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Hala Alyan is a Palestinian-American writer and poet. Her novels include The Arsonists' City and Salt Houses, winner of the Dayton Literary Peace Prize and the Arab American Book Award, and a Chautauqua Prize finalist. Her work has been published by The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Guardian and Guernica. She lives in Brooklyn, where she works as a clinical psychologist and professor at New York University.
'An emotion-packed exploration of the impact of loss on identity.’ * Kirkus * 'A Palestinian American writer explores her winding path to motherhood amid the COVID crisis, braiding strands of memory into a shimmering tapestry.' * TIME * 'Alyan’s writing doesn’t offer easy answers; it gives voice to the ache and beauty of diasporic existence.' * VOGUE Arabia * '[A] lyrical memoir that explores the trauma of fractured identity.' * Los Angeles Times * 'Alyan’s prose captures the disjointed nature of grief and healing, exploring what it means to reconstruct one’s identity while navigating the complexities of multiple cultures, bodies, and emotional boundaries.' * The Markaz Review * 'The long-awaited memoir of the Salt Houses author is not just a story of Palestinian displacement, but also an exploration of motherhood. In her deeply personal autobiography, Alyan shares painful experiences of miscarriages and infertility and ultimately her decision to use a surrogate. As much as it is her own life story, it is also the story of the women in her life: her mother and two grandmothers and their survival through endless war, displacement and exile.' * The New Arab * 'Ultimately, Alyan positions her journey as a powerful resistance to erasure - a way to reclaim a stolen past and secure a narrative for the new life she is about to bring into the world. Superb.' * Candid Book Club * '[A] gorgeous, lyrical memoir ... I’ll Tell You When I’m Home shows the power of even a single narrative to resist the deliberate erasure of a people and their homeland, the violence of colonisation.' * The New York Times * 'Alyan’s poetic prose encapsulates miles in each sentence and paragraph; joyfully, revisiting a passage is another chance at uncovering a new gift. Her nonfiction narrative voice allows the poet in her to shine, especially as each chapter is told in a series of short glimpses weaving together past and present, the old and the new Hala. ... With I’ll Tell You When I’m Home, Alyan has created a record, a story to communicate with those departed and those new to life. In the process, her work is an antidote for others searching for a home they never asked to lose.' * Chicago Review of Books * ‘A poignant exploration of her tumultuous path to parenthood, identity, and displacement … The memoir unfolds like the tale of Scheherazade from One Thousand and One Nights, where Hala becomes the ‘waiting woman,’ reckoning with all the truths of her life before stepping into motherhood … a stunning kaleidoscope of vignettes … More than a story of motherhood and exile, I’ll Tell You When I’m Home is a testimony of everything at once … a moving tribute to the strength of those forced from their homelands and ruthlessly exploited, as well as a celebration of women’s determination to survive and thrive.' * New Arab *
