Review: Love is an Ex-Country by Randa Jarrar
I’m always looking for new non-fiction and memoirs to explore and the cover of this one really jumped out to me.
Randa Jarrar was raised in Egypt, and after finding herself captivated by the story of a celebrated Egyptian belly dancer’s journey across the United States in the 1940s, she sets off from her home in California to her parents’ in Connecticut. On the way, she schools a rest-stop racist, destroys Confederate flags in the desert, and visits the Chicago neighborhood where her immigrant parents first lived.
It is a great memoir other than the writing style (see below), and I really enjoyed the exploration of intersectionality, gender, identity, trauma and her journey. It covers a lot in a short space, and Jarrar speaks really openly about her life and how that led to empowerment.
I don’t like rating memoirs, but I will warn that the rhythm of the writing isn’t wholly there, and despite this being a fairly short book I personally struggled to get into the flow of the writing and had to read other books between chapters. It jumps to different points quickly and did confuse me at points, and because it didn’t captivate me it came across as a bit tedious. I have heard that the audiobook is much better so try that instead!!

Found this book to be a rambling series of writing that didn't really seem to have a point... There was also a level of crassness and a vulgarity that seemed to be there mainly for shock factor that completely turned me off enjoying this read

Great writing and insightful.Great writing and insightful.Great writing and insightful.Great writing and insightful.Great writing and insightful.

Bold, honest, challenging, beautiful. Less of a road trip than I expected but that’s ok, it was wonderful in a traumatic sort of way.

I don't think anyone who picks up this book can ever be fully prepared for the content they are about to read. This book is a memoir of a gay Muslim-Arab who experiences both childhood and adult abuse.

As the book went on I felt myself becoming more and more outraged at the shocking revelations that came with turning the page. There were times when I felt as though I needed to put the book down for a few minutes.

This book contains scenes of racism, sexism, fat-shaming, slut-shaming, abuse and more.

Despite this book being quite a short read, I'd strongly advise people to take their time with it as it is an extremely heavy book.

Thank you to NetGalley and Sandstone Press for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

It's an increadible read. Beautifully written. It's an amazing road trip story talking about the way Arab people are treated in America.

This is a powerfully honest memoir of an Arab woman living in America and reflecting on the everyday challenges that she faces- racism, misogyny, slut shaming, fat shaming and domestic abuse. This is a short book but it definitely is full of emotion!
I felt the writing felt a bit scattered in places making it difficult to read at times but overall a good book memoir.

This is another prime example of expecting a book of a certain kind and getting something completely different. I expected a travelogue memoir but got instead an experimental stream of consciousness type memoir of fragments and what to me felt incoherent statements. Not for me.

This is a brutally honest memoir from a queer, Muslim who is also a big, beautiful brown woman and her autobiography explores the intersectionality and overlapping nature of race, sexuality, religion, gender, identity, trauma, abuse and female personification. She explores these throughout the cross-country road trip and sweeping adventure she embarked on in 2016 from California through to her parents home state of Connecticut as well as soaking up the cultural treats each place along her route had to offer. Very raw and readable.

Randa Jarrar covers a lot of ground in this book, and she does so in an upfront, humorous, and unashamed way. While I admire her attitude, this really didn’t work for me overall. I went into Love Is an Ex-Country expecting a reflective travel story tackling internal struggles, and maybe that was my misunderstanding, but is definitely not how I would describe this book. The writing is blunt and moves through events at a plodding pace, and the messages she conveys are often delivered as a triumphant single sentence to cap things off. Sexual content is rarely an issue for me in books, but describing Tinker Bell and Thumbelina as “queer, visual representations of clitorises” is a bit much for me. It’s just not for me

Jarrar is very blunt and unapologetic about sharing her experiences which shone through the work, in a ‘not letting her past define her’ kind of way. However, the time jumps back and forth through various topics in various places across the world was jarring to the point of plain confusing. It was as though we were missing the links and explanations that are inside her head but not on the page because we didn’t live through it with her, making it difficult to understand what is happening. Due to this, it didn’t really flow like a travelogue at all, more a collection of memories pieced together for people to peruse (I’ve heard the work is a compilation of essay’s she’s written over the years, which if that’s the case explains the discordant nature of the book). That being said, it felt very raw and unedited that really spoke to the content and, although could be difficult to follow at times, if anything reflected her life in a much more realistic manner.

I can’t remember if there were any content warnings at the start, but there definitely needs to be! Jarrar covers so many topics, and in such a graphic, detailed way, that many people may struggle with this book, so just something to bear in mind. Youth and childhood, domestic abuse, sexuality and bodies, religion, race, immigration, travel and place - just some of the areas of her life she addresses in a very personal and authentic way. It’s a hard read, I’ll put it simply. Jarrar does not tread lightly or skirt around topics. She confronts them with full force and is candid in her histories, which I applaud. I can’t imagine being able to write a book quite like Jarrar does.

