Bride of Amman

The Bride of Amman, a huge and controversial bestseller when first published in Arabic, takes a sharp-eyed look at the intersecting lives of four women and one gay man in Jordan's historic capital, Amman-a city deeply imbued with its nation's traditions and taboos. When Rana finds herself not only falling for a man of the wrong faith, but also getting into trouble with him, where can they go to escape? Can Hayat's secret liaisons really suppress the memories of her abusive father? When Ali is pressured by society's homophobia into a fake heterosexual marriage, how long can he maintain the illusion? And when spinsterhood and divorce spell social catastrophe, is living a lie truly the best option for Leila? What must she do to avoid reaching her 'expiry date' at the age thirty like her sister Salma, Jordan's secret blogger and a self-confessed spinster with a plot up her sleeve to defy her city's prejudices? These five young lives come together and come apart in ways that are distinctly modern yet as unique and timeless as Amman itself.

Praise for The Bride of Amman:

"Think Sex and the Citadel meets Ramadan soap: The Bride of Amman is a dramatic portrait of young men and women looking for love in a time of taboo. An insightful and impassioned account of the high cost of social conformity-in and out of the bedroom." - Shereen El Feki, author of Sex and the Citadel: Intimate Life in a Changing Arab World

"Fadi Zaghmout engages the full range of human emotion as he confronts head-on the destructive, corrosive effects of prejudice, tradition, and male privilege on sexuality, sexual expression, and gender identity. Charged, dynamic, and engaging, The Bride of Amman is sure to disturb and please-and to remain with readers long after they've finished Zaghmout's compelling narrative of four lives desperate for liberation." - Matthew Weinart, Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies, Political Science & International Relations Department, University of Delaware

"In this book, Fadi Zaghmout beautifully criticizes the values of the Arab society, smoothly switches between ridiculing our most sacred traditions and exposing the devastating effects that they can have on our lives. We laugh and we cry, but at the end we can't but feel comforted that he managed to express what we all think and feel, ourselves." - George Azzi, gender and sexual rights activist, co-founder of AFE and Helem