Salma El-Wardany’s debut novel is coming out in 2022. The novel is titled, The Way We Were. It was acquired by Trapeze Books in the UK in a six-figure deal. The novel will also be published by US publisher, Grand Central.
Here is a synopsis :
“[the novel] chart[s] the dreams and disappointments of a group of British Muslim women: Jenna, Kees and Malak. They have been friends for years: the three of them together against the world is how it’s always been. Yet one night changes everything between them and they are left adrift, marooned from each other as their lives take different paths. Without the support of each other, nothing seems to go quite right in their lives. Malak and Kees, having said things to each other they’ll always regret, don’t know how to come back together and Jenna has to live with the fallout.”
In a statement made to The Bookseller, El-Wardany spoke about stereotypes attached to Muslim women. “I have grown so sick of reading stories that reduce Muslim women to caricatures and stereotypes when the truth is, Muslim women are some of the most glorious women I know,” El-Wardany said. “I wanted to give us a voice after years of being ignored, misrepresented and vilified. I wanted there to be more for us. I wanted our true stories to come out into the light.”
Sam Eades, the Publishing Director at Trapeze Books describes El-Wardany’s novel as an “electric study of female friendship. While Mahanian at Grand Central calls it a story of “female friendship with an emotional core.”
The Bookseller describes the novel as exploring “themes and ideas such as faith, identity, sexual trauma, loneliness and domestic abuse as well as the nature of female desire and sexuality.”
El-Wardany is a writer, poet, speaker and BBC presenter.
The Way We Were will be published in June 2022.
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