Mario and Abu L-Abbas

Author: Reem Bassiouney and Roger Allen

Paperback

In 20th-century Alexandria, an Italian architect listens for the voice of a man who died 700 years ago. Mario and Abu l-Abbas is a sweeping novel of spiritual defiance, love, and impossible friendship—tracing the bond between a modern architect and a medieval Sufi mystic across centuries and cities.

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15th October 2025

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Pre order release date
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Paperback

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Summary

Description

A visionary novel of spiritual friendship across centuries.

In Mario and Abu L-Abbas, acclaimed Egyptian author Reem Bassiouney reimagines the extraordinary connection between a 20th-century Italian architect and a 13th-century Andalusian Sufi saint. As stories unfold from war-torn Alexandria to medieval Tunisia, the novel explores exile, memory, and the mysteries of divine love. Translated by Roger Allen, this sweeping tale bridges East and West, past and present—where a sacred mosque becomes the meeting point of history, architecture, and the human soul.

About the Author

Dr Reem Bassiouney is an award-winning Egyptian novelist and a professor of Linguistics at the American University in Cairo. Her acclaimed novels, including The Pistachio Seller and Sons of the People, have won major literary prizes and been translated into several languages. In 2024, she was awarded the Sheikh Zayed Book Award for Al-Halawani: The Fatimid Trilogy.

Roger Allen, translator of this edition, is one of the world’s foremost scholars and translators of Arabic literature. He is Professor Emeritus at the University of Pennsylvania and the recipient of the 2020 Sheikh Hamad Award for Lifetime Achievement in Translation. He has translated numerous works by Naguib Mahfouz and other leading Arab authors.