The Arsonists' City

by Hala Alyan

Author of SALT HOUSES, winner of the 2018 Dayton Literary Peace Prize Hala Alyan's THE ARSONISTS' CITY, the story of a fractured family returning to Beirut to sell their ancestral home, tracing their allegiances and betrayals across decades and continents, again to Lauren Wein at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

The Nasr family is spread across the globe—Beirut, Brooklyn, Austin, the California desert. A Syrian mother, a Lebanese father, and three American children: all have lived a life of migration. Still, they’ve always had their ancestral home in Beirut—a constant touchstone—and the complicated, messy family love that binds them. But following his father's recent death, Idris, the family's new patriarch, has decided to sell.
The decision brings the family to Beirut, where everyone unites against Idris in a fight to save the house. They all have secrets—lost loves, bitter jealousies, abandoned passions, deep-set shame—that distance has helped smother. But in a city smoldering with the legacy of war, an ongoing flow of refugees, religious tension, and political protest, those secrets ignite, imperiling the fragile ties that hold this family together.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Literary Fiction, Middle East, Contemporary, Book Club, Audiobook

464 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 9, 2021

About the author

Hala Alyan was born in Carbondale, Illinois, and grew up in Kuwait, Oklahoma, Texas, Maine, and Lebanon. She earned a BA from the American University of Beirut and an MA from Columbia University. While completing her doctorate in clinical psychology from Rutgers University, she specialized in trauma and addiction work with various populations.

Her memoir, I'll Tell You When I'm Home is forthcoming from Simon & Schuster in June 2025.

She has published two novels, her debut Salt Houses (2017), is the winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Arab American Book Award and a finalist for the Chautauqua Prize, and her second novel, The Arsonists' City (2021).

Alyan's poetry collections include Atrium (2012), winner of the 2013 Arab American Book Award in Poetry; Four Cities (2015); Hijra (2016), winner of the Crab Orchard Series in Poetry; The Twenty-Ninth Year (2019); and The Moon That Turns You Back (2024).

She co-edited the poetry anthology We Call to the Eye & the Night: Love Poems by Writers of Arab Heritage (2023) with poet Zeina Hashem Beck.

Alyan has also been awarded a Lannan Foundation fellowship and her poems have appeared in numerous journals and literary magazines including The New Yorker, The Academy of American Poets, Guernica, Jewish Currents,The New York Times Book Review, Prairie Schooner and Colorado Review.

Alyan is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Applied Psychology at NYU. She resides in Brooklyn with her family.

Reviews

[Elyse Walters · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely fantastic… Review soon!!!
UPDATE REVIEW....

Audiobook....read by Leila Buck....(she was excellent)...
E-book ..... read by me.....(yeah, I’m excellent too)...haha!

This is a huge story....sooo much going on! It’s a big-fat-fricken-character-driven-family-saga-STORY!!! There are familiar universal themes. Themes for grownups. Complexities of adulthood...[be it marriage, sex,secrets, migration, betrayals, jealousy, aging, ambition, war, political and cultural challenges, belonging, failings, shame, love, desire, dreams, disappointments, trust, language, skin color, personality dispositions, assumptions, sacrifices, rivalries, envy, expectations, shocking discoveries, realizations, acceptance, forgiveness, ....written with psychological depth and understanding of human conditions, our relationship with home, and the world we live in.

The storytelling is SOOOOO GOOD! Soooo thoroughly enjoyable!!!
......and the characters have funny names...

I was chatting with Cheri yesterday ( Goodreads friend), about this book - how good it was - but the thought of writing a review sounded like torture.....( turns out it’s not really so bad when in the right space).
But I told Cheri I was only going to write a ‘one’ sentence review:
The one sentence review would have been:
“There are a lot of people doing a lot of things.....hiding a lot of things”....and it’s fantastic”. The end!

But...
I got my walk in today - [8.7 miles],....so, what the heck else was I going to do today?
So......I tried to write a review ‘like-a-grownup’. 😊

Here it is:
At the center of this international family story....between the United States, Syria and Lebanon, [Beirut, Damascus, California, Brooklyn, and Austin], is the Nasr family.
Idris Nasr, cardiac surgeon, is Lebanese. His wife Mazna is Syrian. Their three adult children were born and raised in America.

If I HAD.. to pick one character....and say...WHO DID THIS STORY BELONG TO MOST? .....I’m going with Mazna (wife, mother, an actress at heart)....but I won’t say ‘why’.... ( could be a spoiler)...
But....each of the other characters could have been the leading soloist ‘show-off’...just as easily!

At the very start of this novel, [1978] we learn of a murder....an assignation of Palestinian, Zakaria, in a refugee camp in Beirut.
“Tonight the man will die”. .....
Idris and Zakaria had been best friends growing up in Beirut.....but
‘tonight’.... [the night Zakaria, dies....a victim of a retaliation/revenge killing during the civil war in Lebanon], Idris had stopped speaking with him. They had a recent fight. “The insults they’d hurled at each other still echoing, each saying and not-saying the truth”.
The war changed people..... the war changed Zakaria....who considered himself a good man.
He said he only did three terrible things in his life”:
....1. at age 13, Zakaria stole items of little value from others in the refugee camps....where he spent 25 years of his life. (he was also the son of a housekeeper mother — Zakaria’s link in meeting Idris, his best friend).
....2. Zakaria betrayed Idris. He fell in love with Mazna, Idris’s girlfriend.
....3. Zakaria was at wrong place at the wrong time: resulted in death.

The dramatic ‘death’ beginning....directly and indirectly affects every member of the Nasr family.....so pay attention. In time the connections comes together.

Idris married Mazna (a thespian in her youth in Beirut), after Zakaria died.
They’ve been married for forty years -living in California.
They have three adult children: Small tidbits about the adult children are just the small tips of an iceberg:
....Ava, 40 years of age, a microbiologist, University professor, lives in Brooklyn, is the oldest daughter. She’s married to Caucasian American, Nate, and suspects he’s having an affair. They have two children....and a dwindling sex life.
Ava’s sexual fantasies have turned to a Nigerian instructor at her spin class.

....Mimi, (yep, a guys name: unusual in my thinking too, but his birth name is really Marwan), 32 year of age, lives in Austin, recently was dumped from the band he started, is a chef in a restaurant, but would rather be known as a master virtuoso, and.....
ha: > he cheated on his girlfriend.

....Naj, almost 30 years of age, an international famous singer/musician, - mostly in Beirut., is gay, but has not told her parents.

Idris and Mazna have a family house in Beirut. Even though the family had been living in the United States for about 40 years, there had been summer vacations in Beirut....yet, not for many years. Idris wants to sell the house. Mazna doesn’t want to go alone with just her husband- she was begging -literally begging her kids to join.
So, after much dialogue of bickering and resisting, ( juicy engaging good bickering), the adult kids and parents meet in Beirut.....under one roof, for the first time in many years.
I was wishing them good luck and secretly wishing an “under-one-roof” reunion with our own adult kids and son-in-law.

