Oh, Salaam!

ACCLAIMED NOVEL WITH COMPELLING TREATMENT OF GENDER ROLES, AND THE EFFECTS OF CIVIL WAR Najwa Barakat’s Oh, Salaam! (Yaa Salaam!, Arabic, 1999) tells the story of three friends whose lives are transformed by their participation in the inhuman civil war of some unnamed Arab country—and by their relationship with the novel's anti-heroine, Salaam. Two of the friends live to see the arrival of peace, but they struggle to make a life for themselves in a society that has no need for former militiamen.