The Art of Losing, Zeniter - B

       This novel is a multi-generational look into the war in Algeria that shattered France and its nearest colony in the 1950's and 60's. It is seen though the eyes of Ali, a modest merchant in the Algerian countryside; his son, Hamid, and Hamid's  daughter, Naima. An FLN attack on a French patrol in May, 1956 marks the eruption of violence and the beginning of the war. French revenge and reprisals against the civilian population quickly follow. The violence against the Algerians is indiscriminate, continual and justified by some sense of racial superiority that allows the French to believe in the morality of their occupation. In 1960, De Gaulle announces a referendum on Algerian self-determination. Independence follows, and with it anxiety for any who had anything to do with the French. Ali, as a WWII combat vet, had liaised with the French in a years' long effort to smooth life over for his village. Threats mount and the disrespect for Ali and his brothers intensifies. Ali does the only thing he can do to save his family. He takes them to France in 1962.

    Ali, his wife, and their three children arrive in a resettlement camp near Marseilles. It previously held Spanish Republicans, Jews and POW's. The barbed wire has not changed. They are traitors to the Algerians, and nonpersons to the French. After eight months in a tent, they are sent to a forest settlement in Provence and live in a cabin for two years before being sent to an apartment in Normandy. Ali works in a metals fabrication factory and the children attend school and try to become French. Hamid excels and becomes the liaison for the Muslim community with the French bureaucracy. He reads all of his neighbors letters and pens the appropriate response. Hamid's friends are French, he gives up honoring Ramadan, and his brother and sister too feel more and more of a chasm opening up between themselves and their parents.

   Hamid moves to Paris, where he meets and falls in love with a French art student, Clarisse. After a year of living together, they decide to meet the parents and face the reality of loving outside of their tribes. Surprisingly, Hamid's family, in particular his dad, handle the meeting with grace. Clarisse's parents are very uncomfortable and slowly distance themselves from their only child. Hamid and Clarisse go on to have four daughters, the second of whom is Naima.

   Naima works in an art gallery in the 6th arrondissement.  After the assault at 'Charlie Hedbo' in 2015, it becomes very unpleasant to be a French Muslim, even though Naima is an atheist and half-Gallic. The gallery owner decides to present an exhibit on Algerian art and to send her to the country she has heard about for her whole life, but never has visited. She realizes she knows very little and begins to research the events of the past. Her father evasively states that he knows nothing of Algeria, or why Ali fled in 1962. She delays obtaining her visa, but eventually steps up, takes an overnight ferry to Algeria, and begins her exploration for the gallery and of her family's past. Her travels take her to the mountains, where she meets her grandfather's brother and a dozen or so aunts, uncles and cousins.  As she leaves, she wonders: what did she expect? She is a Parisian, not an Algerian.  She will never return. She, and her family, have lost Algeria.