The Art of Losing

By Alice Zeniter

Book Overview

Winner of the Dublin Literary Award
A Best Historical Novel of the Year at The New York Times Book Review

" An] extraordinary achievement." --Liesl Schillinger, The Wall Street Journal

Across three generations, three wars, two continents, and the mythic waters of the Mediterranean, one family's history leads to an inevitable question: What price do our descendants pay for the choices that we make?

Na ma knows Algeria only by the artifacts she encounters in her grandparents' tiny apartment in Normandy: the language her grandmother speaks but Na ma can't understand, the food her grandmother cooks, and the precious things her grandmother carried when they fled. Na ma's father claims to remember nothing; he has made himself French. Her grandfather died before he could tell her his side of the story. But now Na ma will travel to Algeria to see for herself what was left behind--including their secrets.

The Algerian War for Independence sent Na ma's grandfather on a journey of his own, from wealthy olive grove owner and respected veteran of the First World War, to refugee spurned as a harki by his fellow Algerians in the transit camps of southern France, to immigrant barely scratching out a living in the north. The long battle against colonial rule broke apart communities, opened deep rifts within families, and saw the whims of those in even temporary power instantly overturn the lives of ordinary people. Where does Na ma's family fit into this history? How do they fit into France's future?

Alice Zeniter's The Art of Losing is a powerful, moving family novel that spans three generations across seventy years and two shores of the Mediterranean Sea. It is a resonant people's history of Algeria and its diaspora. It is a story of how we carry on in the face of loss: loss of country, identity, language, connection. Most of all, it is an immersive, riveting excavation of the inescapable legacies of colonialism, immigration, family, and war.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0374182302
• ISBN13: 9780374182304
• Release Date: March 2021
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
• Length: 448 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.7" x 6.2" x 9.2"