I received an ARC of The Hollow Half: A Memoir of Bodies and Borders through NetGalley. Thanks to the publisher for granting me a copy in exchange for an honest review.
So I have a confession to make: I have spent a large portion of my life blissfully ignorant of the conflict between Palestine and Israel. Obviously, I understood their was a conflict, but a lot of what I knew of it was from the US media, which skews very pro-Israel. If you were to believe the US media, youād probably think that Palestineans were terrorists.
As time went on, it became clear to me that the Palestinian/Israeli conflict was more complicated than I was previously aware and that I needed to take some time to educate myself on the situation. I wanted to make more of an effort to understand the Palestinian perspective of what was going on; I donāt think itās fair to ascribe the word āterroristā to all Palestineans.
All of this to say that one of the things that drew me to The Hollow Half: A Memoir of Bodies and Borders by Sarah Aziza is that Aziza is Palestinian American. I understood from the description of The Hollow Half that Azizaās book would explore how her experience with anorexia echoes Palestinian displacement.Ā
Obviously, I didnāt expect to understand everything about Palestine based solely on reading The Hollow Half, but I was hoping to get some perspective.
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Summary
The following is lifted from NetGalley, because I was struggling to come up with a decent summary on my own.
āYou were dead, Sarah, you were dead.ā
In October 2019, Sarah Aziza, daughter and granddaughter of Gazan refugees, is narrowly saved after being hospitalized for an eating disorder. The doctors revive her body, but it is no simple thing to return to the land of the living. Azizaās crisis is a rupture that brings both her ancestral and personal past into vivid presence. The hauntings begin in the hospital cafeteria, when a mysterious incident summons the familiar voice of her deceased Palestinian grandmother.
In the months following, as she responds to a series of ghostly dreams, Aziza unearths family secrets that reveal the ways her own trauma and anorexia echo generations of violent Palestinian displacement and erasureāand how her fight to recover builds on a century of defiant survival and love. As she moves towards this legacy, Aziza learns to resist the forces of colonization, denial, and patriarchy both within and outside her.
Weaving timelines, languages, geographies, and genres, The Hollow Half probes the contradictions and contingencies that create ānationā and āhistory.ā Blazing with honesty, urgency, and poetry, this stunning debut memoir is a fearless call to imagine both the self and the world anew.
Thoughts
Iām really grateful for the opportunity to experience The Hollow Half. Aziza is a journalist, and I thought she did a great job of weaving her journalistic skills into her own story. Her descriptions of her eating disorder were vivid and depicted the gravity of her illness. Weaving in stories of Palestine helped highlight the trauma her family experienced.
As I mentioned, I listened to the audiobook, and I felt like this was the way to go. While The Hollow Half is not a translated work, Aziza does use some Arabic words and explains their meaning. As someone who doesnāt speak Arabic, I enjoyed hearing how the words sounded along with their meaning.
Fragmented?
While working on this reiview, I took a look at some of the reviews on Goodreads. I came across one discussing how the reviewer thought AzizaāsĀ book felt fragmented to the point of being disorienting. While I respect this personās opinion, Iām not sure that I agree. I mean, yes, I can see how The Hollow Half can feel fragmented and/or disorienting, but I think that might be the point. I think that being displaced from your homeland and having your identity erased can be very disorienting – or at least, I imagine that it can be. Additionally, Aziza described how she often struggled to reconcile the white American and the Arab American parts of herself. I wonder if these were things she was trying to highlight in how she chose to write her story.Ā
Romantic Partners
One of the things that was kind of lost on me, probably because I listened to the audiobook, was the name of her romantic partner. Was she referring to him by the first letter of his name – C – or is his name pronounced in a way that sounds like the name of the letter (I hope that makes sense). I was wondering this because Iāve met someone whose first name is literally pronounced like the name of the letter, so I didnāt want to rule out the possibility of that being what was going on here.Ā
In any case, I felt like Azizaās descriptions of her partner were somewhat idealized. I mean, I think itās great that he stuck by Aziza through her illness. They clearly love each other. Great. Iām happy for them. But surely, he must have some faults, right?
Additionally, Aziza referred to herself as āqueerā several times throughout The Hollow Half, but didnāt really go into much more detail. I wouldāve been interested to know how her queer identity may have intersected with her Palestinian identity.
All in all, a really fascinating read. I realize that I still have a lot to learn about Palestine, and that is something I plan on working on by seeking out more works by Palestinian authors.
This post may contain affiliate links, which means Iāll receive a commission if you purchase through my links, at no extra cost to you. Please readĀ full disclosureĀ for more information.
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