured and quietly powerful - not a word is wasted.
April 20, 2020
‘What is a home? Is it a house? Is it where you are born? Is it where you will be buried?’
A collection of short stories, divided into four different sections, set in Western Sydney. The first section is a collection of vignettes, which capture small (and often unremarkable) moments in people’s lives. The second section is a much longer and linked set of stories about the gradual disintegration of a family and is told from several different perspectives. The third and fourth sections belong to two older first-generation migrants: a man and then a woman reflecting on the decisions they had made and their families.
‘Always it seems to me that I live between two worlds: the country where I was a child and this one
here where my children were born.’
The people in these stories are ordinary people: first- or second-generation Lebanese migrants to Australia. The themes explored include nostalgia, differences in custom, social isolation, and relationships.
I enjoyed this book: the vignettes (‘Motherland’) prepared me for the second section (‘The House of Youssef’) while the third and fourth sections (‘Homing’ and ‘Darkness, Speak’) enabled me to look at the consequence of emigration through different eyes.
Emigration is never easy. Those of us, like me, some generations removed from the experience of moving between countries take a lot for granted. Those who move to countries with differences in culture and language are always straddling two worlds.
In her thoughtful, minimalist prose, Ms Kassab captures many of the challenges first and second-generation migrants face. While this style will not appeal to every reader, I liked the opportunity it gave me to reflect on choice and consequence.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
A collection of short stories, divided into four different sections, set in Western Sydney. The first section is a collection of vignettes, which capture small (and often unremarkable) moments in people’s lives. The second section is a much longer and linked set of stories about the gradual disintegration of a family and is told from several different perspectives. The third and fourth sections belong to two older first-generation migrants: a man and then a woman reflecting on the decisions they had made and their families.
‘Always it seems to me that I live between two worlds: the country where I was a child and this one
here where my children were born.’
The people in these stories are ordinary people: first- or second-generation Lebanese migrants to Australia. The themes explored include nostalgia, differences in custom, social isolation, and relationships.
I enjoyed this book: the vignettes (‘Motherland’) prepared me for the second section (‘The House of Youssef’) while the third and fourth sections (‘Homing’ and ‘Darkness, Speak’) enabled me to look at the consequence of emigration through different eyes.
Emigration is never easy. Those of us, like me, some generations removed from the experience of moving between countries take a lot for granted. Those who move to countries with differences in culture and language are always straddling two worlds.
In her thoughtful, minimalist prose, Ms Kassab captures many of the challenges first and second-generation migrants face. While this style will not appeal to every reader, I liked the opportunity it gave me to reflect on choice and consequence.
Jennifer Cameron-Smith
March 1, 2020
Read as part of reading the 2020 Stella Longlist.
3.5 stars
This short-story collection was quite a contrast for me, it had it's powerful moments amongst the predominantly intently mundane.
The migrant voice is believable, to a point, there were times I was pulled out of the story with the thought, 'this is a young writer, writing about what she thinks an old person thinks'. I would have given it a higher rating if it wasn't for that.
I read the two longer short stories, 'Homing' and 'Darkness, speak' each in one sitting and before I read the vignettes at the front of the book. I think that's a better way to read this collection. The vignettes are certainly more powerful stories that way. Made the collection end on a powerful note for me not a whimper.
3.5 stars
This short-story collection was quite a contrast for me, it had it's powerful moments amongst the predominantly intently mundane.
The migrant voice is believable, to a point, there were times I was pulled out of the story with the thought, 'this is a young writer, writing about what she thinks an old person thinks'. I would have given it a higher rating if it wasn't for that.
I read the two longer short stories, 'Homing' and 'Darkness, speak' each in one sitting and before I read the vignettes at the front of the book. I think that's a better way to read this collection. The vignettes are certainly more powerful stories that way. Made the collection end on a powerful note for me not a whimper.
February 25, 2020
3 1/2 stars. An interesting structure to begin this book with a broad sweeping look at a community, predominantly made up of Lebanese migrants, and then zoom in closely to family and then finally individuals. While the first part did build up a general atmosphere it was not until I entered the second part, where you enter the lives of the Youssef family, that I really became engaged with this book. I think I needed the characters to care about and relate to.