The momentum of unfolding - those hidden secrets come to the surface at the end....
Dark emotions are reveal.....but it’s a satisfying ending ....

With all the ‘grown-up’ complexities and complications.... there is a lot humor...sometimes sarcasm humor....in the dialogue throughout ....
GREAT NOVEL!
An easy 5 stars

[Lisa (NY) · Rating 5 out of 5]

I did not want this rich, nuanced, novel to end. Set in Beirut, Damascus, New York, Austin and California, I became immersed in the life of a family over two generations. A family conflicted with rivalries and secrets - each person so real they jumped off the page and into my heart. Glorious!

[Anne Bogel · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the Modern Mrs Darcy Book Club October 2022 selection. Hala Alyan will join us for a live discussion!

I was quickly swept up in the story of the complicated Nasr family, with its Syrian mother, Lebanese father, and three adult children flung across the globe. When the patriarch of the family dies, his widow and their three adult children gather in Beirut to sell the ancestral home. What nobody knows is that every family member is hiding an explosive secret from the rest of the family, and perhaps none is more potentially damaging than the one the mother has been holding onto for nearly four decades—one that she knows would devastate her children. In vivid flashbacks, set first during the Lebanese Civil War and later in California after the parents' emigration, Alyan unspools the riveting backstory.

[Elle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ll start off by saying this is a book I have had in my possession for nearly a year at this point, so full credit to Carrie (@bostonbookfanatic) for finally getting me to read it by picking it as our last Mystery Book Club selection of 2021!

The Arsonists’ City is a twisting, unsparing family drama spanning several generations as well as continents. It also features one of the most compelling opening sequences I’ve read from literary fiction in quite a while. Within the Nasr family we follow the three adult children, Ava, Mimi and Naj, as they attempt to wrangle their bickering parents during a family trip to Lebanon. Each are dealing with struggles within their own separate lives while also navigating their place in such a, let’s say, ~colorful~ family.

Then about a third of the way into the book, the narrative suddenly shifts and we are focused on a young Mazna, their mother, in the times before, during and after meeting their father. This is probably the most heart-wrenching portion of the book, with a hefty amount of pages devoted to Manza’s story specifically. No spoilers, but damn. She really couldn’t catch a break, could she? It was admittedly not easy to read through ordeal after ordeal that Manza had to go through, how even when she had a choice she was essentially deciding between ‘bad’ and ‘slightly less bad’. And it was while reading her section that I had a revelation: I do not like most of these characters.

There is not one male character (save for a distinct exception Zakaria) that I felt an ounce of sympathy for. Idris, Mimi, and literally every dude Manza comes across—I hate them! They suck so hard. I wish them the worst. The kids in general were just way less interesting than I was expecting their plot lines to be. Naj is clearly the best of them, but the bar isn’t particularly high. Even Idris’ extended family I could take or leave. The order I would rank my empathy for each character would be:
1. Zakaria
2. Zakaria’s family
3. Mazna
—end of list—

Obviously you don’t have to like characters you’re reading about, but you should care about what happens to them. And all I kept thinking while reading about this family is how privileged they were relative to literally every other person around them. Idris’ family growing up were rich and shielded from the worst of the conflict in the region. The kids have the textbook definition of First World Problems. And in my opinion, Idris himself made out like a fucking bandit. Also yes Idris, you killed your best friend. Mazna was never yours, and you never bothered to ask her how she felt, so in the end you actually stole her from your dead friend. Your dead friend who’s mother still lives in the camps while you whine about wanting to sell your second home.

The ending wasn’t what I was hoping for either. With all of the deft ways Hala Alyan demonstrated her characters’ privilege and ignorance, I was hoping they’d come to atone more for their past complicity. Specifically, they should have given Zakaria’s mom the Lebanon house. By all means, this is beautifully written, if only somewhat too long, and the setting was stunningly rendered. Though if I read more by the author, I think I would prefer following a different kind of character.


*Thanks to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt & Netgalley for an advance copy!

**For more book talk & reviews, follow me on Instagram at @elle_mentbooks!

[Sharon Metcalf · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars

When I read Salt Houses by Hala Alyan I was blown away by her superb writing and the characters she created so it's fair to say I was super enthused about reading her latest novel Arsonist's City.    That enthusiasm was well rewarded within moments of starting and never let up.     Alyan's prologue had me in its grips from the first sentence to the last, her words instantly transporting me to a refugee camp in Beirut where she set the scene for a violent death, retribution for a past wrong doing.   Within in a few short pages she built tension,  introduced a religious war, created a character to care about, introduced two others by association, and revealed a pivotal event which would change many lives.  

Part One was a complete change of pace from the Prologue.   It quickly became apparent Alyan's story had leapt forward by thirty or forty years as readers were introduced to three siblings,  Ava, Mimi and Naj.    We come to understand they're the adult offspring of Mazna and Idris the two others mentioned in the Prologue.     Not only do we find out their secrets and inner thoughts but we learn something of their backgrounds and their present day lives.    Alyan has an incredible talent for creating realistic and delightfully flawed characters with such depth to each one.   As readers you may cheer on or be appalled by their actions but you can't fail to feel the tug and pull of their desires and appreciate the mindset that lead them to behave that way.

As the story progressed it alternated between the present and the past.   We hear how and why Mazna and Idris married, how he'd been granted asylum and moved to America.    Individually they dreamed big.   Idris was to become a heart specialist whilst Mazna yearned for Hollywood.     Acting was the thing for which she'd achieved a small measure of success in Damascus and she hoped to put this artistic talent to good use in America.    Unfortunately, assimilation was not so easy.    

For much of the present day storyline the Nasr family were all together in Beirut.   Back in the family home for one last time before Idris sells it.      This alone was a divisive issue but as is often the case when families spend extended periods of time together things are off key.     They grated on each other.   They squabbled.   Long repressed jealousies and resentments rose to the surface.     A recurring theme throughout was  "People deserve to have their secrets" and my goodness did this family have plenty.      From lies of omission to outright deceptions.    This family's love for each other was complex but as they spent more time together in miniscule ways they seemed to be gelling and getting closer.

Like the Nasr family the story was complex and multilayered and
I've struggled to do justice to this book as there were so many topics I wanted to touch upon.    The lasting impacts of war and the lives of refugees.    The loneliness of moving to a faraway land,  the immigrant experience of never truly and fully assimilating due to cultural differences.   The need for secrets and dramatic steps taken to keep them.  The joys of being blessed with artistic talents and the disappointments and frustrations of having to suppress these same qualities.    So many missed opportunities and loves lost.   I was moved by the story and the writing and would encourage other readers to give this book a try.     Meanwhile I'll be watching out for any future book Alyan writes.  She's not to be missed.

Thanks to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and NetGalley for the opportunity of reading this digital ARC in exchange for an honest review which it was my pleasure to provide.
4.5 stars on Goodreads

[fatma · Rating 2 out of 5]

An irritating and deeply frustrating read.

This book reminded me of The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo, which is just about the most damning indictment I can give it. There are some books I dislike, and there are some books I actively hate. This was the latter.

Let's begin with the characters, who are, according to what I've written in the notes on my phone, "absolutely fucking insufferable." And I stand by that statement. The characters in this book are, by all measures, adults; in their 30s and 40s, in long-term relationships or marriages or even with kids. Tell me why, then, they act like children all. the. time. "Petty" doesn't even begin to cover it. Like of course adults can be immature or childish and petty, but god these characters just stretched the limits of what I was willing to tolerate--and then promptly broke through those limits and became absolutely intolerable. I am not exaggerating when I say that every single character in this book infuriated me. Every single one. First of all, it feels like everyone is constantly cheating on everyone else in this book. Wives cheat on husbands, husbands cheat on wives, boyfriends cheat on girlfriends, girlfriends cheat on boyfriends. If there is a character in any semblance of a long-term relationship in this book, rest assured that they will cheat and/or will have already cheated on their partners. Cheating can be explored in a way that's interesting or engaging--simply giving me a book full of cheaters is not really the way to go about doing that.

There are a lot of characters in this book, and all of them are annoying in their own unique ways. We have Mazna, the matriarch of the family, whose chapters give us a look into her childhood and lost love. This is all well and good, except that Mazna is judgmental, sanctimonious, and snobby; everyone constantly sings her praises and yet there is not a single sympathetic thing about her that the reader can latch on to (at least this reader). Then we have Mazna's children, who I'm just going to quickly go through because I hated them all: Ava, the cheated-on mother, which is a tired trope that is no less tired in this book; Mimi, the sad, failing musician who's held a grudge against his sister for the last however-many years because she has a successful music career (like??? GROW UP); and Naj, whose life seemingly and exclusively consists of concerts, partying, and drugs, all rendered in a very boring way for all their supposed excitement. So yeah, not to beat a dead horse or anything, but I really did not like these characters.

Aside from that, there were also a couple more things that I didn't think this book did very well, to say the least:

- Tonally, this book is SO melodramatic. It needed to be toned down like several thousand notches. I can't be invested in a touching family portrait if the characters and story are crafted with the subtlety of a brick to the face.

- I hated the way this book talked about women's bodies. Are women conditioned to constantly critique their own and other women's bodies? Yes. Did I think this book portrayed this reality in some kind of nuanced or insightful way? Nope. There's literally a scene where Mazna has lost a lot of weight because someone she loves has just been *MURDERED* and when her sister comes in to take care of her this is what we get:

"'You've lost weight.' (There is a trace of wistfulness in her tone. Her own body has expanded with age, like a layer cake. Though Nawal knows it's wrong--her poor little sister, who's always seemed to Nawal on the edge of disaster, chasing after lofty, unlikely ideas--she cannot help but admire Mazna's flat stomach, the perch of her collarbones as her sister dresses.)"

Like???? Can we not have a single moment of peace??? Do I really have to read that in the midst of the aftermath of a horrific MURDER ????

- I was expecting a lot from the writing since the author is a poet but I didn't feel like it gave me much. It was definitely a little weird sometimes, and not in a good way. For example: "'Mazna.' Her name sits like a pet in his mouth. It sounds like what you'd call a woman." Like, what does that even mean ??? make it make sense please

Anyway, I did not get along with this book in any way, shape, or form. There was not a single redeemable thing about it for me, and frankly there is nothing about it that can make up for how much I hated its characters. I'm going to take a breath, finish writing this review, and then try not to think about this book ever again.

[Jordan (Jordy’s Book Club) · Rating 5 out of 5]

QUICK-ISH TAKE: Taking placeover the course of several decades, TAC is told in two timelines: the first follows the members of the Nasr family- Syrian mother Mazna, Lebanese father Idris, and their 3 adult children- who travel from America to Beirut to stop Idris from selling his childhood home, a home that the children would one day inherit; the second timeline follows the relationship between Idris and Mazna, from the time they first meet in Damascus up to present day.⁣
⁣
Like all multigenerational family stories, this one is full of secrets and soap, interpersonal drama and complicated relationship dynamics. I immediately got THE MOST FUN WE EVER HAD vibes when introduced to each of the Nasr children, but I actually found myself really leaning into the love story between Mazna and Idris. Their relationship is complex and messy, and I ended up rushing through the sections with the kids –maybe a small criticism about their specific characters- so that I could savor the mom/dad flashbacks (there’s one moment where Idris betrays Mazna in a way that truly broke my heart and made me gasp). At 500 pages, this is definitely not a fast-paced read, but it was a book that forced me to take my time as Alyan slowly revealed more information about the family in ways that were emotional, relatable and beautifully executed.⁣
⁣
THE ARSONISTS’ CITY is available now. I look forward to discussing this one with more of you, as I’m sure you’ll see it featured on this account a lot more throughout the year.

[Etaf Rum · Rating 5 out of 5]

“I didn’t think I could love The Arsonists’ City as much as Salt Houses, but I did. It was sharp, thought-provoking; I couldn’t put it down. Hala Alyan is a lyrical force, a much needed voice in Arab-American literature.

[Emily Coffee and Commentary · Rating 4 out of 5]

A remarkable family drama that highlights the deepest aspects of the human condition. Each character is so multilayered, incredibly flawed but intensely real and endearing. Against the backdrop of Beirut and America, we see the consequences of jealousy, secrets, revenge, and silence. But we also see the rewards of forgiveness, understanding, and love. Very highly recommended.

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A family saga set primarily in Lebanon, yes please!

For someone who lives in and loves the Middle East and all its complexities, I know very little about Lebanon other than the unrest is decades long. Alyan brought the streets of Beirut alive here, and it's pipped my interest to learn more.

It took me a good 60 pages to ease into this but then I was more than comfortable surrounded by 3 messy adult siblings born and raised in the US and their mother (Syrian) and father (Lebanese) and their return to Lebanon to sell their grandfather's house.

Spanning over 40 ish years, we get to know our characters' pasts and presents along with all their flaws, secrets, hopes, and reasons.

Also, the family banter here is spot on.

I loved every single character. Just loved them.

Five stars.

"You leave every decade I enter" - great line!

[Fanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Following the death of a grandfather and the decision to sell the ancestral home in Beirut, this family of a Lebanese father, a Syrian mother, and three Arab-American children find themselves under the same roof for some time, with a purpose to either stick with what has once been finalised by the father, the new patriarch of this family, or with an aim to reverse this determination — as thought by the mother and supported by the children.

Immensely uplifted with an excellent character development where everyone's lives and paths are carefully dissected through secrets being unravelled, paramount love and loss, and the sense of belonging through ancestral bonds, this story wonderfully represents each scratched piece of a family puzzle in the manner they don't always align but are still connected through a thread of familial devotion that stretches across time, space, and generations.

Understandably slow paced since the commitment to bringing these characters alive through the pages is evident, and the heartache that perpetuates from chaos and destruction in a place one's ancestors breathed in, a place one calls home, and a place where one belongs, is raw and real. Further strengthened by beautiful prose that surprisingly jumped timelines and shifted narrators with ease, this literary fiction is worth reading.

↣ an early digital copy received via netgalley but review remains uninfluenced. ↢

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May 25, 2020: I've just got an early copy of this and I'm so excited to dive into this possibly emotional Arab-American representation. Thank you, Netgalley & HMH Books!

April 18, 2020: Give me some Middle-Eastern rep and I'll be a happy person.

[Brandice · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved The Arsonists’ City, a family saga spanning several decades, set in Syria, Lebanon, and the United States. The Nasr family began with the union of Idris and Mazna in the Middle East. They, along with their 3 adult children, are now living across the U.S and in Beirut.

Following the death of his father, Idris announces he will sell the family home in Beirut. The other Nasr family members are against this and they reconvene for a summer at the house to try to talk Idris out of it.

Of course, there’s more to the story — secrets and pain from the past and in the present are at play. While a couple of the characters were frustrating at parts, I loved this family drama with multiple POVs, insight into the various relationship dynamics, and different locations. The Arsonists’ City is a great story and my first read by Alyan, but it won’t be my last.

[MiA · Rating 2 out of 5]

First of all, Hala Alyan is a true wordsmith.
There is no arguing the excellence in her craft, the vividness of her imagery and her acute perception of human nature. I simply wanted to swoon over her words. I cracked a smile every time she nailed the description of the Arab disposition whether she meant a person or a nation (I probably should note that I'm an Arab who lived most of her life in what is universally dubbed as the Middle East).

Nevertheless, the book left me at a loss. It opened magnificently with a scene from a refugees camp of a man being dragged out of camp and beaten to death for an act he has committed. That scene ended there and then without explanation and I couldn't relate the rest of the story to that gripping beginning.

The story shifts to three long chapters comprising Part I. The three children of the Nasr Family, Palestinian-Syrian immigrants, are leading different lives. Ava, the eldest, is a biologist by day and upper class burnt out wife by night. Marwan, the middle child, is an ageing artist, who couldn't make it big on the music scene. Naj is an uprising musical phenomenon who struggles with her sexuality. One day their father decides to sell their house in Beirut, the only property they still held onto on Arab soil before immigrating to the States. The family makes the trip back to Beirut. Because each chapter was so long, it felt like a collection of novellas.

The story shifts again to Mazna's, their mother, childhood and early youth. in a period marked by political upheavals during the Lebanese Civil War and the Syrian Occupation of Lebanon.

After a huge lump of narrative, we find ourselves back again into the children's lives as they make the trip to the summer house in Beirut. and the cycle, laboriously, repeats itself.

I understand that the shifting timelines between the children's individual stories and that of their mother were meant as a juxtaposition, but the huge chunks of storylines paired with elaborating on the minutest details of the sex life of each character instead of alternating between timelines at a more accelerating pace completely defeated the purpose.

The story spiralled into ZWARIB (alleyways and deadends), to borrow Ava's description of her mother's conversations.

Although the Nasr family are described as "progressive", the book had many stereotypes: the queer rockstar, the burnt-out upper-crust wife. Another downside was the multitude of topics Alyan brushed over (Hezbollah Bombings, Syrian revolution, Lebanese Civil War, Syrian occupation of Lebanon, the refugees' crisis, the Lebanese civil war, immigration, sexual identities, adultery, siblings rivalry). It was dizzying.

This is a very ambitious book. The writing is beyond doubt beautiful. But I got lost in the midst of everything it attempted to accomplish.

[luce (cry bebè's back from hiatus) · Rating 3 out of 5]

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3 ½ stars

Moving through space (America, Lebanon, Syria) and time (from the 1960s to 2019) The Arsonists' City tells a sprawling yet engrossing tale about the Nasr, a Syrian-Lebanese-American family. Written with the same subtlety and beauty as her debut novel, The Arsonists' City presents readers with a cast of fully-fleshed out characters, however flawed or frustrating they may be, a rich exploration of the Nasrs' personal and cultural identities, and a glimpse into Lebanon and Syria's complex pasts and presents.
The prologue opens up with the death of a young man. The narrative then introduces us to the Nasrs' 'children'. There is Ava, the eldest, the only one in the family who is not driven by ambition or particularly cares to be in the spotlight. Although she's quite content with her job as a microbiology teacher, her marriage is undergoing a rough patch. her relationship with Nate, her husband, is undergoing a rough patch. We then have Mimi, their mother's golden boy, whose musical career never truly kicked off. As Mimi's bandmates get younger and younger, and his peers are getting married and having children, he feels stuck. Naj, the youngest and the only one who lives outside America, is part of a successful musical duo. In Beirut, she feels free to do as she wishes. Her family don't know she's gay and Naj isn't keen on abandoning her party lifestyle.
Over the years the siblings have drifted away from each other. Seemingly out of the blue their father, Iris, a heart surgeon, decides to sell his family home in Beirut. After this sudden decision, the Nasr are reunited in Beirut. Close proximity reignites deep-rooted jealousies and brings to the light old family secrets and betrayals. Their feelings towards each other, and themselves, are complicated, messy. They bicker a lot, snitch on each other (often to their mother), and, in general, don't have the easiest time together. However, as Alyan so brilliantly demonstrates, family bonds, however thorny or challenging, can be a true source of happiness or comfort.

Their reunion in Beirut happens quite later on in the narrative. Before that, we delve into Ava, Mimi, and Naj's everyday realities. From their romantic relationships to their sex lives and careers. Alyan also provides us with glimpses into the lives of the people around them—their partners, colleagues, friends, bandmates—so that we end up with a rich cast of characters.
Each of the children reacts differently to their father's decision. Ava and Mimi are initially unwilling to go to Beirut but are ultimately worn down by their mother's unrelenting recriminations. Naj isn't particularly happy at the news either as she feels quite possessive of her life in Beirut.
The narrative then transports us to Damascus, in the 1960s. Their mother, Mazna, falls in love with the theatre and begins to dream about a future as a renowned actor. The Lebanese Civil War is the background to Mazna's chapters which heavily focus on her acting experiences. She befriends Idris, aka her future husband, who is Syrian and his close friend Zakaria, who is Palestinian and lives in a refugee camp.
The remainder of the novel moves between the present, with the family reunited in Beirut, and the past, where we read of Mazna and Idris' early days of marriage and of their eventual migration to California.

