Ahlan wa sahlan!

Thank you for joining in with me in the Year of the Middle Eastern Reading Challenge (YMERC)!

As promised, I will begin each month with:

• A book or two by a Middle Eastern author
• A graphic novel by a Middle Eastern author and/or Middle Eastern illustrator
• A new Arabic song to listen to throughout the month

At the end of each month, I’ll post:

• My reviews on the books and graphic novels of the month
• A Middle Eastern movie or TV show that I enjoyed that month

To recap this month:

• The book of the month was The Morning they Came for Us: Dispatches from Syria. This novel is a war reportage account of the Syrian war. Read my review here.
  
• The graphic novel of the month was The Arab of the Future 2: A Childhood in the Middle East, 1984-1985: A Graphic Memoir #2 by Riad Sattouf. This follows Riad where Arab of the Future 1 left. Riad, now settled in his father’s hometown of Homs, gets to go to school, where he dedicates himself to becoming a true Syrian in the country of the dictator Hafez Al-Assad. Read my review here!
  
• This month’s Arabic song was Amr Diab’s Lealy Nahary. Amr Diab is an Egyptian singer, composer and actor.^[2] He has established himself as an acclaimed recording artist and author in most Mediterranean countries.^[3]

The Arabic show of this month is: al-Hayba (الهيبة)

I wasn’t able to watch it this month, but the reviews have been good. It’s a Syrian-Lebanese drama that came out Ramadan 2017, and it now on Netflix. It’s about a fictional Lebanese village on the Lebanese-Syrian border, and follows a weapons-smuggling family.

Don’t forget to spread the word on WordPress, Instagram or Twitter with the hashtag #YMERC2020.

*The beautiful blog graphic is done by liv_does.