A forty-year old chef, half American-half Iraqi falls in love with an Iraqi-exiled professor. The book is set in the Arab-American community in Los Angeles, and dances around some very complex family dynamics, love, and Arab culture. I found the book to be very slow at times, but liked the focus on Arab food/recipes and the differences highlighted among various Arab cultures. Chef Sirine and Professor Hanif made some poor decisions. Also, I found the Arab fable at the beginning of each chapter to be more annoying than interesting despite its mysticism.

I preferred Pauls Toutonghi's Evil Knievel Days, which had similar themes.

Favorite irreverent quote: In reality, dogs are only reincarnated monks who didn't say their prayers right." ( )

Crescent by Diane Abu-Jaber is a warm, lyrical love story that has been infused with the scents of Middle Eastern food, and stories both of actual history and fables from the Middle East. Set in an Arab-American community in Los Angeles this is the story of the romance between Sirine, an Iraqi-American and Hanif, a haunted, handsome Eastern Literature professor who has come to America to escape his war torn country of Iraq.

Thirty nine year old Sirine has never married, lives with her uncle who is also a university professor, and born story teller along with their dog, King Babar. She works as a chef in a Lebanese restaurant. Her passion has been all about food and it’s preparation until she meets the handsome Arabic literature professor who comes to her restaurant originally for the food, but ultimately for her. Sirine struggles with the Arabic side of her identity and wonders if she is too American for Hanif, while Hanif struggles to feel grounded in America so far from Baghdad and the family he had to leave behind.

A good love story, peopled with lots of interesting secondary characters, with a backdrop of real history about Saddam Hussein and the atrocities that occurred under his reign made this book a very interesting read. The author captures the poignant contemplation of refugees while at the same time celebrates the food, poetry, politics and the daily life of the Arabic-American community and gives the reader a ringside seat. ( )

Timely read with all that is currently going on in the US. I'm looking forward to meeting with D. Abu-Jaber next week for a book club on her recent memoir! ( )

To be fair, I won't rate this. Perhaps it's the most wonderful book in the world. But when I can't get past Page 50 after 5 tries, I have to give up on it. I couldn't connect to this book at all.

On to the next one.

I don't know what I was expecting, but I wasn't expecting... a romance novel.

It's an exaggeration to call it that. However, there was too much love, too much sex, too many dreams in this novel for my personal liking.

That said - the language was beautiful.

Moreover, it was not a good time for me to be reading a (relatively) happy love story.

I would still definitely recommend this book. I love Diana Abu-Jaber's writing, and still plan to read Birds of Paradise. I preferred Arabian Jazz, though. ( )