Most of the characters make bad choices, they hurt the ones they love, they are unsatisfied by the direction their lives are taking (both Mazna and Mimi's careers never truly resemble what they'd envisioned), and they either cheat or are cheated on. I appreciated how each character has to deal with failure or heartbreak, either as a direct consequence of their actions or due to circumstances out of their control. I also liked how realistic the children's relationship with one another was. Alyan gives her characters both individual and shared history, which makes them feel all the more authentic. Alyan also brings her settings to life, for better or worse.
What felt a tad unnecessary was the extensive forays into Mazna's past. She wasn't a particularly likeable or sympathetic character (my favourite was probably Harper, Mimi's Texan girlfriend). For their flaws, I found myself much more interested in the lives of her children.
The story at times felt a tad too melodramatic, especially in regards to certain 'revelations and all that cheating. I swear the Nasrs' are a family of cheaters. It got kind of repetitive (wow, quelle surprise, someone is cheating/being cheated on, yet again). There was an odd line sexualising a child which felt a bit...yuckish? And one that gave me incest-y vibes, which was also pretty unecessary.
Despite all that, I remained enthralled by Alyan's storytelling and piercing observations. Her dialogues ring true to life and the character dynamics are very compelling.
With the tone of Elif Shafak The Saint of Incipient Insanities and the scope of Roopa Farooki's The Good Children, The Arsonists' City offers its readers a captivating and intricate family saga populated by nuanced characters and deeply rooted in Lebanon and Syria's histories and cultures. In spite of its length (the audiobook is over 19 hours) The Arsonists' City proved to be a gripping read one that I might even re-read.

ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

[Athena (OneReadingNurse) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks so much to Bookish First and HMH (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) for the advanced copy of The Arsonists’ City in exchange for an honest review! All opinions are my own.

This is an extremely rich and nuanced look into family, life, heritage, and identity, but I struggled with whether or not to feature this one on the blog.  I try really hard to stick to cleaner content these days and there are more than a few mature sexual situations & adultery in this one, but there’s also a discourse on humanity, immigration, and reconciliation that as a 30-something, I could appreciate, and hey, we are all adults here.

I was originally interested in this book because allegedly my grandfather was a random Syrian exchange student’s brother, and I sometimes feel interested in Syrian books assuming he came from the actual motherland.

So let’s just discuss content first because it’ s the first thing that anyone reading the book encounters.  A man is murdered in the prologue, and it sets the whole book up to be super dramatic and interesting and I am thinking “oh boy this is going to be good!!”  Then the next thing you know one of the characters is on her stomach thinking about a deflated condom, like, shit.  So now I have to remember her depressing sex life throughout the rest of the book, and it’s a theme through all the characters’ chapters, including a heavy discussion of the gay sibling’s sexuality, which is tied to Beirut’s youth culture in general somehow. Between that and pretty much everyone either contemplating or committing adultery at some point, I am like… Well sex is not what I want to read, and it’s depressing.

But it’s part of life, which along with death, are major themes of the book.  Idris and Mazna immigrated to America on asylum when he started his surgical residency, leaving his ancestral house behind.  Years later once Idris’ father dies and the house is empty of family he decides to sell it – which brings the scattered family all back together.  In Beirut.  For one very enlightening summer.

Each of the three siblings and Mazna the mother, were the chapter points of view. This sorted into the present (the kids) and past (Mazna).  It is always interesting to see people struggle bus through their 30s in slice of life style, because that’s me, but a big part of me just didn’t care.  Mazna’s story was legitimately interesting with her life between Damascus and Beirut, and seeing the war, plus being brown in America once they immigrated.  None of the characters were really likeable for me though, like I wanted to like Mazna but she’s so stubborn and then hooked up with that film guy, plus she took Idris (a heart surgeon) for a total moron.

The book spent a LOT of time building each character. It is kind of the point of the book, but some parts involving the siblings were just boring to me.  I didn’t care about Marwan’s band or Ava’s cheating husband, or even Naj, even though she had the most interesting life by far it was all flings and drugs and music. Once they got to Beirut and all the secrets started coming out, it got more interesting.  

There were so many side characters mentioned too that I just couldn’t keep track… Many of them not horribly relevant but still.  

I can relate a lot of the book to real life though – for example – being entitled to our secrets, and maybe not needing to know all of our parent’s secrets.  Also learning that we (as adults) are maybe a little bit more like them than we like to admit.

I know this is a book that a lot of people are loving for Alyan’s fantastic writing style and the story of love, loss, immigration, and familial reconciliation that she tells, and I don’t blame them at all. I think fans of the genre will love this. I just found it to be a 12 day long snooze fest when the kids were featured and I was limited to one rather long chapter at a time.

[Jill · Rating 5 out of 5]

“I think people deserve to have their secrets.”

Every character in The Arsonists’ City has his or her own secrets. They are all enigmas, not only to those around them, but also to themselves. And now all of them—the Syrian mother Mazna and her Lebanese cardiologist husband Idris and their three grown children, Ava, Mimi and Naj—are about to come together in the ancestral home in Beirut for the first time in years.

This is a novel that mines deepest emotions—long ago passions secret loves, rivalries, shame and desires—and mixes it with the external world of smoldering tensions, class differences, the ongoing Lebanese Civil War, the difficulties inherent in uprooting to another country. The result is a page-turning saga of fully fleshed characters who are coping with complicated relationships and the debris of lost dreams and ambitions.

Particularly riveting is the triangle of the patriarch and matriarch of this family, Mazna and Idris and their back story that includes their Palestinian friend Zakaria. Close friend to Idris, love interest to Mazna, this hypnotic man lives on and casts a wide shadow over their marriage—even though we, the readers, know from the first few pages that he is killed.

Their adult children are all on the cusp of a decision: Ava, who is married to a WASP from a prominent family who is processing her husband’s short-lived affair, Mimi, a musician who has just walked away from the rock band he founded, and his more successful sister, Naj, who enjoys a stellar music career in Beirut and is dealing with the emergence of her one-time lover.

“We don’t choose what we belong to. What claims us,” Mazda reflects at one point in the novel. This novel has it all – powerful characters, a mesmerizing plot, and even the fig leaf of redemption. I felt as if I had lost something when I had to step away from the characters I had grown to care for by the end of the book.

[Swati · Rating 4 out of 5]

Where do I even begin to talk about Hala Alyan’s “The Arsonists’ City”? How can I gather all the feelings and observations and emotions it brims with and crush them into this miniscule capsule? For Alyan’s novel sprawls across countries – Syria, Lebanon, America – people, and, most of all, matters of the heart.

This is a multi-generational story that begins with Idris’ decision to sell the family house in Beirut, which becomes a cause for the entire family – Idris, his wife Mazna, and their three children Ava, Mimi, and Naj – to come together for a couple of weeks. From here, we are taken into the stories of each of these people, how they came to be where they are, and what lies ahead for them.

The Arsonists’ City is a gorgeously character-driven book and Alyan draws each of them with fine brushstrokes. Of all the sub-plots related to each person, I loved Mazna and Zakaria’s the most with its bittersweet, heartbreaking story. Alyan’s character construction is so intricate and detailed that at the end of the book, I felt like I knew each of them personally, as if I was in on their secrets and their innermost thoughts.

