NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST A happily misanthropic Middle East divorcee finds refuge in books in a "beautiful and absorbing" novel of late-life crisis ( The New York Times ). Aaliya is a divorced, childless, and reclusively cranky translator in Beirut nurturing doubts about her latest project: a 900-page avant-garde, linguistically serpentine historiography by a late Chilean existentialist. Honestly, at seventy-two, should she be taking on such a project? Not that Aailiya fears dying. Women in her family live long; her mother is still going crazy. But on this lonely day, hour-by-hour, Aaliya's musings on literature, philosophy, her career, and her aging body, are suddenly invaded by memories of her volatile past. As she tries in vain to ward off these emotional upwellings, Aaliya is faced with an unthinkable disaster that threatens to shatter the little life she has left. In this "meditation on, among other things, aging, politics, literature, loneliness, grief and resilience" ( The New York Times ), Alameddine conjures "a beguiling narrator . . . who is, like her city, hard to read, hard to take, hard to know and, ultimately, passionately complex" ( San Francisco Chronicle ). A finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the National Book Award, An Unnecessary Woman is "a fun, and often funny . . . grave, powerful . . . [and] extraordinary" ( Washington Independent Review of Books ) ode to literature and its power to define who we are. "Read it once, read it twice, read other books for a decade or so, and then pick it up and read it anew. This one's a keeper" ( The Independent ) Praise for An Unnecessary Woman : Finalist for the National Book Award Finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award Washington Post Top 50 Fiction Books of 2014 Kirkus Best Books of 2014 NPR Best Books of 2014 Amazon 100 Best Books of 2014 The Christian Science Monitor Top 10 Fiction Books of 2014 A Daily Beast Hot Read “ An Unnecessary Woman is a meditation on, among other things, aging, politics, literature, loneliness, grief and resilience. If there are flaws to this beautiful and absorbing novel, they are not readily apparent.” — New York Times “[I]rresistible. . . [the author] offers winningly unrestricted access to the thoughts of his affectionate, urbane, vulnerable and fractiously opinionated heroine. Aaliya says that when she reads, she tries to 'let the wall crumble just a bit, the barricade that separates me from the book.' Mr. Alameddine's portrayal of a life devoted to the intellect is so candid and human that, for a time, readers can forget that any such barrier exists.” — Wall Street Journal “Alameddine. . . has conjured a beguiling narrator in his engaging novel, a woman who is, like her city, hard to read, hard to take, hard to know and, ultimately, passionately complex.” — San Francisco Chronicle “[An] opaque self-portrait of an utterly beguiling misanthrope… Aaliya notes that: “Reading a fine book for the first time is as sumptuous as the first sip of orange juice that breaks the fast in Ramadan.” You don’t have to fast first (in fact it helps to have gorged on the books that Aaliya translates and adores) in order to savor Alameddine’s succulent fiction.” —Steven G. Kellman, The Boston Globe “You can't help but love this character.” —Arun Rath, NPR’s All Things Considered “A restlessly intelligent novel built around an unforgettable character. . . a novel full of elegant, poetic sentences.” — Minneapolis Star Tribune “I can’t remember the last time I was so gripped simply by a novel’s voice. Alameddine makes it clear that a sheltered life is not necessarily a shuttered one. Aaliya is thoughtful, she’s complex, she’s humorous and critical.” —NPR.com “[A] powerful intellectual portrait of a reader who is misread. . . a meditation on being and literature, written by someone with a passionate love of language and the power of words to compose interior worlds. It’s about how, and by what means, we survive. About how, in the end, what is hollow and unneeded becomes full, essential and enduring.” —Earl Pike, Cleveland Plain Dealer “Beautiful writing…sharp, smart and often sardonic…an homage to literature.” —Fran Hawthorne, The National “Reading An Unnecessary Woman is about listening to a voice — Aaliya’s — not cantering through a plot, although powerful events do occur, both in the present and in memory…a fun, and often funny, book…rich in quirky metaphors… An Unnecessary Woman is not a game, though; it is a grave, powerful book. It is the hour-by-hour study of a woman who is struggling for dignity with every breath...The meaning of human dignity is perhaps the great theme of literature, and Alameddine takes it on in every page of this extraordinary book.” — Washington Independent Review of Books “Playful, brainy and full of zest, An Unnecessary Woman is an antidote to literary blandness.” — Newsday “Aaliya is a formidable character… When An Unnecessary