Books
Vanished - The Mysterious Disappearance of Mustafa Ouda
What does it take to discover the truth? Betrayal? Deception? Risking one’s own life? Omar Ouda did it all. Vanished is a fictional story set against the political unrest in Palestine, following a young boy trying to find his father. The deeper he delves into his father’s mysterious disappearance, the more he finds himself forced to make terrible choices, testing his loyalty to his country and his family. The book is also about friendship born out of difficult circumstances, presented here through the character of Ahmed who risks his life to help his friend in the quest to find his father.
Omar’s journey is fictional; however, it describes real life in Palestine’s Gaza Strip between 1981 and 2011. This period witnessed three major events that have shaped the current situation – the first Intifada, the Oslo Accords and the second Intifada. While politics provide an important background to the story, the novel does not aim to put forth any political arguments. Instead, it sheds light on what it is like for two young boys to lead an ordinary life in an extraordinary place often described as ‘hell on earth.’
Come What May
How does one investigate murder in the middle of a war zone? Does it matter if a person is killed by an airstrike or a knife?
When Zahra’s husband, Ammar Bseiso, is killed in 2014 he is written off as one of the two thousand or so casualties of war. However, his thirty-five-year-old wife is convinced that her husband was murdered by a fellow Palestinian and not an Israeli airstrike. She spends two years looking for a detective who would agree to take on her case as people dismiss and ridicule her.
When Nouman El Taweel agrees to investigate the crime, Zahra begins to regret it almost immediately as the policeman uncovers the truth behind the murder, along with a network of deception, lies and corruption.
Come What May is a novel about love, betrayal and class issues in a conservative society which is very isolated from the rest of the world.
The Shroud Maker
Hajja Souad, an 80-year-old Palestinian woman living in the besieged Gaza Strip, knows about business. She has survived decades of wars and oppression by making shrouds for the dead.
A compelling black comedy that delves deep into the intimate life of ordinary Palestinians to weave a highly distinctive path through Palestine’s turbulent past and present, The Shroud Maker is a one-woman comedy that weaves comic fantasy and satire with true stories told first-hand to the writer, and offers a vivid portrait of Palestinian life in Gaza underscored with gallows humour.
Britain and the Muslim World: Historical Perspectives
(ed. by Gerald McLean). Ahmed Masoud published a chapter entitled Race & Identity in Early Palestinian Literature of Resistance in this book. Based on papers presented at an international three-day conference, sponsored by the British Academy and held at the Institute for Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter in April 2009, this collection of essays provides a comprehensive and accessible synthesis of the most advanced specialist and scholarly knowledge to date concerning historical perspectives on relations between Britain and the Muslim World.
Ranging from the early-modern period to the present day, the essays collected here represent work by leading writers and scholars from relevant fields history, international relations, economics, religion, law, art history and design, film studies, and sociology, as well as literary and cultural studies. These essays explore the historical impacts of cross-cultural encounters between Islam and Britain by variously addressing the question of how relations between Britain and the Muslim world in the past have brought us to our current situation and, in some cases, by proposing directions for necessary further consideration and research.
Palestine + 100
Ahmed wrote a short story entitled Application 39 for this unique anthology which will be published in July 2019.
Palestine + 100 poses a question to twelve Palestinian writers: what might your country look like in the year 2048 – a century after the tragedies and trauma of what has come to be called the Nakba? How might this event – which, in 1948, saw the expulsion of over 700,000 Palestinian Arabs from their homes – reach across a century of occupation, oppression, and political isolation, to shape the country and its people? Will a lasting peace finally have been reached, or will future technology only amplify the suffering and mistreatment of Palestinians?