I was given access to an eARC of this book through NetGallety in exchange for an honest review.

Love is an Ex-Country is a poignant memoir about Randa Jarrar's life and experiences as a fat, queer, Muslim Arab-American woman. She discusses childhood, marriage, sex, motherhood, her Muslim identity, kink, her white-passing privilege, and much more on a personal level; she also weaves in facts about, for instance, the occupation of Palestine and how that affects her as a Palestinian. This memoir is not always easy or comfortable to read, with explicit depictions of e.g. domestic abuse and sexual assault, but if you are able to read about these topics it is worth it.

There is a strong theme of travel throughout the book - with journeys around the USA with her dog as well as to multiple other countries - but I would not call it a travelogue, which seems to have caused some confusion for other viewers. I personally prefer memoirs-with-travel rather than travel-with-memories, so this did not bother me.

If you would like a taste of the style of this memoir, many of the chapters have previously been published as essays in various magazines. Randa has also written fiction, which I will definitely be looking into and reading in the future.

Content warnings: child abuse (physical, emotional, and possibly sexual); domestic abuse (physical, emotional, sexual); forced pregnancy; body shaming/fatphobia; disordered eating & dieting; racism (including Islamophobia and colourism); alcohol use; drug use; explicit sexual content; sexual violence; sexual assault.

Jarrar’s memoir is a brutally honest, no holding back, beautifully bold insight into her life as a muslim, fat, queer Arab femme living in America. It’s a book about identity and relationships; cultural, sexual, familial.

It’s part road-trip, following Jarrar as she travels across the US (ish, it’s described as this in the synopsis but that’s bit misleading and is definitely a more minor element of the book) and part reminiscence of her defining, and often traumatic, life experiences from the abusive relationships she’s endured, her discovery and love of kink and BSDM, and her experience being a white-passing Palestinian in the US. It’s beautifully written and the rhythmic wording and witty observations are honestly top level.

However I struggled with the the structure of this book. I think it’s meant to be poetic, but it just comes across as a bit messy. It jumps and time hops literally by the paragraph to the point where I honestly couldn’t keep up. It almost felt like it should have been 3 separate books, or at least 3 very separate sections within the book: the road trip, her family and relationship to her heritage, and her sexual encounters and enlightenment. Because as it stands, it’s a little exhausting.

I struggle to review memoirs because it always feels like I’m reviewing the person’s life, and who is anyone to do that? This book wasn’t entirely for me, not due to it’s content but simply because my brain couldn’t comprehend the the structure. That said, I’d recommend it. It’s eye-opening and unique and raw and unapologetic. Just prepare yourself to be thrown around alot.

After reading her 2014 Salon essay about cultural appropriation of belly dancing I knew I want to read more about and by Randa Jarrar. She´s fierce, bold, open, and a good and intelligent writer. Her takes are often political because identity is politically assigned and chosen, but I am political and my identity too involves political aspects and social priviledges that I am able to deconstruct in full awareness. I am not condescending when I say I want to understand a different identity, because I don´t know exactly the everyday existential content of a different identity. I can only listen and, as in the case of belly dancing, assume that me, as a white person born and living in Europe (by choice) I can only be a cartoonish clown if trying to play in other people´s shoes.

Love is an ex-Country is Randa Jarrar´s latest book, a memoir about the experience of parental abuse, political pressure, longing for her father´s country, coming to terms with her own sexuality and body. Every piece of this life puzzle is polished and added to her story which in all her contradictions and revolt shape her journey. Her everyday experience with America pushes forward her thoughts about what does it mean to be Arab in America. Her relationship with her body, the shape and the colour and the sexual stories wrote on it, or deleted from it, it´s building up barriers and the sense of her own being, liberated from her abusive narcissist father. She is ´confident and gorgeous´ in her ´rejection of mainstream beauty standards´, mostly the result of white people dreams about beauty.

And there is the inevitably political part of her identity, which involves the longing for the Palestine of his father´s family, which make her a Palestinian writer. I am a very political person and I assume my own political choices and identity, including by saying loudly that for me Leila Khaled is the very opposite of a hero. And that´s all I will write about this part because it is not my story to tell.

I love the way in which the memoir is organised, and the pace and sharpness of the story. From the Egypt to her mother to the closed gates to Ben Gurion and Marfa, Texas, Randa Jarrar lives with devouring passion for life, sex and ex-countries.

Rating: 3.5 stars

tw: child abuse, sexual assault, domestic violence, toxic relationships, fatphobia.

