Voices of the Lost: Winner of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction 2019

‘Barakat isn’t writing about ‘the immigrant’. She’s writing about the human.’ Rumaan Alam, author of Leave the World Behind

Shortlisted for the Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Translation * Longlisted for the DUBLIN Literary Award, 2022

Winner of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction, a devastating story of displacement, war, and the unlikely glimmer of hope in the dark

In an unnamed country torn apart by war, six strangers are compelled to share their darkest secrets. Taking pen to paper, each attempts to put in writing what they can’t bring themselves to say to the person they love – mother, father, brother, lost love. Their words form a chain of dark confessions, none of which reaches the intended recipient. But their consequences will ripple through other lives, affecting strangers in ways the writers could never have anticipated…

Luminous and haunting, Voices of the Lost tells the moving story of characters living on the periphery, battling displacement, poverty, and the demons within themselves. From one of today’s most talented Arabic writers, this is the story of lives intimately woven together in a society that is tearing itself apart. 

‘Hoda Barakat is one of Lebanon’s greatest gifts to literature’ Amy Bloom, author of White Houses