A House at the Edge of Tears
1998
First Published
3.48
Average Rating
140
Number of Pages
In the city of Beirut, five shabby dwellings circle a courtyard with a pomegranate tree weeping blood red fruit. The residents hear screams in the night as a boy is tossed out into the street by his father―a punishment for masturbating in his sleep. A crime not worthy of the the neighbors gossip and decide that he must have tried to rape his sisters. "Small-boned with long, silky lashes, no one but the devil could camouflage evil so seductively." The poems he writes are perhaps an even greater crime to his father, but ultimately a gift to his eldest sister, who narrates their story with a combination of brutal truth and stunning prose. As her brother becomes more and more lost to his family and to himself, we also learn of a Contessa who teaches tango, a family who spends every Sunday in search of buried treasure, and the miracle of a weeping Madonna statue that cries when human tears run dry. In the harrowing and mesmerizing novel A House at the Edge of Tears, celebrated novelist and poet, Khoury-Ghata, presents the disintegration of a family and a country―both ruled by a fury fueled by fear.
Avg Rating
3.48
Number of Ratings
92
5 STARS
20%
4 STARS
32%
3 STARS
30%
2 STARS
14%
1 STARS
4%
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Author
Venus Khoury-Ghata
Author · 7 books
Vénus Khoury-Ghata is a Lebanese poet and novelist, resident in France since 1973. Her work has been translated into Arabic, Dutch, German, Italian and Russian, and she was named a Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur in 2000.
