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The Ghorba Ghost Series Strories #1
Building 46
Sam Saadoun, a closeted Jewish-Arab from Los Angeles, travels to Beijing to attend university. He is in pursuit of a romantic gay dream, desperate to escape the conservative clutches of his childhood United States. When he arrives in Beijing, he is hurled into dilemmas, harassed by shadowy characters and forced to confront a strange new life in this foreign city. All the while a disturbing murder mystery is unfolding in the halls of the university’s most curious building. Building 46 draws its reader into the darkest, quietest spaces of China’s vast capital. Set just before the 2008 Beijing Olympics, this queer coming-out-and of-age story explores the interplay between so-called Eastern and Western superpowers, between humans and halls of power, and between light and dark. It is a love letter to Beijing. It is an expression of love for its intellectuals, its imams, its waitresses, its foreigners, its wanderers, its middle-aged moms, its shadow men, its DVD bootleggers, its migrant labourers. It is a love letter to a people very different to their mono dimensional portrayals in foreign correspondence.
240 pages, Paperback
Published May 17, 2022
5 people are currently reading
193 people want to read
About the author
Massoud Hayoun
4 books64 followersMassoud Hayoun is a journalist who lives in Los Angeles. He has reported for Al Jazeera, Pacific Standard Magazine, Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown online, The Atlantic, and Agence France-Presse. He speaks and works in several languages.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
February 22, 2025
I loved this so much, though I might be a little biased because it made me super nostalgic for my time in Beijing. I loved the tone, the concept, the deeper social critiques, the mystery, the relationships between different characters. I just wish the publisher had done a better editing job because there was a significant number of typos and even a whole duplicated paragraph, which detracted from my reading experience.
October 16, 2022
3.5 - 4 stars
i really enjoyed reading this!
gonna take my fav aspect away before diving into the full review: my fav thing about this book was that i loved learning about beijing!
to start with, i'd say for me one of the most interesting things about it was the perspective on beijing (and chinese politics) through the main character - a closeted jewish arab university student from la who spends a few months there to search for two things, a gay hollywood romance, and feelings of "connectedness" (can't think of the perfect word for it) that he feels he can't really find in a hyper-capitalist space like the us.
the way he saw and experienced beijing and china as a whole were very interesting for me to read, and one of the main things i took away from the book are the aspects it held about chinese culture, history, and especially also politics - which is what i was hoping for, so a win! it made it especially interesting that the mc, sam saadoun, was a foreigner in beijing.
the story takes place in the period before the olympics (held in beijing), so i additionally found it really interesting to see the ways (as observed by the mc and commented on by the author) in which the chinese government wanted to prepare beijing for that event and the arrival of 'international guests' - and what contradiction this actually meant. in the way that, in the desire to throw the world off its focus on the so-called west, the 'forced alterations' of beijings for instance sort of uplifted certain western ways - the very ways that the chinese government wanted to separate itself from and 'top'.
so i liked reading the author's take on that!
and in general it was interesting to constantly have the mc (who was, you could say, tired of and annoyed by the us in several aspects, but also struggled with china in others) compare the us and china, and point out the differences and sometimes also similarities that he felt they had - and also criticise them.
and amidst that, i also liked to read about his smaller-scale thoughts on every-day stuff, as someone living in a huge foreign city. like for example the ways in which he felt lost and the moments (& people) that helped him, also him kind of exploring his sexuality, and just his relationships with various people he met (both other foreign students and chinese people). and in the end, how all of that always made him come back to all the bigger questions!
the fantasy element was interesting in its own way, but it wasn't the main focus for me in the book. it didn't bother me and there was an "ah!" moment when it was all revealed in the end, i personally just focused more on what the book told me about chinese culture and beijing life.
another rather specific thing that i also found interesting was the different opinions on, interpretations of and attitudes towards socialism (chinese socialism, specifically) that sam encountered during his time & studies in beijing (at his uni, he did research in the form of street interviews for a professor in the department of 'socialism with chinese characteristics').
an untintendedly long review short -
what'll stay with me the most are the mc's perspective on beijing as a foreigner, and the author's exploration of & take on beijing and chinese politics and history in connection with the united states, and the deeper social critiques & questions that resulted from this. that really was the most compelling to me!
oh and secondly, just everything i learned about beijing through this book!! loved it.
the goodreads summary says "It is a love letter to a people very different to their mono dimensional portrayals in foreign correspondence" and that's truly what i felt while reading!
so i def recommend this is you're interested in learning something about beijing, and just reading an interesting narrative on china but also just the world, honestly 😅. i can say i enjoyed it and have things to take away from it ;))!