“queer. muslim. arab american. a proudly fat woman. randa jarrar is all of these things. in this provocative memoir of a cross-country road trip, she explores how to claim joy in an unraveling and hostile america.”

this novel is marketed as a “provocative memoir of a cross country road trip” but that wasn’t the vibe i got from it. whilst reading, the book felt very disjointed and directionless which confused me slightly when consuming the book.
it wasn’t until afterwards that i saw jarrar had stated that “it is meandering, disorientating and non-linear on purpose, as it is a reflection of my own body and experiences as a refugee and a survivor of assaults.” that being said i don’t think this is something that i can criticise, the writing style just wasn’t to my personal taste.

this is quite a raw memoir. jarrar is unashamedly and unapologetically herself and puts herself out there touching on various different topics she has experienced throughout her lifetime such as child abuse, sexual assault & domestic violence, fatphobia and sexuality. my heart ached at the things that she went through but as said before, the prose were so jumpy that i felt like i couldn’t really connect with the story because the subject matter would switch every half a page.

moreover, i don’t really think i am this books intended target audience. i did, however, come away from this book with a new found love for jarrar and her openness.
altogether this was an interesting and quick read and would recommend reading it if it is something that appeals for you.

This was a beautiful read and whilst i hoped for something a bit more fully fleshed, I appreciated the style of writing and vulnerability between its pages.

Based on the blurb, I went into this book expecting an ‘American road trip’ book. It turned out to be not quite what I expected!
This is less a travelogue than a meandering trip through Jarrar’s life, prompted occasionally by the author’s drive across America. That is not to say we do not go on a journey! Indeed, we follow the author through a childhood overshadowed by her overbearing, violent, father, and the ‘escape’ to a boyfriend who turns out to be worse.
We glimpse the hardship of being half-Palestinian in America (Jarrar can pass for white, which leads to an encounter in a rest stop bathroom where a racist white woman waits for an obviously non-white family to leave before turning to Jarrar, expecting Jarrar to join her in her disgust. Needless to say, she does not get what she wants).
The book does shy away from controversy, and is frank in its depictions of abuse and trauma, as well as the author’s discovery of her own sexual appetites – including her discovery of kinky sex.
‘Love Is an Ex-Country’ may not be a conventional road trip, but it takes on Jarrar’s journey from trauma to something like acceptance and then Jarrar’s love of self – a fat, queer, Arab American who is unabashed about her desires, and gloriously unapologetic about any part of herself.

This was an anecdote-filled road trip across America full of observations and anecdotes about the way Arabs are perceived in America as well as A variety of other ethnic minority groups.

Jamar, our narrator has astute observations about the way Americans perceive a multitude of things exactly the way the are manipulated to.

Through the course of this trip we explore the author"s life and how she became the person that she is today fir better or worse and her battles with prejudice both racial and sexuality-based.

A particular highlight is how she intersperses real life news stories and landmarks with her reflections.

Thanks netgalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Love is an Ex-Country is a stunningly bold, no holds barred and brutally honest memoir from a queer, Muslim who is also a big, beautiful brown woman and her autobiography explores the intersectionality and overlapping nature of race, sexuality, religion, gender, identity, trauma, abuse and female personification. She explores these throughout the cross-country road trip and sweeping adventure she embarked on in 2016 from California through to her parents home state of Connecticut as well as soaking up the cultural treats each place along her route had to offer. It's an unforgettably raw and relatable read comprised of multiple authoritative essays on a rich array of topical issues: including police brutality, systemic racism, the discrimination still present in America and many other finely tuned, straight-talking and provocative pieces. I loved how original it was and Jarrar’s voice forces us to take a long hard look and evaluate the issues that impact us every day. She talks openly and empoweringly about self-love and accepting ourselves as we are which is a strong, inspiring message and is told in a refreshingly original, no f*cks given fashion.

A set of beautifully portrayed vignettes with such wonderfully uplifting and often humourous messages that are balanced out by the trauma and hardship suffered, Jarrar examines queerness, kink, race, domestic violence, and love through the lens of the body, as well as how to claim joy in an unravelling and hostile world. Her most important pieces remind you to love your authentic self and not to let anyone change you, and I found her words powerful and incisive with a profound sense of realness that is missing from many similar books. Highly recommended to those who have always struggled to fit in, to be heard and to conform to societies standards or to love themselves. Let this book show you that regardless of the way you look, your sexuality, your past traumas and how you identify, you are as entitled as anyone else to love and accept yourself and to treat yourself with the kindness you deserve. It's funny and fierce and above all reminds you that the joy and the pain we have each been through makes us the beautiful person we are today. Unapologetically and without mincing her words, Jarrar takes you on the journey of her lifetime where she reflects on both her identity and her past. Highly recommended.

You know when you read a book and it just doesn't quite click with you, and you're not sure if you're the problem because you expected something different or if the book is the problem because it promised you something else? That. I didn't dislike this one by any means, but it took such a long time to get anywhere, and when it finally arrived, I wasn't really sure where I was; the narratives flit back and forth with such pace that I almost felt carsick. I've read and loved some of Jarrar's essays in other anthologies and publications, and her conversational writing is just as lively as ever here, but it didn't quite carry a whole book for me. I liked it, but wanted to love it. I'd still read anything she writes, because I do love her insights and her sense of humour, but I'm holding out hope for something more cohesive.