One of BuzzFeed's New Books You'll Love
"Cairo Circles is a novel that proves literature needn't choose
between pleasure and substance. You will tear through the pages of this
delicious book, and you will be changed in the process. Doma Mahmoud is
a tremendous writer." --Jonathan Safran Foer
Sherif "Sheero" Abdallah is an NYU student reveling in independence,
free from the judgmental gaze of his conservative family in Egypt to
indulge in all sorts of pleasures. When the FBI comes knocking on his
door, he's convinced it's a case of mistaken identity--until they show
him a picture of his cousin Amir. Amir has perpetrated a horrific attack
and Sheero is suddenly forced to return to Cairo and confront the events
that led to their wildly different circumstances.
While Amir wore Sheero's hand-me-downs and suffered at the hands of
neglectful, abusive parents, Sheero attended Cairo's most prestigious
high school, where he and his best friend Taymour, the son of one of
Cairo's business moguls, could enjoy sports clubs, beach vacations,
high-end dining, and socializing with girls from the French and British
schools. Once inseparable cousins, Sheero and Amir grew further apart,
Amir ultimately having more in common with the children of Taymour's
housekeeper: Omar, Mustafa, and Zeina.
In Cairo Circles, the lives of this unforgettable group of six young
Egyptians intertwine dramatically over the course of over a decade,
revealing complex relationships dominated by faith, tradition, social
class, and the boundaries of personal freedom. An epic,
multi-perspective page-turner, Doma Mahmoud's debut introduces readers
to a bold and inventive new voice in fiction as Cairo's streets burst to
life on the page.
