Death Is Hard Work

This one deals in small inner journeys during a larger but somehow almost less significant journey as well as in the small indignities and degradations of dealing with things that are both cruel and somehow absurd. If you're not looking for grandiose revelations and adventures but for the horror in the details this one might work for you. I know that it'll stick with me for a while.

This may not be the most cheerful book with which to start a new year, but with repeated reminders of death, thanks to the pandemic, it seemed a fitting read.
In war-torn Syria, Bolbol's father dies, after making a final wish to be buried in the family plot near Aleppo. It is only a two-hour drive away but war has made such long journeys treacherous and possibly fatal. Bolbol recruits his brother Hussein and sister Fatima to grant his father's dying wish, and the three of them transport the body of their father in a rusting van to his hometown.
The journey is fraught with danger, from soldiers and militia, falling bombs, and festering family hurts and painful memories.
In less than 200 pages and often with black humour, the author (who lives in Damascus despite the war) paints a vivid portrait of the ravages of war - not just of the lives it takes but also the life that it leaches out from the living, and of the complicated and often treacherous terrain of family relationships.
A five-star read, for its emotional punch and dark humour.

exceptional