“This is not just the Arab world’s ‘Year in Provence.’ It is as if Shadid has combined the breakthrough effects of Amy Tan’s ‘The Joy Luck Club,’ William Faulkner’s ‘As I Lay Dying,’ and Frances Fitzgerald’s ‘Fire in the Lake’ into one enormously likeable book. It is a masterpiece, and a terrible reminder of what an empathic guide to the Middle East we lost last month with Shadid’s passing….” —Boston Globe
“HOUSE OF STONE [is] Anthony Shadid’s wonderful memoir of the year he devoted to restoring his great-grandfather’s home in the southern Lebanese town of Marjayoun. His symphonic narrative strikes many notes — elegiac, ironic, angry, funny (in a rueful sort of way).….He also turned the experience into one of the finest memoirs I’ve read. It’s a shame, almost an injustice, that he did not live to see it in print.” —Washington Post
“a strange and often lovely hybrid — one-third memoir, one-third Middle Eastern history, one-third written version of what is more often an oral genre, popular among homeowners worldwide: the Contractor Nightmare Narrative.” —New York Magazine
“House of Stone is an elegant narrative that creates unity from diverse elements, much like the Ottoman-era cemento tiles over which Mr. Shadid obsesses and bargains during one stage of his beguiling restoration work. . . At the heart of the book, Mr. Shadid’s third, lies the strong, open voice of its author.” —New York Times
“At once outsider and native son, Shadid elegantly reflects on the violent splintering of the once-vibrant Levant and its uphill struggle to reclaim its dwindling notions of regional identity.” —Mother Jones
“A moving portrait of both a family and region in recovery….HOUSE OF STONE affords readers a view into an Arab world that longs for peace and reclamation, and requires new identities in order to achieve them.” —Oklahoma City Gazette
“A poignant, and typically vibrant, memoir of finding his roots in his ancestral home in Lebanon.” —Pittsburgh Post Gazette
“HOUSE OF STONE is a melancholy meditation on the Middle East and all the problems that the people of the Middle East didn’t cause and are struggling to solve….In language lyrical and tragic, he wrote of dreaming of bringing his children to Isber’s home. After he was held hostage and then released by Libyan government forces last year, he went home to Marjayoun. It seemed like a triumphant ending, a slightly lost man finally coming home. The story is hard to read now, knowing that he will never go there again and that a voice that understood the Middle East like few others is now silent like the stone walls he so lovingly restored.”—Miami Herald
“The book is both intimate and sweeping. The sweep comes from the panorama of Middle East conflict and his family’s emigration epic, woven throughout the book. Shadid’s family traces its roots to Marjayoun, a town in what is now Lebanon….But what emerges from this book — an extraordinary memoir, rooted in humility and humanity — is the beauty of his mind and the depth of his feeling. Some of the most elegant passages are the quiet side-roads, about harvesting olives or refurbishing dusty tiles.” —Seattle Times
“HOUSE OF STONE offers a fascinating portrait of a unique time and place, along with a self-portrait of the author. ‘I felt I could never really find home, not in Oklahoma, not in Maryland, not in Marjayoun,’ admits Shadid. ‘I suppose it is the curse of a generation always looking for something more.’” —Minneapolis Star Tribune
“HOUSE OF STONE the new memoir by foreign correspondent Anthony Shadid, who died while on assignment in Syria two weeks ago, is a tender homage to the region he spent his storied career helping American readers understand. As with his writing for The New York Times and other outlets, his deep affection for the language and culture of the Arab world are the basis of his masterful storytelling. It is the story of his family’s exodus from a small town in southern Lebanon and of his return.” —New York Daily News
“HOUSE OF STONE wasn’t written as a curtain call, but it is that and more — a fitting bookend to a brilliant career.” —Wisconsin State Journal
“A memoir in which the personal meets the political—and Shadid has already demonstrated that he has the ability to deliver.” —Library Journal, pre-pub alert
“An interesting and often emotionally stirring account of Shadid’s search for a time and place that are irrevocably lost.” —Booklist
“Six pages into this book, I said to myself, if Anthony Shadid continues like this, this book will be a classic. And page by page, he did continue, and he wrote a honest-to-God, hands-down, undeniable and instant classic. This is a book about war, and terrible loss, and a troubled region, and his own tattered family history, yes, but it’s written with the kind of levity and candor and lyricism we associate with, say, Junot Diaz — and that makes the book, improbably, both a compulsive read and one you don’t want to end. I have no idea how Shadid pulled all this off while talking about the history of modern Lebanon, how he balanced ribald humor and great warmth with the sorrow woven into a story like this, but anyway, we should all be grateful that he did.” —Dave Eggers, author of Zeitoun and What Is the What
“Anthony Shadid’s House of Stone is a haunting, beautifully realized piece of writing. With the poignancy of an exile and the eye of a reporter, Shadid juxtaposes past and present not only to tell the story of his family’s house and what happened there, but also to take us back to a Middle East we had forgotten, a place of grace, dignity, and diversity. He illuminates what has been and what is in the Middle East.” —Nick Flynn, author of Another Bullshit Night in Suck City and The Ticking is the Bomb
“Readers like me who have admired Anthony Shadid’s superb close-to-the-ground reporting from the Middle East will be fascinated by this very different sort of journey he takes into his own family’s past. He not only reconstructs that story in words, he physically rebuilds the house at its center. I know few family memoirs more bold and unusual.” —Adam Hochschild, author of To End All Wars
