Snow in Amman by Ahmed Abu Hleiwa

Filled with deeply nuanced storytelling and vividly drawn, often heartbreaking human characters, Snow in Amman: An Anthology of Short Stories from Jordan is a rich selection of contemporary Jordanian fiction which stands in stark contrast to many of the prevailing stereotypes of Arabic culture. Outside the archaeological lens, very little is known about life in Jordan, particularly in the English-speaking world. Such lack makes it more susceptible to falling into the soup of widespread generalizations about the Middle East. The 11 stories in Snow in Amman, published in their original Arabic in Jordan and appearing in this book for the first time in English, depict a wide array of social and feminist issues through a lens at once familiar and surprising, commonplace and yet intensely different.