Yalo propels us into a skewed universe of brutal misunderstanding, of love and alienation, of self-discovery and luminous transcendence. At the center of the vortex stands Yalo, a young man drifting between worlds like a stray dog on the streets of Beirut during the Lebanese civil war. Living with his mother who "lost her face in the mirror," he falls in with a dangerous circle whose violent escapades he treats as a game. The game becomes a horrifying reality, however, when Yalo is accused of rape and armed robbery, and is imprisoned. Tortured and interrogated at length, he is forced to confess to crimes of which he has little or no recollection. As he writes, and rewrites his testimony, he begins to grasp his family’s past, and the true Yalo begins to emerge. Ha’aretz calls Yalo "a heartbreaking book . . . hypnotic in beauty."
- ISBN10 0914671286
- ISBN13 9780914671282
- Publish Date 22 September 2015 (first published 1 January 2007)
- Publish Status Active
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Archipelago Books
- Format Paperback (US Trade)
- Pages 318
- Language English
- URL https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780914671282