‘Guapa’ by Saleem Haddad was published in the UK in October 2016 by Europa Editions and in the US in May 2016 by Other Press.
‘The morning begins with shame.’
So begins Haddad’s revolutionary novel Guapa, a tour de force that encompasses themes of friendship, queer sexuality, state violence, revolutionary hope and revolutionary despair. I read it as the siege of Aleppo reached its horrifying and bloody nadir. To read a novel that explores the lost hope of the Arab Spring in such an unashamedly personal and political way is quite an extraordinary experience.