While this book specifically looks at Lebanese migrants I felt like there were parallels to many migrant groups along with experiences of parenthood and ageing that are cross cultural.
While this book specifically looks at Lebanese migrants I felt like there were parallels to many migrant groups along with experiences of parenthood and ageing that are cross cultural.
November 26, 2019
Yumna Kassab has utilised the sparse economy of short stories to craft her début collection, grounding universal diasporic themes such as generational disconnect, cultural loss, and the weight of familial expectations in the distinct Lebanese-Australian social milieu of western Sydney, where she was born and raised.
Read the rest of my review on the Australian Book Review here: https://www.australianbookreview.com....
Read the rest of my review on the Australian Book Review here: https://www.australianbookreview.com....
May 7, 2020
The House of Youssef is a collection of short stories detailing the migrant experience in Australia, exploring the lives of Lebanese migrants who have made their home deep in Sydney's western suburbia. The collection circles themes of isolation, family and community, and nostalgia for the home country. This is an interconnected exploration of relationships, the customs and traditions which both create and complicate them, the unwavering bond between parents and children, the dark secrets of marriage, the delicate bonds between friends and how easily they can be shattered.
Told with extreme minimalism, Kassab has no problem in breaking the hearts of readers with a vignettes barely two pages long. If anything, her efficiency with words serves only to heighten the emotional impact on the reader. These are the stories of the ordinary person, and are unfailingly relatable, simple and unglamorous in their telling. The understated style of Kassab's writing isolates tiny details and highlights the anxieties of her characters. To read this collection is to feel grief, sadness, longing, nostalgia and rebellion.
Told with extreme minimalism, Kassab has no problem in breaking the hearts of readers with a vignettes barely two pages long. If anything, her efficiency with words serves only to heighten the emotional impact on the reader. These are the stories of the ordinary person, and are unfailingly relatable, simple and unglamorous in their telling. The understated style of Kassab's writing isolates tiny details and highlights the anxieties of her characters. To read this collection is to feel grief, sadness, longing, nostalgia and rebellion.
October 3, 2021
I particularly liked the actual House of Youssef section in the middle. 3.5 stars
March 13, 2020
When this made the longlist, I was really unsure about it. I hadn’t really seen anyone I knew talk about it, and while I’m getting better at it—I’m still not the best at reading short story collections.
There was something about this one that kind of blew me away.
I loved the first section which is a collection of unrelated short pieces, mostly only a few pages long each. I absolutely flew through these, but they all held my attention and there weren’t any that I didn’t enjoy. My favourite part, however, was the second section which is the story the title takes it name from. It’s a longer piece following the one family. I don’t know what it was about this one, but I just really enjoyed reading it.
I have to admit that I struggled with the last two stories a little. Kassab’s prose is incredible throughout the book, but I just didn’t feel the same connection to them as the others.
There was something about this one that kind of blew me away.
I loved the first section which is a collection of unrelated short pieces, mostly only a few pages long each. I absolutely flew through these, but they all held my attention and there weren’t any that I didn’t enjoy. My favourite part, however, was the second section which is the story the title takes it name from. It’s a longer piece following the one family. I don’t know what it was about this one, but I just really enjoyed reading it.
I have to admit that I struggled with the last two stories a little. Kassab’s prose is incredible throughout the book, but I just didn’t feel the same connection to them as the others.
October 26, 2025
3.5 stars. Enjoyed reading from a new Australian perspective. A mixture of stories that bring various emotions to the surface.
February 19, 2020
A collection of four lightly connected stories covering first and second generation Lebanese families who migrated and tried to adapt to Australian life in Western Sydney - adapt and hang on to the old values, and ways of life.
The opening story - Motherland - is a series of many short vignettes each one person's experience of being Lebanese, Muslim, a widow, an outcast from the family or from society, experiences of arranged marriages. So much heart, and heart break here.
The second - The House of Youssef - has stayed with me for days. A family shattered by the experience of fracture between old and news ways, of confirming and rebelling. Told by each perspective, it's tough, heart wrenching.
The final two stories are as if you are sitting with the narrator as they lament over their life, the decision to come to Australia, the hardships, the difficulties fitting in and holding in to traditions. Of family pains, and the challenges of the diaspora.
