Laila
SynopsisPlot
Although the Arabic world is as diverse as any other region, customs and traditions endure. Injustices continue. And then there is Laila. Trapped in a marriage to a man she finds physically revolting, Laila begins to realize secret truths about her sexuality, about her very identity as a modern Jordanian woman. "Good" Arab women may have occasional lurid fantasies about dominating men in bed... but Laila actually finds the strength to do it. And when she dies suddenly in an encounter with a lover, the stakes for the survivors become a matter of life and death.
Story
About this book
Laila is a novel by Jordanian author Fadi Zaghmout set in modern-day Jordan. Its central character, Laila, is a woman trapped in a marriage to a man she finds physically repulsive. As her dissatisfaction deepens, she begins to confront hidden truths about her own sexuality and what it means to be a woman navigating expectations in a society shaped by enduring customs and traditions. The book uses her private life as a lens onto broader questions about gender, autonomy, and desire in the contemporary Arab world.
Zaghmout frames the story as a kind of trial, placing the men in Laila's society under scrutiny through her perspective. Where a conventional narrative might keep its female protagonist confined to quiet endurance, Laila acts on her impulses and breaks with the role assigned to her. The consequences of her choices ripple outward, raising the stakes for those around her to a point where survival itself comes into question. The novel sits within a small but growing body of Jordanian fiction that addresses sexuality and personal freedom with directness, drawing on the specific social landscape of Amman and its surroundings rather than treating the Arab world as a single undifferentiated setting.
