Out Of Mesopotamia

(Paperback)

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Informed by firsthand experience on the battlefronts of Iraq and Syria, Abdoh captures the horror, confusion, and absurdity of combat from a seldom-glimpsed perspective that expands our understanding of the war novel.

"Abdohs powerful novel follows an Iranian war reporter who is torn between his wearying job on the front lines and a civilian existence that he finds increasingly alienating. The book is as much a reflection on memory and art as it is a war story, and Abdohs writing captures beautifully the absurdity of both the battlefield and modern life."
--New York Times Book Review, Editors' Choice

One of a handful of great modern war novels...These wars will not end until we look at what we are doing and what we have done. Abdohs novel lifts the veil on the murderous insanity.
--Pulitzer Prizewinning journalist Chris Hedges, for ScheerPost

"As much a meditation on time and memory as it is a book about war...Abdoh skillfully captures combat's intrinsic absurdity...For many Americans, the conflicts in Syria and Iraq have become abstractions, separated from our lives by geographic as well as psychic boundaries. Abdoh collapses these boundaries, presenting a disjointed reality in which war and everyday life are inextricably entwined...[The novel shines] a brilliant, feverish light on the nature of not only modern war but all war, and even of life itself."
--New York Times Book Review

"Transcendent."
--The Daily Beast

"A masterful, stylish novel told from the perspective of a disaffected Iranian writer who is drawn to the militias fighting in Syria and Iraq. Abdoh beautifully illustrates the paradoxes of war in the field and on the home front, alternating moments of brutality and comradeship and showing war's pointless heroisms, its random accidents, its absurdities, and its ongoing human costs. This is at once a probing look at the disaster in Syria and Iraq, and an affectionate yet gimlet-eyed view of masculinity, art, and cultural politics."
--The Millions

, One of the Most-Anticipated Books of 2020

"Abdoh explores the lives behind the war-torn headlines in a way that captures the full humanity of the participants. Channeling a bit of Tim O'Brien and a good deal of Joseph Heller, he has written the best novel to date on the Middle East's ceaseless wars."
--Library Journal

, STARRED review

Saleh, the narrator of Out of Mesopotamia, is a middle-aged Iranian journalist who moonlights as a writer for one of Iran's most popular TV shows but cannot keep himself away from the front lines in neighboring Iraq and Syria. There, the fight against the Islamic State is a proxy war, an existential battle, a declaration of faith, and, for some, a passing weekend affair.

After weeks spent dodging RPGs, witnessing acts of savagery and stupidity, Saleh returns to civilian life in Tehran but finds it to be an unbearably dislocating experience. Pursued by his official handler from state security, opportunistic colleagues, and the woman who broke his heart, Saleh has reason to again flee from everyday life. Surrounded by men whose willingness to achieve martyrdom both fascinates and appalls him, Saleh struggles to make sense of himself and the turmoil in his midst.

An unprecedented glimpse into "endless war" from a Middle Eastern perspective, Out of Mesopotamia follows in the tradition of the Western canon of martial writers--from Hemingway and Orwell to Tim O'Brien and Philip Caputo--but then subverts and expands upon the genre before completely blowing it apart. Drawing from his firsthand experience of being embedded with Shia militias on the ground in Iraq and Syria, Abdoh gives agency to the voiceless while offering a meditation on war that is moving, humane, darkly funny, and resonantly true.

Reviews

One of The Margins' 100 Essential Books by Iranian Writers

- One of Vulture's Fall 2020 Best New Books

- One of Publishers Weekly's Big Indie Books of Fall 2020 and a Best Book of the Year

- A Chicago Review of Books Must-Read Book of September 2020

"[A] superb pressure cooker of a novel . . . Abdoh brilliantly fuses the confusions of combat and modern life to produce an unforgettable novel. This is one of the best works of literature on the war against ISIS to date."
--Publishers Weekly, starred review, book of the week

"Abdoh explores the lives behind the war-torn headlines in a way that captures the full humanity of the participants. Channeling a bit of Tim O'Brien and a good deal of Joseph Heller, he has written the best novel to date on the Middle East's ceaseless wars." --Library Journal, starred review

"[A] searing, poetic, and morally authentic account of contemporary conflict. Abdoh eloquently depicts the absurdity of war, employing darkly comic interludes while also showing the devastating brutality." --Booklist

"Salar Abdoh defies all formulaic constructions . . . The result is an unblinking look at the realities of war and the impossibility of ever leaving war behind . . . Out of Mesopotamia provides a wrenching examination of war and of the way humanity can't ever manage to be done with violent conflict."
--Shelf Awareness

"One of a handful of great modern war novels . . . These wars will not end until we look at what we are doing and what we have done. Abdoh's novel lifts the veil on the murderous insanity."
--Chris Hedges, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist

"Out of Mesopotamia is a brutally realistic look at war and love and fear and everything else that humans do. The writing is impossibly good. The characters aren't characters at all--they seem to have emerged fully formed from the blood-soaked soil of Syria and Iraq. And they rise up to live out a story that is as old as history and yet somehow could only have happened today. I'm stunned by how good this book is."
--Sebastian Junger, author of Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging

"Transcendent." --Daily Beast

"[A]n unprecedented novel, one that captures the brutality, absurdity and, yes, beauty of war from the grounded perspective of an Iranian man straddling multiple worlds." --BOMB

"If history is written by the victors than most good war novels are written by those accustomed to losing, and Out of Mesopotamia calls to mind the grim brilliance of Czech writers like Bohumil Hrabal and Jaroslav Hasek--which is to say it is really fucking funny. And maybe this is at the heart of Abdoh's genius, the art and instinct for getting very close to the darkest corners of humanity without succumbing to the despair that dwells therein." --Literary Hub, Jonny Diamond's Favorite Book of 2020

"[P]rofound . . . With first-hand experience with militias in Iraq and Syria, Abdoh travels between war and peace in his novel, picking up on the in-between moments, the ones that are not glorified and where suffering is silent." --Arab News (Saudi Arabia)

Author Bio

Salar Abdoh was born in Iran and splits his time between Tehran and New York City. He is the author of the novels Tehran at Twilight, The Poet Game, and Opium; and he is the editor of Tehran Noir. He teaches in the MFA program at the City College of New York