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Ahlème, a young woman living on the outskirts of Paris, is trying to make a life out of the dreams she brought with her from Algeria and the reality she faces every day. Her father lost his job after an accident at his construction site. Her mother was lost to a massacre in Algeria. And her brother, Foued, boils with adolescent energy and teeters dangerously close to choosing a life of crime.
As she wanders the streets of Paris looking for work, Ahlème negotiates the disparities between her dreams and her life, her youth and her responsibilities, the expectations of those back home and the limitations of life in France.
With the same laugh-out-loud, razor-sharp humor that made Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow an international hit, Some Dream for Fools shows Faïza Guène’s evolution as a novelist and reminds us of her extraordinary talent as she explores what happens to people when a lid is put on their dreams.
"Super-young, super-cool and fast becoming known as one of the hottest literary talents of multicultural Europe, Guene takes us on a tour of the tough suburbs of Paris and Algeria, where having the wrong-colour passport sentences you to a half-life. A funny, intimate and timely book by one of the stars of tomorrow - Daily Telegraph
"Guène is too important a writer to dismiss because she conveys a generally unsettling message. As before, she deserves to be heard, and it is hardly her fault that she cannot come up with any easy solution to the problem posed by desperate semi-legal immigrants trying to cope in an increasingly tough political and economic climate." - The Independent
"There's no real plot to this short novel. It's slice-of-life stuff, one thing after another, but it's written so lightly and engagingly that you read on happily." - The Scotsman
"...a fuller account would have added weight to a decidedly slight novel." - Library Journal
"Ahleme is real, and her tenacity, uncompromising toughness and cynical sense of humor give the novel a hint of joy." - Kirkus
"Guène aptly depicts how small joys ... take on weight as Ahlème dreams of the future." - Publishers Weekly
This information about Some Dream for Fools was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Photo: Thomas Brodin/Technikart
Faïza Guène was born in France in 1985 to Algerian parents. First published in French in 2004 when Guène was only 19 years old, Kiffe kiffe demain has since sold 360,000 copies in French and has been translated into more than 25 languages. Faïza Guène has also published Du rêve pour les oufs and Les gens du Balto.
Name Pronunciation
Faiza Guene: fie-ee-za gen (first syllable rhymes with pie) – and her book Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow is pronounced keef keef tomorrow)
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