Fencing with the king by Diana Abu-Jaber

Name of Book: Fencing with the King

Author: Diana Abu-Jaber

ISBN: 978-0-393-86771-8

Publisher: Norton

Type of book: Jordan, royalty, 1995, family, relationships, complications, father/daughter, manipulation, Middle East, celebration, secrets

Year it was published: 2022

Summary:

A mesmerizing breakthrough novel of family myths and inheritances by the award-winning author of Crescent.

Amani is hooked on a mystery—a poem on airmail paper that slips out of one of her father's books. It seems to have been written by her grandmother, a refugee who arrived in Jordan during the First World War. Soon the perfect occasion to investigate arises: her Uncle Hafez, an advisor to the King of Jordan, invites her father to celebrate the king's sixtieth birthday—and to fence with the king, as in their youth. Her father has avoided returning to his homeland for decades, but Amani persuades him to come with her. Uncle Hafez will make their time in Jordan complicated—and dangerous—after Amani discovers a missing relative and is launched into a journey of loss, history, and, eventually, a fight for her own life.

Fencing with the King masterfully draws on King Lear and Arthurian fable to explore the power of inheritance, the trauma of displacement, and whether we can release the past to build a future.

Characters:

Main characters include Amani and Hafez. Amani is a half American half Jordanian young woman who has recently gone through divorce and seems to be stuck in a rut. She has recently discovered her grandmother's poetry and desires to discover more about her family that is living in Jordan. Hafez is advisor to the king, oldest of the two brothers who underneath his own placid and calm appearance has his own ambitions and desires, namely the family land that he wants for church to gift him. He is extremely charismatic and will do what he can to get his way, even from an early age. Other characters would include Amanis father Gabe who seems to be a man of simple desires as well as Natalie, a palestinian refugee of 1918 who desired more than the lot that was handed to her. 

 
Theme:

One never knows how much is hidden. 

Plot:

THE story is in third person narrative primarily from Amanis and her uncle Hafezs points of view and it takes place over the course of several weeks in October and November of the year 1995, dealing with complex inheritance as well as mystery of Amanis fathers family. The men, in particular Hafez and Gabe are drawn very well and one wished a lot to see and understand more of their backgrounds. Also the reader is given a chance to experience beauty and diversity of Jordan that quite often gets ignored in favor of extremists. There is discussion of palestinians and their plight, and while I was a bit uncomfortable with that, at least there is more history of their flight beyond the 1948. So yes, a bit educational novel. In writing style, there is similarity to Erica Bauermeisters novels. 

Author Information:
(From goodreads)

Diana Abu-Jaber is the award-winning author of Life Without A Recipe, Origin, Crescent, Arabian Jazz, and The Language of Baklava. Her writing has appeared in Good Housekeeping, Ms., Salon, Vogue, Gourmet, the New York Times, The Nation, the Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times. She divides her time between Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and Portland, Oregon.

Opinion:

Truly speaking, the world needs a book like FENCING WITH THE KING, in particular to dispell the stereotypes of Middle East. In my fiction readings, I rarely travel to Middle East, thus I hadn't had time to examine and question my thoughts and unfortunate stereotypes I hold over a group of people. Quite honestly, Middle East is one of the areas where people hold stereotypes of people as all monolithic with little to no differences between. Yet, FENCING WITH THE KING encourages us to think and feel differently. I think there are a few things that surprised me a lot when it came to area of Jordan: the diversity of the population, ( especially the mixed marriages between Jordanian men and women from elsewhere) I also was shocked at the big heartedness that Jordanians exhibit, especially towards refugees. While I enjoyed the story a lot, I did feel romance is a bit unnecessary and I wanted more about Amanis family.  

This was given for review 

4 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)