The opening story - Motherland - is a series of many short vignettes each one person's experience of being Lebanese, Muslim, a widow, an outcast from the family or from society, experiences of arranged marriages. So much heart, and heart break here.
The second - The House of Youssef - has stayed with me for days. A family shattered by the experience of fracture between old and news ways, of confirming and rebelling. Told by each perspective, it's tough, heart wrenching.
The final two stories are as if you are sitting with the narrator as they lament over their life, the decision to come to Australia, the hardships, the difficulties fitting in and holding in to traditions. Of family pains, and the challenges of the diaspora.
July 12, 2024
“In the dream we are girls once again.”
January 26, 2020
3.5 stars
This book is shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literaty Awards 2020http://email.wordfly.com/click?sid=MT...
'She places the paper before her and she picks up her pen and she begins. Dear Fatima. Then she stops and stares at her words. She thinks of what to write. Sentences come to her but she doe not write them down. The words seem so small and what she wants to say is so large. The things she wants to write do not belong on a page; has never even spoken them. Their true story was in silence. Now that Fatima is in the next world, there is no need to write about love and friendship because those words had lived silently between them all along.'
This short story collection focuses on Lebanese immigrants and there first generation children living in Western Sydney. I am also first generation from Latvian refugees, so although the culture is different I could empathise with the disassociation between home life and every day Australian culture.
This book is broken into two main parts; Motherhood and The House of Youssef. It is then followed by two longer short stories; Homing and Darkness, speaks.
In the first section, the stories are brief, no more than three pages, some like vignettes. Kassab sparse but poignant prose begins to etch images in your mind. From the nerves of a new bride and groom, to a grandmother looking after her grandchildren on the weekend, wondering why her daughter in law doesn't visit and a young women reflecting on the overt racism she has experienced from the age of five. Some stories and characters follow on through the whole collection, so pay attention. Kassab is building a Lebanese community in this book, so the connection and interplay is important.
The House of Youssef is a collection of short stories about this family. It begins with a portent of the future of the Youssef family. It than moves into the story of the parents proposal and their two children Abdullah and Mayada navigating their childhood between their family's expectations and their own impressions. Unfortunately both children struggle between worlds.
'A girl needs a husband and children to keep her stable. If not right after school, then give a year and then find someone. Her aunts and uncles, they said the same. The children are married and they have children of there own. I always say to kids do not forget to marry, it is half your religion.'
The reaction of the Lebanese community to this family once it starts unravelling is filled with judgement.
'People say it is better to live on your feet. I say it is better to be able to face the people on your street.'
'The birds, usually rosellas but lorikeets came by too, swaggered, cooed, they crab-walked along the line, and she would think, lucky were those who believed in rebirth, who could return as a bird once they were done with this human thing.'
This book deals with heavy topics around grief of loss of homeland, the expectations of a new country but the need to maintain tradition, the fierceness of cultural expectations on the children and the pressure on the children who have to navigate themselves through this diaspora. It is a book to be sipped rather than gulped down, so you can digest the fullness of it's stories without being overwhelmed by the lack of filtered light.
This book is shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literaty Awards 2020http://email.wordfly.com/click?sid=MT...
'She places the paper before her and she picks up her pen and she begins. Dear Fatima. Then she stops and stares at her words. She thinks of what to write. Sentences come to her but she doe not write them down. The words seem so small and what she wants to say is so large. The things she wants to write do not belong on a page; has never even spoken them. Their true story was in silence. Now that Fatima is in the next world, there is no need to write about love and friendship because those words had lived silently between them all along.'
This short story collection focuses on Lebanese immigrants and there first generation children living in Western Sydney. I am also first generation from Latvian refugees, so although the culture is different I could empathise with the disassociation between home life and every day Australian culture.
This book is broken into two main parts; Motherhood and The House of Youssef. It is then followed by two longer short stories; Homing and Darkness, speaks.
In the first section, the stories are brief, no more than three pages, some like vignettes. Kassab sparse but poignant prose begins to etch images in your mind. From the nerves of a new bride and groom, to a grandmother looking after her grandchildren on the weekend, wondering why her daughter in law doesn't visit and a young women reflecting on the overt racism she has experienced from the age of five. Some stories and characters follow on through the whole collection, so pay attention. Kassab is building a Lebanese community in this book, so the connection and interplay is important.
The House of Youssef is a collection of short stories about this family. It begins with a portent of the future of the Youssef family. It than moves into the story of the parents proposal and their two children Abdullah and Mayada navigating their childhood between their family's expectations and their own impressions. Unfortunately both children struggle between worlds.
'A girl needs a husband and children to keep her stable. If not right after school, then give a year and then find someone. Her aunts and uncles, they said the same. The children are married and they have children of there own. I always say to kids do not forget to marry, it is half your religion.'
The reaction of the Lebanese community to this family once it starts unravelling is filled with judgement.
'People say it is better to live on your feet. I say it is better to be able to face the people on your street.'
'The birds, usually rosellas but lorikeets came by too, swaggered, cooed, they crab-walked along the line, and she would think, lucky were those who believed in rebirth, who could return as a bird once they were done with this human thing.'
This book deals with heavy topics around grief of loss of homeland, the expectations of a new country but the need to maintain tradition, the fierceness of cultural expectations on the children and the pressure on the children who have to navigate themselves through this diaspora. It is a book to be sipped rather than gulped down, so you can digest the fullness of it's stories without being overwhelmed by the lack of filtered light.
abandoned
December 9, 2019This book is highly regarded, see https://www.killyourdarlings.com.au/a... and
https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/c..., and it's just been shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for fiction, but I am out of step with critical opinion. I wasn't impressed by the 'minimalist' writing style and I wasn't engaged by the theme of migrant alienation. There are plenty of books on this theme that I've found compelling but this isn't one of them. In the end I just found it too bleak to want to continue.
I don't rate books that I don't finish.
https://www.thesaturdaypaper.com.au/c..., and it's just been shortlisted for the Victorian Premier's Literary Award for fiction, but I am out of step with critical opinion. I wasn't impressed by the 'minimalist' writing style and I wasn't engaged by the theme of migrant alienation. There are plenty of books on this theme that I've found compelling but this isn't one of them. In the end I just found it too bleak to want to continue.
I don't rate books that I don't finish.
September 29, 2020
I found this quiet, serious collection of stories about the Lebanese community in Western Sydney really moving. The stories are structured in an interesting way - the book's first section is comprised of small vignettes - almost flash fiction - focusing on moments in different people's lives, usually concerning the community expectations and constraints around gender roles, child/parent relationships, the respect/shame dynamic, as well as the costs and opportunities of immigration. This section was fairly long, but it did provide a broad contextual sweep that set the scene for the rest of the book, in terms of tone and theme. The second section of the book comprised an interconnected set of vignettes about the disintegration of the Youssef family, and the third and fourth sections contained extended soliloquies from older generation migrants, reflecting on their choices, and their relationships with families and friends.
The structure of the book might not be to everyone's taste, but I found the shifting perspectives helped demonstrate the way that most people in the community are suffering in some way (often in similar ways) despite the way that Kassab presents that community as simultaneously suppressing honest discussion of such suffering. Recommended if you enjoy minimalist prose and a more thematic (rather than character/narrative based) approach to storytelling.
The structure of the book might not be to everyone's taste, but I found the shifting perspectives helped demonstrate the way that most people in the community are suffering in some way (often in similar ways) despite the way that Kassab presents that community as simultaneously suppressing honest discussion of such suffering. Recommended if you enjoy minimalist prose and a more thematic (rather than character/narrative based) approach to storytelling.
July 31, 2020
The House of Youssef is such a strange minimalistic collection of short stories. It's split into 4 sections, one of which is a series of snapshots, a Rolodex of different people and their stories. The second is a story of a family delicately stitched together, and the last half are a man then a woman reflecting on their life in Australia after immigrating. As such, I found this very much a book of two halves.
The first section absolutely blew me away, the stitching of vignettes to create a mosaic. Kassab uses her minimalism and short glances at someone's life to create this emotional landscape of regret and yearning and sadness, the alienation inherent to the immigrant experience so carefully composed. The space here of words left unsaid and feelings left unexpressed is so beautifully contoured and shaped. The snapshots create this strange artifice of motion while dwelling in the same emotional spaces, a strange contradiction that creates a seeming universality. The second section composed of looking at a family's story also worked really well, overlapping perspectives with just enough left obscured and enough contradicting to create such an interesting look at this family's life. The influence of a wider community on the family unit is so subtly hinted at. Kassab's prose here is so precise, there's a surgical efficiency to how carefully each word has been chosen to create that overarching dismal atmosphere.
The second half of The House of Youssef didn't hold up as well for me. I think the limiting to one perspective without any overlapping meant the prose started to become a bit monotonous and it felt like it was covering a lot of similar ground as to the first half of the book. The storylines were a bit too straightforward as to justify so much space when Kassab demonstrated in the first half that she did not need all that many pages to so beautifully craft a picture of a disconnect.
The first section absolutely blew me away, the stitching of vignettes to create a mosaic. Kassab uses her minimalism and short glances at someone's life to create this emotional landscape of regret and yearning and sadness, the alienation inherent to the immigrant experience so carefully composed. The space here of words left unsaid and feelings left unexpressed is so beautifully contoured and shaped. The snapshots create this strange artifice of motion while dwelling in the same emotional spaces, a strange contradiction that creates a seeming universality. The second section composed of looking at a family's story also worked really well, overlapping perspectives with just enough left obscured and enough contradicting to create such an interesting look at this family's life. The influence of a wider community on the family unit is so subtly hinted at. Kassab's prose here is so precise, there's a surgical efficiency to how carefully each word has been chosen to create that overarching dismal atmosphere.
The second half of The House of Youssef didn't hold up as well for me. I think the limiting to one perspective without any overlapping meant the prose started to become a bit monotonous and it felt like it was covering a lot of similar ground as to the first half of the book. The storylines were a bit too straightforward as to justify so much space when Kassab demonstrated in the first half that she did not need all that many pages to so beautifully craft a picture of a disconnect.
February 23, 2020
I can't say I really enjoyed this collection of micro-stories - it's full of domestic tragedy - but I was impressed by its intensely claustrophobic mood. Read more on my blog.
March 3, 2022
Nice read , made me really sad to read about Lebanese living in Australia and how they live their lives away from their homeland and live a very hard life , fighting racism , cultural clashes and challenges of new world and era
November 22, 2022
I enjoyed this describing immigrants feelings when first living in Australia. It spoke of the different cultures and how hard it was to follow in this country especially when bringing up children. I would recommend this book to anyone.
August 8, 2024
Beautifully written vignette depicting life as a Lebanese migrant family in contemporary Sydney. The characters are developed through a series of snapshots and ends with monologues from the 2 parents. The writing is exceptional from a young writer and I look forward to reading her future works.
March 6, 2020
Interesting structure, I enjoyed the simplicity of form in the first half although I could have easily put this down. Pleased I persisted as the last half of the book is more engaging.
May 2, 2020
Minimlaist writing. Very short stories. Almost imperciptably link together.
May 18, 2020
This book is just outstanding. Highly reccomended.
July 31, 2020
It’s in four segments, I liked Homing the best. A light read yet great insight into the daily life & culture of Lebanese immigrants. What is a home? Good food for thought.
September 8, 2020
I LOVE this book!
One word to describe it... distilled.
Little vignettes delving into another culture, so foreign and yet so similar.
Thank you Yumna.
One word to describe it... distilled.
Little vignettes delving into another culture, so foreign and yet so similar.
Thank you Yumna.
December 20, 2022
3.5 rounded up - super minimalistic prose which took a while to get used to, but the middle house of youssef section and extended soliloquy homing really stood out for me at the end
June 22, 2023
rtc if i ever get around to it 😭😭
October 10, 2024
A good collection of stories
May 7, 2025
3.5 stars
September 2, 2025
I found the stories too short to get a grasp onto the characters.
January 12, 2026
Poetic writing, partly short stories and partly novellas around the same characters - a group of families trying to find their way in Sydney in potentially 1960 or 1970.
I really enjoyed it.
I really enjoyed it.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 37 reviews