But what I enjoyed, nay, relished was Alyan’s storytelling, the slow build up, teasing out gentle bends and folds in people. There were parts where I wished it to move faster, and some plot points that seemed to be purposeless, not going anywhere. My interest was sustained through these places only due to her exquisite writing, which made me forget my quibbles. The book's setting in Beirut and Damascus in the 1960s was very interesting and gave me a peek into the cultural milieu of a country you otherwise don't come across commonly.

If you enjoy layered, multi-generational family stories with some scintillating prose, pick this up now.

Thanks to NetGalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for the copy!

[Holly R W · Rating 5 out of 5]

The outstanding books that I read have all been absorbing from the first page on. The Arsonists' City is such a book. This is the second book I have read written by Hala Alyan. Like Salt Houses, the novel is about a family of Arab descent spanning through four generations. A major portion of the novel is spent in both Beirut, Lebanon (where the father is from) and Damascus, Syria (the mother's city).

The central characters are Mazna (the mother) and Idris (the father) and their three children, all of whom are believable and wonderfully drawn. After growing up in the Middle East, the parents flee the violence in Beirut by going to live in California, U.S.A. Idris works to become a successful heart surgeon and Mazna, a firebrand, has aspirations of becoming an actress. Their relationship is not ideal, due to feelings that Mazna has about another man, whom she had met in Lebanon.

When Idris' father dies, the family travels back to the home in Beruit where Idris grew up. For reasons of his own, Idris wants to sell it. The children are now adults and begin to wonder about family history not well explained to them. As a dysfunctional family, there is much for them to unravel. Lies and secrets abound. Each adult child has his/her own worries as well. I liked how the sibs come together to support each other, despite their differences. A special shout-out goes to Harper, the son's generous and plain talking American fiancee who has a way of seeing through B.S.

I am always in awe of authors who write in such a realistic way. This is a wonderful book, well worth the time of reading it.

Additional: Ever since reading Hope Jahren's Lab Girl, I have been interested in the unique place of special trees in the books I read. In this one, three almond trees at the ancestral home are highlighted and are meant to be safe-guarded. This caught my attention.

[Blue · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Tonight the man will die. In some ways, the city already seems resigned to it, the Beirut dusk uncharacteristically flat, cloudy, a peculiar staleness rippling through the trees like wind"

I received an Arc from Netgalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in exchange of an honest review

Star rating- 3.25
Technical rating- 7.5/10
Enjoyment rating- 4/10

This is one of those books that made me question how I review books. I was constantly thinking about how I'm going to rate this. I didn't want to rate it too low because I want to be fair to the author; this is a genuinely good book. But I didn't want to rate it too high because I want my ratings to match my reading tastes because I now have some amazing friends who read my reviews (looking at you Jess, if you're not reading this consider me disappointed). I don't want to mislead anyone who has similar tastes in books as me. (I've apparently convinced some people to read some books, which is amazing, but I'm paranoid of this kind of power)

Premise-
"The Nasr family is spread across the globe—Beirut, Brooklyn, Austin, the California desert. A Syrian mother, a Lebanese father, and three American children: all have lived a life of migration. Still, they’ve always had their ancestral home in Beirut—a constant touchstone—and the complicated, messy family love that binds them. But following his father's recent death, Idris, the family's new patriarch, has decided to sell.

The decision brings the family to Beirut, where everyone unites against Idris in a fight to save the house. They all have secrets—lost loves, bitter jealousies, abandoned passions, deep-set shame—that distance has helped smother. But in a city smoldering with the legacy of war, an ongoing flow of refugees, religious tension, and political protest, those secrets ignite, imperiling the fragile ties that hold this family together."

We follow 4 perspectives-

Mazna, a young and beautiful woman from a poor family, with big dreams of Hollywood and becoming an actress.

Ava, Mimi, and Naj. Mazna's kids, summoned back to Beirut as mentioned above.

I'd recommend this book to you if-

- you are a character-driven reader. This is VERY much, a character-driven book. The character work is one of the best I've seen. Definitely in the top 15. I have a feeling that I will bring along a part of Mazna with me in my memories. She is just so real. If you'd like to analyze character motivations, their emotions; delve into what makes them tick, their fears, their joy. I'd honestly believe you if you said "These characters are real people."

- You are patient for the tea. There are quite a few betrayals, and a few heartaches (under hyping this one). But it takes quite a few pages (about a few hundred) to get there. After introducing the characters, the author takes her sweet time exploring the character's life story. The water has been set in the kettle, explores the character work before you get burned with scalding hot, sweet, and JUICY tea. I am a nosy person so I liked the reveals, but it takes a bit too long for me to love it.

- You have the time. This is a relatively slow-paced book (I had a few issues with it but I'll discuss it later) This is definitely a spring/summer book, which is a great move on the publisher's part because this book comes out in March. Read slowly, enjoy the atmosphere, read in a preferably a breezy area. Let the book lead your mind.



I personally didn't like this book as much I expected to, because I anticipated a fast-paced family drama with reveals and turns left and right. But here, it's a bit slower paced. The interesting thing about this book is, that it builds up the twists right in front of you, and it teases you and builds suspense on how other characters will react to it. I was not a big fan of the pacing but I'm not gonna lie, it dragged a lot through the middle. There was a purpose to it, the character work is amazing but I wish it was more balanced but the author clearly succeeded on what they intended to do, so I'm not gonna spend more time on that.

My biggest issue with the book is the formatting. BUT, they did mention that the book will be going through more editing, so hopefully, it won't be an issue anymore when it gets published. The book is kinda on the bigger side of the general fiction page count. The book is formatted as such. There is one storyline of a portion of the character's life. This part takes about 50-80 pages. This part is divided into bite-sized passages which adds to this part and by extension the story. My issue here is, this is kinda too long. I was more interested in Mazna's POV, I was less interested in the other POVs and got frustrated when it went of for pages upon pages. The shift from one POV to the other is pretty jarring because the character voices and narrative is so different (which is a good thing, but it contrasted with this negatively). Sometimes it went on for so long, I kinda forgot what was happening on the other "plot thread".
I just think that smoothing these out would do the book a lot of favors.


Sorry for the rant, onto what I liked.

The characters (obviously)

The writing. There are just some nuggets here, that hit so deep. It is poetic in a straightforward manner. I love the way the author handles the characters. In front of you; the character dreams and dares to hope, but you know how it turns out from the other (future) POV. Not gonna delve too deep because I'm terrified of accidentally spoiling anyone.

This review is not as clear and articulate as I'd like it to be, or as much as my other reviews but it is what it is; my brain vomit. I found it hard to write this review because I have too many thoughts on this book for it to be a coherent review. I tried; read it if you want to.

If you have read this far, thank you very much. Happy reading.

[Sheena · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Arsonists’ City is a family drama saga taking place in Beruit and all across the United States. It is very character driven and focuses in depth of each character. It tells the tale of the Nasr family - the children and the parents, moving between present day and the past of how the parents met. I think that the emotional depth of human emotion was captured quite well. The writing was very beautiful and poetic.

I did like this however I did think it was a little too long and slow for my liking. I’m more of someone who likes fast paced but I can enjoy a character driven novel from time to time. The sibling dynamic and interpersonal relationships are explored in depth. There’s so much more heartache and betrayal than I expected. Strong 3.5 rating!

Thank you to Netgalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[Stitching Ghost]

Real talk, this one just wasn't for me. It's a family saga with multiple POVs and shifts back and forth in time and if you're familiar with my reading style you know that generally speaking these are all things I really don't care for. There were a lot of interesting elements in there but the characters we spent the most time with were the ones I cared the least about and after a heart-shattering start it failed to rekindle my enthusiasm for it. I'm just not going to rate this book because I wasn't the right audience for it.

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Throughout the novel, as I was reading, I kept hearing the Neko Case song, “Hold On, Hold On,” about how it is safer to be around strangers, as the familiar was too dangerous. That sums up the Nasr family’s approach, living apart from each other due to guilt, shame, and relationship issues. Mazna (from Damascus) and Idris (from Beirut) met in the 70s, while Mazna was doing local theater, dreaming of becoming a famous actress, and Idris was in medical school, pursuing a career as a surgeon. They met through friends, and Idris fell instantly for Mazna when he saw her onstage. Now it is (pre-pandemic) contemporary times, and Mazna and Idris have lived in Blythe, California for nearly four decades, and their three children are scattered around the globe. This is their story.

The Nasr family FaceTimes and Zooms, calls and texts each other, from a distance, but the secrets they carry erect an invisible wall that they hide behind, and from one another. But now Idris’ father has died, and he wants to sell the ancestral home in Beirut. The urgency and the looming past create a reluctant gathering at the old house.

The prologue, as well as subsequent chapters, often gives away a climactic event, so it isn’t about “What is going to happen?” Rather, the intrigue lies in the reactions, conflicts, and fears when secrets are mounting to the surface. Events are periodically predictable, but it doesn’t diminish the tension. It’s all about the characters and theme. Can you go home? What is home? How do shameful secrets destroy you, and when is it fitting to reveal these buried skeletons? Who can you trust, and have you betrayed or been betrayed? How does trauma affect the next generation? The narrative alternates characters and time periods, gradually filling in everyone’s backstory. Mazna’s story is the most blistering and dramatic.

ARSONIST’S CITY is epic, emotional, tragic, and redemptive. Ava is the oldest child of Mazna and Idris, a mother of two little ones, struggling in her marriage. The middle child, Naj, left America for Beirut after graduating college, and became a celebrity rock star. But she knows the industry is fickle, whimsical. Moreover, she keeps secrets from her family, and sleeps around a lot. Mimi is the boy, the baby, but as an adult he is flailing in Austin, trying to make it as a musical artist, but jealously not up to his sister’s talent. His relationship with his long-time girlfriend, Harper, is stagnant.

Mazna, Idris, and their three kids (and Ava’s two children and Harper) meet in Beirut in the house that Idris grew up in and wants to sell. However, the rest of the family conflicts with Idris, are horrified, and want the home to stay in the family. Throughout this summer of togetherness, the narrative reaches down deeper, and mines their lives, past and present. But it is Mazna’s story that gives the narrative its heft. And, even as she grew up during war between Syria and Lebanon, and the occupation of Beirut by Syria, Mazna experiences the war from a place of safety, as if she is witnessing a ten-car pileup outside the window of her own intact vehicle. This story isn’t about war, but it is part of the landscape and affects all its citizens. Mazna dreams of a career in America, a place she can be a serious thespian and play any role.

“Films make people sad, Mazna is slowly understanding. They remind people of a time that is over or a time they’ve never been part of…Theater is the same. It’s heartbreaking because it will end, because people will become a part of the story and then be abandoned by it. She’s aware of this during rehearsals as she repeats the same lines…learning to let her hands flutter naturally, playing with tone and volume. She’s lying to a roomful of people. She is going to break their hearts.”

Read it and weep!

[Phyllis · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this multi-generational story of the Nasr and Adib families, with their origins in Lebanon and Syria, and eventual spread across America. It is well-told and well-written, with deeply loveable (though fallible) & compelling characters and rich settings. I want more from Ms. Alyan, please.

It begins in 2019 with the three adult children. Ava is a botanist in Brooklyn, New York, married to Nate and with two small children Rayan and Zina. Mimi (aka Marwan) is a lead singer & guitarist in a hopeful band and a restaurant manager as his day job in Austin, Texas, in a decade-long relationship with Harper. Naj (aka Najla) is a highly successful world-touring singer & violinist in a hard rock duo based out of Beirut, to which she relocated to attend college. The three siblings are as American as apple pie, having been born & raised in rural Blythe, California, where their dad Idris is a heart surgeon and their mom Mazna works in a greenhouse.

After the last of their grandparents pass away, the story moves to Beirut to their dad's ancestral house, with some chapters set in Damascus where their mom grew up. At its core, this is the story of Mazna and Idris, of who they were as children, how they met, what sent them to America in 1978, and the lives they lived (and the hoped for but unlived ones).

Like all families, each person has secrets. Like with all families, secrets are hard to keep and sometimes it turns out they aren't really secrets at all. But perhaps "people deserve to have their secrets."

[Ming · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just a truly enjoyable read. Beautiful writing (please see my many highlights), smart and thoughtful plotting, affecting/poignant tone.

I don't recall where I first heard about this book. It was a list...perhaps some book awards or something (Found the list: https://www.aspenwords.org/programs/l... . After seeing the general description, I picked it up immediately (dropping my other in-progress book).

In any case, this book is gorgeous. And I'd readily read this author's future works.

The characterization is thoughtful and nuanced so each has foibles and hurts. Then the characters are thrown into a family system...and bam! And with the backdrop of Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine...and history. What a mix! (Like watching a K-drama series and being completely immersed.)

I finished the book with tears in my eyes and made a mental note to remember the author's name.

(As an aside, reading this reminded me of A Bridge Between Us by Julie Shigekuni A Bridge Between Us That sort of Rashomon effect or structure and its emotional depth so one could see how and why the characters are as they are, and we're empathetic about it.)

[↠Ameerah↞]

After reading and loving Salt Houses I'm excited to read this. Hala's writing is exquisite!

Thank you to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for providing me with an eARC of this novel via NetGalley.

[richa ⋆.˚★ · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5/5 🌟

Need a soap opera on this book ASAP.
rtc

[Kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Arsonists' City is a beautiful, multigenerational tale about family, love, and secrets. I adored every page and would recommend it to anyone who who enjoys long, multilayered stories.

[Sammie Reads · Rating 5 out of 5]

This. Book. Was. Amazing. A detailed look into the past, future, and current lives of the Nasr family. It starts with a death and ends with hope for forgiveness and finally happiness, with a whole lot of drama, tension, and flawed humanity in between.

