Celestial Bodies Jokha Alharthi Marilyn Booth by Jokha Alharthi, Marilyn Booth 9781912240166, 1912240165, B076W8NSLD instant download after payment.

Jokha Alharthi’s elegantly structured and taut novel tells of Oman’s coming-of-age through the prism of one family’s losses and loves. Translated by Marilyn Booth.

In the village of al-Awafi in Oman, we encounter three sisters: Mayya, who marries Abdallah after a heartbreak; Asma, who marries from a sense of duty; and Khawla who rejects all offers while waiting for her beloved, who has emigrated to Canada. These three women and their families witness Oman evolve from a traditional, slave-owning society that is slowly redefining itself after the colonial era, to the crossroads of its complex present. Elegantly structured and taut, Celestial Bodies is a coiled spring of a novel, telling of Oman's coming-of-age through the prism of one family's losses and loves.

"...the novel is a beautifully achieved account of lives pulling at the edges of change ... The writing is teasingly elliptical throughout and there is a kind of poetic understatement that draws the reader into the domestic settings and public tribulations of the three sisters ... Celestial Bodies deftly undermines recurrent stereotypes about Arab language and cultures but most importantly brings a distinctive and important new voice to world literature."  -  Michael Cronin, The Irish Times

Jokha al-Harthi is an Omani writer and academic. She was educated in Oman and in the United Kingdom, obtaining her PhD in classical Arabic literature from Edinburgh University. She is currently an associate professor in the Arabic department at Sultan Qaboos University. al-Harthi has published three collections of short stories and three novels (Manamat, Sayyidat el-Qamar and Narinjah).