{"id":8614,"date":"2022-06-01T11:02:51","date_gmt":"2022-06-01T11:02:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=8614"},"modified":"2022-06-01T11:02:51","modified_gmt":"2022-06-01T11:02:51","slug":"discretion-by-faiza-guene","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/?p=8614","title":{"rendered":"Discretion by Fa\u00efza Gu\u00e8ne"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Translated by Sarah Ardizzone<\/strong><\/p>\n

Published by Saqi Books 31 May 2022<\/strong><\/p>\n

224pp, paperback, \u00a312.99<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/strong><\/p>\n

Click here to buy this book<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

First published in France in 2020, this is the latest book by award-winning French Algerian\u00a0 writer and director Fa\u00efza Gu\u00e8ne, who burst onto the international literary scene at the age of 19 with her bestselling novel, Kiffe Kiffe Demain<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Infused with her signature wit and forthright tenderness, Discretion<\/em> calls out for recognition of people of North African descent living in France (and especially in the notoriously rundown housing estates occupied by working-class Parisians) as human beings like anyone else.\u00a0 Above all, she writes so that they can recognize themselves.<\/p>\n

The new book explores further the limbo life of immigrants, specifically the men and women who came over to France after Algerian independence, and their children, as they try to find a place in a new world that does not see them as legitimate citizens. An ordinary family with humble roots on an Algerian farm, the six members of the Taleb household consist of Brahim, the father, a construction worker; Yamina, the modest matriarch; \u00a0her four unmarried adult children, Malika (a minor functionary), Hannah (a youth worker), Imane (who has daringly left home) and Omar (an \u00dcber driver). For Yamina, \u2018remaining invisible is a matter of survival\u2019: a lesson learned brutally in early childhood.\u00a0 For her three daughters and her son, who did not grow up in rural, patriarchal, war-torn Algeria, there is more to life than domestic martyrdom or public subservience.\u00a0 There is culture – fashion, films, music, TV; there is politics; there is systemic racism; there is the loss of family history.\u00a0 As the younger generation work through their anger and unease – Hannah with her nightmares full of violence, Omar with his dreams of romance – Yamina comes to the understanding that she will never recapture the past, and that home is where her children are.<\/p>\n

This is a rich novel, full of insight into cultural tropes, racial prejudice, consumerism, shameful colonial history but also infused with sheer human warmth and humour.\u00a0 It is a tightrope walk that Fa\u00efza Gu\u00e8ne carries off with grace.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reviewed by Alison Burns<\/p>\n

For Yamina, \u2018remaining invisible is a matter of survival\u2019: a lesson learned brutally in early childhood. For her three daughters and her son, who did not grow up in rural, patriarchal, war-torn Algeria, there is more to life than domestic martyrdom or public subservience. There is culture – fashion, films, music, TV; there is politics; there is systemic racism; there is the loss of family history […] in Reviews<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,19,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-fiction-and-non-fiction","category-notable-books","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8614"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8614\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8617,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8614\/revisions\/8617"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bookoxygen.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}