We zig-zag back and forth between Idris and Mazna and their three grown children, Mimi, Naj, and Ava. We get intimate details on their relationships, their love and heartbreak, their flaws and their disappointments, and resentment. So so much resentment. Towards each other, at themselves, at the dead.

There were times that I despaired and cried, when I was so angry at these people for their treatment of others and to themselves. Hala has a masterful way of weaving her words, this came to a really satisfying conclusion that slowly pieced my heart back together. One of my top five out of 2021 published books and that I’ve read this year!

[Bruce Katz · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 rounded up. And done with great internal conflict. Most of the way through the book I was torn between 4 and 5. But then...

Before I go any further, let me get this out of the way: This is an extraordinary book, truly. I sincerely recommend it to anyone who likes well-written, thoughtful, insightful, and compelling fiction. Full stop. Don't let anything I write here dissuade you from reading "The Arsonists' City." The problems I had with it are almost certainly a consequence of my tastes and expectations.

Summaries of the plot are plentiful on GR (a man, now living in America, decides to sell his family home in Beirut, thereby setting off an extended, event-filled meditation on memory, connection, history, and hopes denied), so I'll skip that to make a few broad points. Alyan is utterly brilliant in depicting multi-generational families: their secrets, frustrated desires, jealousies, failures, broken dreams, self-delusions ("she loves the idea of herself as loyal to modest living"), resentments, and yes, their moments of generosity and tenderness . (No surprise: She's a psychologist.) The people in "Arsonists' City' just come alive with all their warts and contradictions. They act unexpectedly and not often well, jump to mistaken conclusions and do stupid things, hold grudges... Alyan gives voice to how immigrants and their born-in-America children see the world so differently. The relationships are so complicated (and sometimes confusing: who is this character again? is s/he a sibling? Cousin? Old friend? -- but it all gets sorted out), so real. They have complicated relationships to the past, to the places the family came from. In short, it's a compelling story, deftly told.

Alyan is also brilliant in capturing aspects of daily life in Beirut (and to a lesser degree, Damascus) that are entirely different from the impression most Americans form in response to news reports. Beirutis lead normal lives, shop in supermarkets, go to dance clubs and fancy restaurants, while in the background, fires and outbreaks of violence occur. Let one passage serve to suggest all: It's disgusting outside, the humid, smothering days of early July in Beirut, steam everywhere, the streets filled with the smell of garbage. Everyone's cranky and the traffic is a disaster; people have been protesting the new parliament, which is really the old parliament, since nobody new ever gets elected, and posters of those men's faces, crossed out, decorate every corner... They're protesting the piles of garbage, the old-new men, the corruption and high electricity bills. Naj always thinks about the fires -- the protesters are unhappy with the city, so they set fire to it. It makes no sense. And poverty, Palestinian refugee camps, racism, collisions between the past and the present. (Unsurprisingly, given the title, fires -- both real and psychological -- flare up frequently in the book. Alyan chose her title well. Its significance dawns over time in the reader's mind, this reader at least.)

The writing is well-crafted and evocative. I have to say, Alyan does love her similes. The book has lots of them: "the sun has begun to rise, pastel as a baby blanket"; "sometimes [her] life feels like a seat left sightly warm for her"; "there is something peculiar about seeing an unlived-in house so clean and preserved, like a dog awaiting its dead owner"; "Beirut was where her life at cracked like a thin ankle". "They outshine the dated establishments like puppies in a pound." Yeah, some work better than others.

So: great characters, a compelling story, perceptive and artfully drawn depictions of life and culture, striking portraits of foreign places -- what made me drop from 250+ pages of unalloyed enthusiasm to "loved-the-book-but" attached? The ending, that's what. Not necessarily how things are wrapped up (though I felt a little of that) but something else. As I said above, maybe it's me, my own tastes and limitations, but I found myself thinking 'this is the final chapter... no, this is... no, this is. I felt like the book didn't want to stop (like the interminable multiple endings in the final Lord of the Rings movie: an allusion I make specifically with my daughter in mind). The ending, viewed from afar, struck me as superfluous. I found myself impatiently wondering why the author felt the need to add this scene, this coda, this brief chapter. After loving the book up to this point, the final pages left me a little annoyed. Annoyed but wanting everyone to read the book.

But that's me. Most readers found the book nearly flawless. Trust them -- there are some splendid reviews on GR. "Arsonists' City" deserves every bit of it.

[Tamara Agha-Jaffar · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Arsonists' City by Hala Alyan is a multi-generational family saga about a Lebanese/Syrian family. The patriarch is Idris Nasr, a Lebanese, married to Mazna, a Syrian. Their three children are Ava, Mimi (Marwan), and Naj (Najla). Apart from Naj who lives in Beirut, the family all live in America. Set mostly against the backdrop of a Lebanon emerging from sectarian tensions and civil war, the novel covers a span of about 40 years. The focus is on Mazna and her adult children. Their challenges and personal demons are gradually revealed through temporal shifts and locations alternating between Damascus, America, and Beirut.

The novel opens in 1978 when Zakaria, a young Palestinian refugee, is murdered in Lebanon in an act of sectarian revenge. The novel goes back to 1965 to introduce a young Mazna in Damascus, an aspiring actress with dreams of becoming a Hollywood movie star. Through a mutual friend, she meets Idris in 1978 who becomes totally besotted with her. And through Idris, she meets Zakaria. The three become involved in a love triangle when Mazna and Zakaria fall passionately in love and make plans for a future together. Their love affair comes to a screeching halt with Zakaria’s murder.

Shortly after Zakaria’s death, Idris is accepted in medical school in California. He proposes to Mazna with lures of Hollywood fame. A broken-hearted Mazna accepts his proposal, resigning herself to a marriage with a man she does not love. Forty years later when Idris decides to sell the Beirut ancestral home he inherited from his father, he causes a family uproar. The family converges in Beirut to hold a memorial for Idris’ father and to protest the sale of the home.

In this character-driven novel, Alyan excels in creating authentic, believable, and multi-dimensional characters beset with sibling jealousies and rivalry, marital bickering, simmering resentments, petty squabbles, thwarted aspirations, and ongoing deceptions. The ebb and flow of their relationships as they push away from one another or pull toward one another realistically capture the complexity of family dynamics. Each character is fully fleshed out, unique, flawed, and realistically drawn. The dialogue is natural with its pauses, hesitations, things said, and things left unsaid. Secrets buried for forty years bubble to the surface. Added to the mix are first and second generation struggles with issues of forced migration, displacement, fractured identity, questions of belonging, assimilation, and loss of homeland.

This complex, multi-layered novel grips the reader from the first pages of its riveting prologue depicting a revenge murder to the last pages depicting the resiliency of the Nasr family bond. Alyan’s finely drawn characters, intricate storytelling, masterful pacing, and sparkling prose attest to her skill as an accomplished writer well-deserving of the accolades she has received.

A compelling family saga. Highly recommended.

My book reviews are also available at www.tamaraaghajaffar.com