Read to page 268 and stopped wasting my time. ( )

The Map of Love By Adaf Soueif

Beautifully written love story set against both contemporary Egypt and the early 20th century tumultuous British occupation. There is much detail about Egyptian history and the culture of the Arabic society, related in letters and dialogue. While it might be advantageous to have a background in this era, the broad outline is apparent and accessible.

At the heart is a family history and a love story, the intertwining of two cultures- the lovely British Lady Anna and the upperclass Egyptian lawyer Sharif Basha al-Baroudi who can only converse together in French.

The beautifully described scenery, the family home, the color and feel of the women's silk gowns were vivid. Indeed, when Amal writes, after reading Lady Anna's 1901 journal entry about her betrothal . . .

"Looking up from Anna’s journal I am, for a moment, surprised to find myself in my own bedroom, her trunk standing neatly by the wall, my bed, the top sheet folded back, waiting for me to ease myself in. I had been so utterly in that scene, in the hall of the old house, in my great-grandmother’s haramlek. My heart had beaten in time with Anna’s ..."

- I felt exactly how she felt, so immersed was I in the story. The events that affect this family had deep roots that continue to be felt in this troubled region of the world today.
( )

Last fall my wife read about the BBC/Fox production of Taboo starring Tom Hardy and an amazing supporting cast. What could possibly fail? Well, we waited for all the episodes to air and having recorded them sat to binge. Along the way I noticed Guardian headlines bemoaning the show. My best friend who doesn't believe in dvr dismissed the show as macho mumblecore. Still, I harbored hope. What an utter waste Taboo proved.

So I went to Cincinnati the other day to buy books. I found a nice copy and looked forward to settling down with what had been described by a GR friend as (A.S. Byatt's) Possession in Egypt. The weather turned really cold yesterday and I thought why not? Well, 516 pages later, I do not understand the parallel. There are two story lines, almost a century apart. There are journals and letters. The troubled travails of Egypt are explored through the casual racism of the British Occupation and the contemporary (circa 1999) fears of US/Israeli hegemony in the region. Most of this is approached obliquely, though the resistance to Mubarak is balanced with fears of the jihadi. There are mirrored situations where love conquers all and I felt my chest ache from repetitive sighing. This wasn't for me. ( )

“So. Tell me. What do you think? Which is better? To take action and perhaps make a fatal mistake - or to take no action and die slowly anyway?”

This novel centres on three women of three differing nationalities, Egyptian, American, English, one of whom lived nearly a century earlier than the other two. An American woman arrives in Cairo looking for someone to interpret the contents of a trunk that she has inherited. Once there she is befriended by an Egyptian woman who agrees to helps her with the task.

The lives of the women are not portrayed in a linear fashion, rather the author reveals each of them piecemeal meaning that the reader discovers the characters and their stories in a way that is akin to how they might unpack the contents of the trunk that is at the heart of the book. Thus the three intersecting stories are revealed to the reader at much the same pace as they are to the characters themselves. This did, however, also mean that it took me a few chapters to realise who was actually telling the story. The family tree at the front of the book was a big help here.

In 1997 American Isabel Parkman, discovers amongst her mother's belongings a trunk and meets and falls in love with, Omar al-Ghamrawi, a famous Egyptian conductor who is known not only for his musical ability but also for his espousal of the Arab cause. As Isabel starts going through the contents of the trunk she realises that, unbeknown to her,she has Egyptian ancestry. Her English great-grandmother, Anna Winterbourne,had married Egyptian, Sharif el-Baroudi, in 1901. On telling Omar about the trunk he suggests that she should take it to Cairo and show it to his sister, Amal, in the hope that she might help translate the Arabic portion of the journals.

Amal immerses herself in Anna's story and in particular the love affair between Anna and the Egyptian nationalist leader who became her husband. Widowed Anna travelled to Egypt in 1900 after her husband's death. Once there she comes to dislike the insular lives of most of the colonial Britons that she meets there. Unlike most of her country men and women she wants to learn the language and about the indigenous people. She wants to experience a side of Egypt that the colonials ignore and one day disguised as a man in order to see the beauties of the Sinai Desert, she and her guide are captured by young nationalists. Her captives are appalled when they learn of her true identity and in their panic hand her over in to the care of the sister of an influential Egyptian lawyer, the man who will come her future husband.

As the two women's' friendship grows so does Anna's doubts about the British occupation of the country, gradually seeing her own nation's presence as being deeply malign as Egypt strives to free itself from the auspices of the disintegrating Ottoman Empire. The longer Anna spends in the country the more sympathetic she becomes towards the Egyptians' cause. Nor do the repercussions of British rule end there. Nearly one hundred years on the legacies of British occupation continue to affect Amal's generation.

