Fencing with the King

Starred review from November 1, 2021

In this latest from the multi-award-winning Abu-Jaber (Birds of Paradise), young American poet Amani is struggling with both her career and her marriage when her father, Gabe, is invited by his royal-adviser brother Hafez to return to his homeland, Jordan, and fence with the king during the celebrations surrounding the king's 60th birthday in 1995. (Gabe had fenced with the king in his youth, as did Abu-Jaber's father.) Gabe has no interest in returning to a place he left decades ago, but when Amani discovers a poem-like missive tucked into one of his old books, she is determined to have them both travel to Jordan so that she can investigate the mystery of the letter and her family background. Unfortunately, Amani's uncle Hafez is deviously ambitious--not just politically but within the family; he covets a precious heirloom in Gabe's possession and, readers eventually learn, committed a shocking act in his youth to secure his familial position. As Amani slowly uncovers these and other secrets, she must ask herself where she belongs, what it means to come from anywhere, and how to balance the importance of the past with the promise of the future. VERDICT A resonant and pointedly perceptive story about family, Middle East history, and creating new narratives, whether as individuals or nations.--Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal

Copyright 2021 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2022
A failed marriage behind her, Amani Hamdan knows tenure at her college faculty job is a tenuous proposition, and her ancestral land of Jordan has always exerted a pull. When her father, Gabe, is invited to Jordan for a fencing demonstration with the king, Amani decides to join him. Once there, Amani delves into family roots and explores the hidden story of her Palestinian grandmother, Natalia. In Jordan, Amani's uncle Hafez has an agenda of his own and covets Il Saif, an ancient sword that was passed on as a family heirloom to his brother Gabe. Abu-Jaber (Birds of Paradise, 2011) spins a mesmerizing tale of displacement, not just in Gabe's move to the U.S. but in Natalia's wrenching transplantation to Jordan. Even if at times the narrative stumbles under the weight of its storytelling ambitions, this is a haunting look at the pull the past exerts on us. As Gabe finds out, "the longer you're away, the bigger and more elusive the past becomes; a beautiful monster." Descriptions of the shifting desert landscapes are icing on the cake.

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January 24, 2022
Abu-Jaber (Crescent) places a family in the crosshairs of Jordanian political intrigue in this nicely layered story. In 1995, recently divorced poet Amani Hamdan encourages her father Gabe to accept an invitation to return to his native Jordan for a fencing demonstration alongside the king. Amani, intrigued to learn more about a mysterious poem written by her deceased grandmother, accompanies him on her first trip there. They stay with Gabe’s older brother, Hafez, an influential government official who has schemed to lure Gabe and recover an ancient knife from him that belonged to their late father. Hafez views Amani as a potential protege but is unsettled by her questions about the family’s past, and while he plots to claim a lucrative swath of land near the Israeli border, which is ripe for settlement by Palestinian refugees, Amani tries to locate the places mentioned in her grandmother’s poem. She also uncovers a lost relative and catches the eye of a fencing instructor. Their romance takes up a good chunk of the final act, but it’s less gripping than the plot involving Hafez. Still, Abu-Jaber ably captures the tenuous role of Jordan in the mid-1990s Middle East peace process while unearthing a family’s buried secrets. It adds up to an engrossing family drama.

February 15, 2022
A woman from Syracuse, New York, makes her first trip to Jordan with her immigrant father to celebrate King Hussein's 60th birthday. The 1995 monthlong birthday festivities are the government's attempt to highlight Jordan's influence in the region and Hussein's peacemaking skills. Hafez Hamdan, a Yale-educated adviser to the king, has invited his younger brother, Gabe, who (like Abu-Jaber's father) had been the king's sparring partner years earlier, to participate in a fencing demonstration with the king. Gabe's daughter, Amani, a recently divorced poet and professor, joins Gabe on the trip, her curiosity concerning her family history whetted after finding a scrap of poetry written and translated into English by her long-dead grandmother. Along the way she uncovers a dark family secret concerning a long-lost relative. Amani is the usual contemporary heroine of this somewhat contrived romantic melodrama: She starts as passive and insecure; then, through a series of plot manipulations and skillfully described adventures, particularly getting lost alone overnight in the desert, she discovers inner strength as well as the love of a courtly, handsome man who's half Muslim and half Jew. Inadvertently, Amani also upends Hafez's private agenda for the Hamdan brothers' reunion, plans motivated by a combination of greed, envy, simmering resentment, and genuine affection for his favorite niece. Hafez is a disturbing villain: a feminist, an intellectual, and a loyal aide to his king but also selfish, vengeful, anti-democratic. And perhaps murderous. The novel's third, most complex protagonist is Jordan itself. Abu-Jaber focuses on the ruling-class Hamdan family--generous, striving, proud of their Bedouin and Orthodox Christian roots. Jordan's poor are meagerly represented by stereotypically devoted servants and noble traditional Bedouins. Personifying Jordan, King Hussein is idealized as a grand-hearted optimist, a warrior for peace; but his government's secret police allow no opposition, and corruption is the norm. While Abu-Jaber glories in Jordan's beauty and culture, the shadows of poverty and authoritarianism are ever present. A slightly overwrought family drama set against a fascinating backdrop of late-20th-century Middle Eastern politics.

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