Salt Houses

Salt Houses is a very interesting novel about what it is like to live as a Palestinian in the Middle East. 
Author, Hala Alyan, an American Palestinian is writing about what it is like to be a middle class, well to do, educated Palestinian family having to leave Israel and move from place to place.  We start as the first generation of this multilayered family, watching through the eyes of Salma, as her family leaves Jaffa and moved their family to a home in Nablus, Palestine,  the year is 1963.  We follow in alternating chapters different members of the family in each generation as they live trough the history of the mideast.  In 1965 we follow Mustafa, Salma's young adult son, who is visiting the Mosque and handing out anti Israel pamphlets.  There is violence, arrests and deaths as the family again leaves separating  between Amman and Kuwait City.  We see how the Palestinian Israeli conflict could lead to radicalizing a young man. 

We follow Salma's daughter, Alia and her husband, Atef as the newly married couple moves to Kuwait City.  Salma joins her sister and other family living in Amman. 
The reader is drawn in as each of the characters experiences the upheaval and fear as historical events impact their day to day lives.  We listen with the family as the news reports the Kuwait airline hostage crisis.

Later generations start a new life in the United States, returning to spend summers in either Kuwait City or Amman with family.  Souad, Alia and Atef's daughter returns from life in America, as a divorcee with two children.  She come back to live in Beirut.

This is a story of both Palestinian displacement and family drama.  This is a novel that examines the effects of loss and displacement of a family home even for the privileged.  This novel explores the way outside forces affect our family lives and connections.