Although Britain's influence in Egypt has an important role to play in this novel as it's title would suggest love is the most important element. In particular the fact that love unlike romance comes in many different forms, love of country; love of nature; spiritual love; sensual love; love between family members and friends; love between differing generations.

Soueif cleverly gives an quick oversight of a century of Egyptian politics (unsurprisingly from the biased standpoint of the Egyptians themselves) and in doing so she conveys the sense that whereas love can bind people and nations together politics often only separates them. Equally neither can be fully resolved in one generation instead the ramifications of both are still to be revealed, like a trunk passed from one generation to the next.

''That is the beauty of the past; there it lies on the table: journals, pictures, a candle-glass, a few books of history. . . . You can leaf forward and know the end. And you tell the story that they, the people who lived it, could only tell in part.''

I found this an accomplished piece of writing from an author whom I had not previously read before, an surprisingly engaging and detailed portrayal of LOVE in its many forms. ( )

Compelling and complex, this book turned out to be somewhat different from what I had expected. Isabel, a young American woman, is given her English great-grandmother's trunk, containing her diaries and mementos from her travels in Egypt, where she fell in love and married. Isabel travels to Egypt herself to connect with her heritage and discover her family's history. I expected the love story to be central to the book, and while it plays a big part, the book offers a great deal of political analysis of colonial and modern-day Egypt. The narrative shifts between 1st and 3rd person, past and present, several narrators, as well as diary entries and letters - this should be confusing, but I didn't find it so. The result is a beautifully written, vibrant and utterly fascinating novel which should be read and savoured slowly. This is not a quick and easy read, but a very rewarding one. ( )

Family saga, but in the form of a family history being uncovered/researched by descendants come together.

Widowed Englishwoman comes to Egypt, 'goes native', and falls in love, not necessarily in that order. A startlingly happy marriage ensues - life isn't without its ups and downs, but culture clash doesn't much dent the relationship. In the present day, American woman falls in love, comes to Egypt, and gets to know the sister of her True Love as they together get to know what turns out to be their mutual ancestor. ( )

It started out with some promise but ultimately was very dissapointing. Although the blurb says it is about Isabel and learning about her great-grandmother, Anna, it is really about Amal. Which is good because Isabel is a really annoying character. Her obessions with Amal's brother Omar borders on the crazy side. I like more of Amal's immersion in Anna's life but really, it is mainly about Anna. With a huge dollop of Egyptian history that I know so little about and a large number of names and phrases in Arabic that went completely over my head. I really don't see what people rave out with this one, rather a snoozer.

rats!! the dreaded 3-star catch-all. :(

the thing i am happiest about, concerning the read of this novel, is the curiosity it has created in me to seek out excellent nonfiction books about egypt, israel and turkey. i do try to stay current with regard to world issues and events, but it's been at least 20 years since i last read purposefully about these countries/this region, in an attempt to gain an understanding of these countries, their histories and challenges. so this is a good thing and i hope to discover some great reads.

the novel itself, though, was fairly clunky to me. while i felt the use of letters and journal entries very good and effective, the parts outside of these forms didn't flow very well and it was a bumpy reading experience. i felt that, when soueif went into sections of political and social commentary, i was being lectured and that jarred me out of her fictional world. i kept comparing this book to john steinbeck's [b:The Grapes of Wrath|4395|The Grapes of Wrath|John Steinbeck|http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/books/1352912927s/4395.jpg|2931549], which i read for the first time recently. he also employs plot devices to address social and political issues, but with his novel, it felt more natural and informative and helpful. which is weird. because his strategy took us outside of the action of the novel, into these almost stand-alone chapters. whereas souief incorporated her messages, usually, into dialogue and discussions among her characters. but it didn't feel natural to me. so, i don't know that it was fair of me to contrast this novel with a steinbeck book...but i really couldn't stop my brain from going there.

oh, one other point of interest - this novel was written in 1999. the novel is split into 2 different times - the very early 1900s and the 1990s. topics and issues going on in the novel and being struggled with are issues that are very current and relevant to the issues going on NOW in egypt, israel, palestine and turkey. it's a sad, sad thing and certainly reinforces that feeling of helplessness as a reader sitting safely in canada.

i am very glad i read this novel and i will seek out more works by soueif. i just didn't love this one the way i had hoped. which is too bad. ( )

"This is a brilliant tapestry of a book weaving together historical and fictional characters. It is a story of worlds and cultures colliding and how they've always done so."
read more: http://likeiamfeasting.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/map-of-love-ahdaf-soueif.html ( )

The Map of Love tells two stories. Primarily, it is about Anna Winterbourne, living in the early 1900s, and her fascination with Egypt. In the present, Isabel Parkman and Amal al-Ghamrawi have found a trunk of Anna’s journals and letters and set out to piece together her story, while living their own.

The writing in this book was beautiful. There were some parts where the author seemed to be trying to show what a colorful, vibrant place her Egypt is and those just glowed. But my problem with beautiful writing is that I very often get bogged down and get bored and wish I could just get on with the story. I wish it didn’t happen, but it does. That happened for me here.

I really enjoyed reading Anna’s story. She’s an interesting, brave woman who isn’t afraid to break out of the mold that’s been made for her. Unfortunately, I couldn’t stand Isabel and I was indifferent to Amal.

I’m not exactly sure what the point of the book was. There definitely was a message, I just can’t decide how to take it. As an American reading a book by an Egyptian author, I’m afraid of misreading something. But, right or wrong, what I took away was the author trying to tell me that there’s more to her country than what I see in the news, and the problems that exist began in colonial times under British rule, but now under their own rule they aren’t doing any better. The poor are still oppressed and nothing seems to be changing. I hope I didn’t read all that wrong.

That being said, I got bogged down in the politics, both present and past. I don’t know anything about Egyptian history and it felt like that was almost necessary to be able to read between the lines and accurately see what the author was trying to show me. This was written in 1999 and there’s one section about American foreign policy and Islamic radicals. That was a little eerie to read post-9/11.

There were tons of names in this book. Enough to make me think of Anna Karenina. With at least half of them being Egyptian names, I just gave up and hoped that I would figure out the main players as I went. I think I did, but I hate when authors do that. Even the British names were hard to keep up with. Just too much.

This is such a little thing, but it drove me crazy for a while. Every chapter started on the left-hand page. Doesn’t sound like a big deal, right? Well, I must have some sort of OCD about that because I could not get over it for the longest time. I just felt “off.” Fortunately every chapter also starts with a quote by itself on the right-hand page before the chapter starts and I was able to start thinking of that as the first page of the chapter, but it really was killing me at first.

So, beautiful writing, Egyptian politics both past and present. If you’re interested, go ahead and pick this up. Anna’s story really was good, the rest of it just confused me. ( )

This is a very genteel story that is a romance but also explores the clash between Egypt and Britain. ( )

A bit sentimental, and pushes rather a lot of the obvious postcolonial buttons, but I enjoyed it. A good fast read, for all its 500 pages, and plenty of Egyptian atmosphere. The "now-and-then" historical novel form isn't exactly untrodden ground, but Soueif makes a very competent job of it: even Lady Anna's slightly stilted Victorian prose sounds almost right. The only point where it goes right over the top is the camel expedition into the Sinai desert. But, as she says herself later in the book: "there have to be camels". You couldn't really imagine a novel about Egypt for Western readers that doesn't include camels and a bit of "native dress". ( )

A love story about an English widow and her marriage to an Egyptian gentleman at the end of the 19th C. This story was so romantic it made me ACHE!! I loved it, and have since bought it as a present for a friend. I would give it more than 5 stars if I could!!! ( )

History and romance bound together.

This was quite a weighty read and the first time I read it, 8 years ago, I only gave it 1.5 stars. Having recently re-read it for a book group, I got far more out of it, appreciated the two love stories and didn't get bogged down in the politics. Even so, it's not an easy read and there are passages where the politics still became a bit dense. I particularly struggled with the Arab names, the Bashas and Beys etc.

Although we never really know how the trunk of Anna Winterbourne's letters and personal effects came to be in Isabel's possession, I enjoyed wading through her life alongside her great niece, Amal. As Amal reads chronologically through the journals, we learn of Anna's love affair with Sharif, a handsome Egyptian, and how they are both drawn into the events of the time.
Meanwhile Isobel is repeating history by her infatuation with Amal's brother, 'Omar.
It was an excellent tool for investigation into such a significant time in Egypt's history, without allowing the historical facts to become too overbearing.
The descriptions of the day to day life were wonderful and the characterisations were brilliant. I could feel the warm breeze in the private garden, alongside Anna and her new husband, I could almost smell the orange blossom.

