An astonishingly moving novel about the connection to be found in family, art and shared resistance
'A moving and important novel' Namwali Serpell
After years away from her family's homeland, and reeling from a disastrous love affair, actress Sonia Nasir returns to Haifa to visit her older sister Haneen. While Haneen made a life here commuting to Tel Aviv to teach at the university, Sonia remained in London to focus on her acting career and now dissolute marriage. On her return, she finds her relationship to Palestine is fragile, both bone-deep and new.
When Sonia meets the charismatic and candid Mariam, a local director, she joins a production of Hamlet in the West Bank. Soon, Sonia is rehearsing Gertrude's lines in classical Arabic with a dedicated group of men who, in spite of competing egos and priorities, all want to bring Shakespeare to that side of the wall. As opening night draws closer and the warring intensifies, it becomes clear just how many obstacles stand before the troupe. Amidst it all, the life Sonia once knew starts to give way to the daunting, exhilarating possibility of finding a new self in her ancestral home.
Timely, thoughtful, and passionate, Isabella Hammad's highly anticipated second novel is an exquisite story of the connection to be found in family and shared resistance.
'Beautifully written, poignant yet forceful, thoughtful and thought provoking' Azar Nafisi
Enter Ghost is worth reading on the strength of Hammad’s eye for similes alone, but the plot, too, proves as insightful and surprising as her first extraordinary novel The Parisian.
Set in modern day Palestine, Enter Ghost follows our protagonist Sonia, an actress living in London reeling from a disastrous love affair. She fleas to her ancestral home to visit her sister, and immediately and unwilling become wrapped up in a production of Hamlet in the West Bank, where she soon finds herself reciting Gertrude’s lines in classical Arabic. Conflict is stirred up around – and because of – the controversy of the play. As opening draws closer, warring and disaster escalate while the actors contend equally with their egos as they do their context of political conflict.
An exquisite novel about art, connection, and resistance, Hammad’s writes Sonia’s search for meaning with a subtle but precise undercurrent; much like Sonia, to read this book is to find yourself wholly invested in something you didn’t know you were getting into.