Reading Canada Reads: What I Know About You

Welcome back to my Reading Canada Reads series, where I take you all along as I attempt to read as much of the Canada Reads longlist as I possibly can. This year’s theme: one book to change the narrative.

The second longlist book I finished was What I Know About You, written by Éric Chacour and translated by Pablo Strauss. I listened to this one as an audiobook, narrated by Nabil Traboulsi.

“As a boy in 1960s Cairo, Tarek knows that his entire life is written in advance. He’ll be a doctor like his father, marry, and have children. Under the watchful eyes of his mother and his sister, he starts to do just that – until Ali enters his life and turns it upside down. The two men, from very different worlds, embark on an unsayable relationship that threatens to tear apart Tarek’s family.

Years later, as Tarek is living a solitary life in Montreal, someone starts writing about him and to him, piecing together a past he wants only to forget. But who is the writer of this tale? And will he figure it out in time?”

What stood out to me the most about this book is the way the author played with perspective. Until somewhere around the halfway point, it is told entirely in second person, with Tarek - the novel’s protagonist - seemingly being the one that the story is being told to. I don’t see many books told in second perspective like this and it always catches my attention when I find one that is. In this case, I think it was used rather well. It sets up a mystery-like element in that you wonder who is telling the story of Tarek’s life and love affair and how they know all of these details. When the narrator’s identity is finally revealed, it makes several pieces start to fall into place while also calling into question some of the accuracy of what we’ve been told about Tarek’s life so far.

This type of literary fiction is not always something I gravitate towards, but this one worked for me. The writer, translator, and narrator all did a great job conveying the rollercoaster of emotions and secrets that existed within this family and the impacts they had on everyone. I found myself getting swept up in both the moments of hope and the moments of devastation, being both angry with and understanding of a lot of the characters and the choices they made at the same time. The characters are messy, complicated, and often unlikable while also feeling very real. While it did take me a little while to really get into the story, once I did I was listening to it pretty much every time I left the house.

How does this book change the narrative? I think one way is that it tells a queer story outside of the modern, western context we’re probably the most used to in this part of the world. While there are some chapters later in the book that are set in Montreal, most of the book is set in Cairo in the mid-late 20th century. Queer people have always existed, even in places and times that preferred not to acknowledge them, and this story tackles that history and the way it affects not only Tarek, but his entire family and the rift that forms between them. It also goes beyond that and carries the story into the next generation, examining how shame and secrets impact the lives of people who weren’t even present to witness the fallout.

I don’t think I would have picked up this book if it wasn’t on the Canada Reads list this year, but I am glad that I gave it a chance.

Rating: ⅘ stars.

Previous entries in this series: