Keynote
"Patricia Ward writes with great authority and unyielding lyric precision about a family and nation torn apart."—Nicholas Delbanco
Book Title
The Bullet Collection
Subtitle
A Novel
- “A startlingly insightful tale of female coming-of-age in a time of war. . . . A powerful debut.”—Booklist, starred review
Body
"Passionate, lyrical, and deeply humane, this tale of two sisters caught in a war without end moves effortlessly through space and time, illuminating the private terrors of a dispossessed family and the public terror-more relevant than ever, now-arising from clashing cultures. This is an astonishing novel."
—Andrea Barrett
Marianna watches her older sister Alaine collect evidence of violence from the war: bullets, shrapnel, a gas mask. These objects, taken from or near dead bodies, begins Alaine's slow decent into madness. As the family's beloved city of Beirut is caught in the crossfire of the Middle East conflict, it is nine-year-old Marianna who becomes Alaine's keeper. She watches for any signal that might trigger one of Alaine's frequent, grim excavations. But once the family escapes to America, Alaine's new found contentment is as alien to Marianna as her madness once was. As Marianna longs for her beloved, war-torn home, she struggles to understand that she now is the difficult sister.
In lyrical, dream-like prose, Patricia Sarrafian Ward mines both the stunning, exotic landscape of Beirut and the pure, defiant landscape of a child's heart, and shows how war leaves its indelible scars on both.
—Andrea Barrett
Marianna watches her older sister Alaine collect evidence of violence from the war: bullets, shrapnel, a gas mask. These objects, taken from or near dead bodies, begins Alaine's slow decent into madness. As the family's beloved city of Beirut is caught in the crossfire of the Middle East conflict, it is nine-year-old Marianna who becomes Alaine's keeper. She watches for any signal that might trigger one of Alaine's frequent, grim excavations. But once the family escapes to America, Alaine's new found contentment is as alien to Marianna as her madness once was. As Marianna longs for her beloved, war-torn home, she struggles to understand that she now is the difficult sister.
In lyrical, dream-like prose, Patricia Sarrafian Ward mines both the stunning, exotic landscape of Beirut and the pure, defiant landscape of a child's heart, and shows how war leaves its indelible scars on both.
List Price
$20.00
Purchase at
Purchase at:
About the Author
Credit: C. L. Jordan
Praise
- “Shows stunningly, profoundly, the depth of the tragedy of Lebanon and offers, so slightly, the hope of salvation.”—The Daily Star (Beirut)
- “Ward offers a heartbreaking education about the emotional damage done to those who were, literally, caught in the crossfire.”—Ararat
- "This is a truly incredible novel about the scars of war that are left on the hearts of a family living in exile and reduced to intolerable circumstances."—Sanford Herald
- “With this debut novel, Ward emerges boldly from the ranks of Arab women writers and proves to be a writer to watch.”—Library Journal