There were one or two blips, the one supernatural event towards the end was a bit strange and the ending itself a bit frustrating. Also one genetic question, that I can't mention in any more detail, but which seemed a bit soap opera.
On the whole though, this was a worthwhile read with a fair bit of Egypt's history that I was fascinated to learn about. ( )

This is a wonderful book, in which 2 distant cousins (1 Egyptian, 1 American) piece together the hundred year old romance of the American cousin's English great-grandmother and Egyptian great-grandfather. But it's not just a love story, there is a lot of history and politics in there, comparing the situation of Egypt then (nominally ruled by the Turks, but under the control of the British) and now (pressurised by the Americans and the World Bank). I enjoyed it much more than I expected, due to the many facets of the story. ( )

This book convinced me to marry my husband. The story centeres on characters whose lives are profoundly affected by global events of their time. It reminded me how defenseless life and love can be against politics, violence and prejudice. Moments of happiness are precious yet choices for love deemed frivilous. On the other hand, sacrifices for country, religion, ideology are celebrated. This story made me wonder if it would be better the other way around. ( )

A novel that was both interesting and enjoyable to read. The theme of love was enjoyable and learning about life in Egypt was interesting. The action of the novel moves between Edwardian and contemporary times. ( )

Soppy title but intelligent read ( )

I wanted so much to really really like this book as there is not much written about the makings of modern Egypt, it was short listed for the Booker Prize in 1999, and it is recommended for book discussion groups in all sorts of lists. At times I thought I was rereading some sort of "The Sheik" romance and at others it seemed like an apologetic for radical Islamic tendencies in modern Egypt. After I read this book I read Karen Armstrong's "Battle for God" and found that I understood much better what was happening in Egypt during the time period of this book, but even a clearer understanding of modern Egyptian history and modern Islamic fundamentalism didn't help me like it any better. I did like the plot device of contrasting two romances from different points in time with all their similarities and differences. While it did have enough spark that I finished reading it, on the whole it was rather boring. The worst part was the ending. Was there some sort of supernatural phenomena going on, a dream, or what? Why muddle a muddled historical romance with this ending? ( )

I must admit I picked this up because of the cover and in my head it was a different book. A happy error!

A British Lady falls in love with an Egyptian Pasha in 1900s Egypt. Her great-granddaughter goes through the papers in her trunk and enlists a distant cousin's help to re-discover her story. The story is narrated by this cousin in 1997, reminding herself of the tales her mother had told her.

Knowing very little about modern Egypt, the book is set at key points in Egypt's history - turn of the century, with Egypt struggling for independence from Turkey and British influence and 1997, a turbulent year with terrorist attacks. ( )

This lyrical book paints a vivid and moving picture of colonial and modern-day Egypt, and allows the reader to catch a glimpse of the inherently different ways its history is viewed by East and West. Beautiful descriptions and tender scenes invite the reader to share the pain and the joy of cross-cultural relationships. The modern-day love story echoes the one from the past, showing how little some things have changed in the last hundred years in Egypt. I highly recommend this beautifully written book. ( )

Enjoyed this for the love story of Anna and for its evocation of Egypt, but found it over-long and the political side of the story hard to follow (mostly because of all thos Arabic names!) I also wasn't sure that the contemporary sub-plot with the two women added a great deal. Neither of them seemed to resove their difficulties, and I didn't feel there was a satisfactory ending for them. I feel the book would have been at least as successsful (and easier to read) if it had concentrated on the historical narrative. Still, I think it will stick in my mind (hence the rating!) ( )

http://bookcrossing.com/journal/5632887 ( )

Excellent story with many insights into intercultural relationships. ( )

I finally managed to finish this book on the third attempt. It was hard going, no doubt about it, not least because it takes upwards of 50 pages before the reader begins to recognise easily who is speaking or narrating.

The weakness of the whole thing is, to my mind, the role and character of Isabel, the American divorcee who sets the whole thing off with her trunk packed with memories and relics of her great-grandmother. I had the distinct impression that Soueif had written an American into the novel in order to give it "Yank-appeal" while in reality Isabel is the shallowest, most superficial, character in the novel and contrasts painfully with the depiction of Anna, her British great grandmother.

Anna had gone to Egypt to see its wonders in the wake of losing her first husband, falls for and marries a lawyer involved in the anti-British Occupation movement and herself becomes involved in and committed to Egyptian politics until her second husband's death. Isabel, by contrast, is essentially driven by a determination to drop her knickers for her famous Egyptian cousin and an obsession with wheedling her way into his and later his sister's lives. The contrast set my teeth on edge and if Soueif originally set out to create "Yank-appeal" she succeeds only in creating a very unpleasant, clingy and dependent American character who gets pregnant in order to trap her man.

As I said, this was an overblown and rather tedious read which would have been much stronger as a novel if Soueif had opted to create something, anything, other than Isabel.

Maybe I'm being unfair - this is not the sort of book I would normally read and I know that others have reviewed it much more favourably. ( )