50 pages 1 hour read

A Woman Is No Man

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2019

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Summary and Study Guide

Overview

Etaf Rum’s debut novel, A Woman Is No Man, was originally published in 2019. According to Rum, the novel, a work of historical fiction, relies heavily on autobiographical details. In fact, Rum’s life so closely parallels her characters’ lives that the narrative effectively blurs the line between fiction and memoir.

Switching between past and present, the novel tells the intergenerational story of Isra, a Palestinian immigrant living in Brooklyn, and her daughter Deya, growing up in the same house 18 years later. According to Arabic tradition, Isra is married off by her parents to Adam, a Palestinian American living in New York. She now belongs to his family, and she is shipped off to America to start her new life with Adam and his parents, Khaled and Fareeda. Isra, who has grown up with a love of reading—for which her father beat her—is naïve about life. She believes in marrying for love, but she soon discovers that her culture has a far more utilitarian view of marriage. Her destiny is household chores, bearing children (ideally boys), and enduring the occasional beating.

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