Al-Qata'i

As in the coffeehouses of old Cairo, where the medieval epics were recited until the last century, the pleasure here is to be found in the storytelling itself … A professor of linguistics as well as an award- winning novelist, [Bassiouney] is alive to the tricks of language and the words her characters dress themselves in.

Reem Bassiouney is a contemporary and gifted Egyptian author that has his enthralled readers considering such universal themes as diversity and equality as viewed through historical and intercultural lenses that make his historical work of fiction one that will enrich his reader’s understanding of these same issues as are presented in the contemporary world of today. Aptly translated from Arabic into English for an American readership by Roger Allen, Al-Qata’i: Ibn Tulun’s City Without Walls is especially and unreservedly recommended for community and academic library Literary Fiction collections.

Reem Bassiouney is an Egyptian author living in Cairo. She won the Naguib Mahfouz Award for best Egyptian novel for Sons of the People: The Mamluk Trilogy. She also won the 2009 Sawiris Foundation Literary Prize for Young Writers and the 2009 King Fahd Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies Translation of Arabic Literature Award.

Roger Allen is an Arabic literature scholar and translator. He is credited with bringing Naguib Mahfouz to international recognition.