-- oh yeah, the only thing i could critize would be the editing: there were quite a few typos and even a whole duplicated paragraph - which isn't grave, but it did irritate me for a sec there.
i really enjoyed reading this!
gonna take my fav aspect away before diving into the full review: my fav thing about this book was that i loved learning about beijing!
to start with, i'd say for me one of the most interesting things about it was the perspective on beijing (and chinese politics) through the main character - a closeted jewish arab university student from la who spends a few months there to search for two things, a gay hollywood romance, and feelings of "connectedness" (can't think of the perfect word for it) that he feels he can't really find in a hyper-capitalist space like the us.
the way he saw and experienced beijing and china as a whole were very interesting for me to read, and one of the main things i took away from the book are the aspects it held about chinese culture, history, and especially also politics - which is what i was hoping for, so a win! it made it especially interesting that the mc, sam saadoun, was a foreigner in beijing.
the story takes place in the period before the olympics (held in beijing), so i additionally found it really interesting to see the ways (as observed by the mc and commented on by the author) in which the chinese government wanted to prepare beijing for that event and the arrival of 'international guests' - and what contradiction this actually meant. in the way that, in the desire to throw the world off its focus on the so-called west, the 'forced alterations' of beijings for instance sort of uplifted certain western ways - the very ways that the chinese government wanted to separate itself from and 'top'.
so i liked reading the author's take on that!
and in general it was interesting to constantly have the mc (who was, you could say, tired of and annoyed by the us in several aspects, but also struggled with china in others) compare the us and china, and point out the differences and sometimes also similarities that he felt they had - and also criticise them.
and amidst that, i also liked to read about his smaller-scale thoughts on every-day stuff, as someone living in a huge foreign city. like for example the ways in which he felt lost and the moments (& people) that helped him, also him kind of exploring his sexuality, and just his relationships with various people he met (both other foreign students and chinese people). and in the end, how all of that always made him come back to all the bigger questions!
the fantasy element was interesting in its own way, but it wasn't the main focus for me in the book. it didn't bother me and there was an "ah!" moment when it was all revealed in the end, i personally just focused more on what the book told me about chinese culture and beijing life.
another rather specific thing that i also found interesting was the different opinions on, interpretations of and attitudes towards socialism (chinese socialism, specifically) that sam encountered during his time & studies in beijing (at his uni, he did research in the form of street interviews for a professor in the department of 'socialism with chinese characteristics').
an untintendedly long review short -
what'll stay with me the most are the mc's perspective on beijing as a foreigner, and the author's exploration of & take on beijing and chinese politics and history in connection with the united states, and the deeper social critiques & questions that resulted from this. that really was the most compelling to me!
oh and secondly, just everything i learned about beijing through this book!! loved it.
the goodreads summary says "It is a love letter to a people very different to their mono dimensional portrayals in foreign correspondence" and that's truly what i felt while reading!
so i def recommend this is you're interested in learning something about beijing, and just reading an interesting narrative on china but also just the world, honestly 😅. i can say i enjoyed it and have things to take away from it ;))!
-- oh yeah, the only thing i could critize would be the editing: there were quite a few typos and even a whole duplicated paragraph - which isn't grave, but it did irritate me for a sec there.
May 13, 2022
A smart and witty novel about identity and belonging in an ever changing and scary world.
March 30, 2025
Hm a very interesting read. I liked that it was murder mystery meets gay romance meets Chinese megacity and for that it was a unique read … however the ending whilst satisfying felt pretty rushed and scenes that seemed to be much less important took up more space than moments that a lot of the book ended up hinging on. The proofreaders of this book also need to be fired because there were genuinely so many typos and grammatical errors that it sometimes felt like I was reading an online fanfic rather than a published book 😭 but yea. Maybe I’ll read the sequel
November 12, 2022
There is a genre of French films that has a character wander around navel-gazing in some sort of existential angst. Several of those films were referenced in here, and the book is in conversation with them. Sam, the main character, spends most of his time wandering around Beijing in various levels of existential angst. The novel is well written, but decidedly not the genre I tend to read. The wrap-up of the mystery was rather entertaining, though.
August 28, 2022
One of the most enjoyable books I've read this year. Not without some rough spots though. It definitely needed a better copy-editor. Typos all over the dang thing. But the feelings of the little nooks and mysteries of a big city and university and young adulthood were perfect!
August 12, 2022
Pulled through with the ending
June 23, 2024
a bit too y/a
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews