Confessions

"My father used to kidnap people and kill them." Who can resist that opening line? In a long and sometimes rambling narrative, Maroun describes growing up in Beirut during the Lebanese Civil War. His father and older brother disappear for days with no explanation, and no one dares ask where they go. Maroun has an ailing mother, and he lives in the shadow of his dead older brother, who shares his name. He doesn't learn all the family secrets until his older brother tells all while their father is on his deathbed, and the guilt and turmoil almost destroy Maroun. Teens will understand the boy's desire to use education to escape from his existing life—he learns English because he knows he wants to move away from Lebanon. Maroun copes with depression in college as he comes to terms with his personal history and the emotional abuse he endured as a child. Give to teens who enjoy reading coming-of-age novels that take place in other countries, such as Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner.