3gs: An Imaginary Memoir

By Tamer Nafar

From "the Chuck D of Palestinian hip-hop" (Los Angeles Times), a memoir of three generations of one Palestinian family up against loss, oppression, and a shape-shifting past, present, and future, in a work of stunning originality and kinetic energy

3Gs tells the stories of a father, his son, and his son's future daughter--Fawzi, Tamer, and Shaden Nafar--three generations of fracture and dissonance, stubborn insistence, love, hope, and the will to create. It's also the story of a town--Lyd to the Palestinians who fled there in 1948, Lod to Jewish Israelis--built of people from elsewhere, swamped by crime and poverty, and, in the not-too-distant future, off-limits to those who call it Lyd.

Fawzi, Tamer's father, keeps his head down as the '48 expulsion lives in his bones. He gets by, passing as a postman though he can't read, installing boilers, and playing in a wedding band, until an accident puts him in a wheelchair. Tamer keeps his head up and his voice loud, spitting punchlines and cries of fury, not leaving Lyd even as the violence comes for his own. He will come to a point of understanding and gentle respect for the father who, he always thought, hadn't fought back. Shaden is the future--no longer living in Lyd, she risks returning to save its artifacts and memories in Palestine in the cloud, a place beyond conquest and capture.

Part oral history, part fable, part self-analysis, 3Gs defies the expectations of memoir and the literature of Palestine. With the emotional vastness of a multi-generational novel and the rhythmic force of rap, 3Gs is a wildly innovative work of power and pathos that introduces a master storyteller.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1250394228
• ISBN13: 9781250394224
• Release Date: December 2026
• Publisher: Metropolitan Books
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.1" x 9.3"