“House of Stone takes the reader to the heart of the Middle East and all its conflicts: the core question of what gives people a sense of who they are and what they are. In this deeply personal but deeply relevant memoir, Anthony Shadid looks at the way family, place, history, and faith work their way into a people’s blood, determining not only how they look at their past, but how they go about trying to build a future.” —Christopher Dickey, Middle East Editor, Paris Bureau Chief, Newsweek
“Homesickness forms part of the American condition, the descendants of immigrants longing for places most of them have never seen. In this deeply affecting memoir, at turns both melancholy and comic, Anthony Shadid demonstrates that you can indeed go home again — and reveals the rich rewards waiting there.” —Andrew J. Bacevich, author of Washington Rules: America’s Path to Permanent War
“To some reporters, the Middle East is a ‘story.’ To Anthony Shadid, one of the best journalists working today, it is life itself. His love of the place and its people resonates in every word of this lovely book.” —Thomas E. Ricks, author of Fiasco and The Gamble
“Anthony Shadid has written a beautiful and timeless book about a broken place and a breaking man. House of Stone is poignant, aching, and at times laugh-out-loud funny. It is a story of history and healing, and Shadid’s writing is so lyrical it’s like hearing a song.” —David Finkel, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Good Soldiers
“In House of Stone, Anthony Shadid embarks on a remarkable journey through time, an unforgettable and moving chronicle of discovery and determination. Shadid brings alive a landscape of lost hope and rekindled yearning with the flair and timeless eloquence of Naguib Mahfouz. The house in Marjayoun is more than just the cool breezes and stone arches, it is a gateway to another time.” —David Hoffman, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Dead Hand: The Untold Story of the Cold War Arms Race and its Dangerous Legacy
“Anthony Shadid has always been an exquisite story-teller. He has done it again in House of Stone, taking a riveting, soulful, and candid journey into his own history by rebuilding his long-abandoned family home in Lebanon. The sub-story explores how the area’s plight is a microcosm of the state’s challenges, current and past. Shadid’s many fans — old and new — will be regaled along the way as the impossible becomes quirkily possible. In the end, it’s a story of hope — that for some, you can go home again.” —Robin Wright, author of Rock the Casbah
“A compelling study of exile and return, conflict and reconciliation, identity and memory. Shadid brings the reader along on his own journey to make peace with his past. The writing is both gripping and lyrical, and he expertly weaves together the personal and the universal. The reader comes away not only knowing vastly more about Lebanon and its history, but more about the human condition as well.” —Jon B. Alterman, Middle East Program director, Center for Strategic and International Studies
“What a beautiful introduction to a world that I knew so little about. House of Stone is engaging, poignant, and funny. A lovely and unique story that will stay with me.” —Abraham Verghese, author of Cutting for Stone
“Anthony Shadid’s beautifully rendered memoir is a rich account of a man’s gradual immersion into the world of Middle East and the culture of the Levant, a kingdom almost unrecognizable today, where the rooms and hallways of his great-grandfather’s house tell stories that will linger with every reader for decades. Readers of Shadid’s work in the New York Times will be impressed by his expanding range as a writer and by the way the life of each of his characters echo the region’s haunting misfortunes.” —André Aciman, author of Out of Egypt
“Human greatness and human pettiness, the shadow of past glories and the intricacies of everyday life, the blending of cultures and the need to belong, the courage in facing hardship and the readiness to abandon basic values in order to survive — few books provide such a subtle, yet powerful insight into the tragedy of today’s Middle East.” —Amin Maalouf, author of Origins: A Memoir
“Evocative and beautifully written, House of Stone uses the restoration of Anthony Shadid’s lovely ancestral stone home in South Lebanon as a metaphor for history, family, and the importance of place. It is a wistful story, at once sad and amusing, that opens an arched window onto the complexities of the Middle Eastern mosaic. Shadid is one of America’s most courageous and perceptive foreign correspondents, and he should be read by anyone who wishes to understand the agonies and hopes of the Middle East.” —Kai Bird, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and author of Crossing Mandelbaum Gate
“I was captivated, instantly, by Anthony Shadid’s lushly evocative prose. Crumbling Ottoman outposts, doomed pashas, and roving bandits feel immediate, familiar, and relevant. Lose yourself in these pages, where empires linger, grandparents wander, and a battered Lebanon beckons us home. Savor it all. If Márquez had explored nonfiction, Macondo would feel as real as Marjayoun.” —Dave Cullen, author of Columbine
“From the premier American journalist in the Middle East, House of Stone is unlike any other book you’ll read about the region. Deeply personal, funny and soulful, filled with wisdom and wonder, it is a profound meditation on history, friendship, politics, and the indelible music that guides us home.” —Phil Bennett, former managing editor, Washington Post
“No one has chronicled the Middle East’s recent wars as brilliantly as Anthony Shadid, but in this moving exploration of home he takes us deeper behind the headlines and into his own family’s ancestral village. His wise, compassionate storytelling weaves together unforgettable characters, hilarious dialogue, cultural insights, and elegiac journeys into the past. This masterful narrative offers an intimate, lyrical portrait of a country we usually see only through the chaos of war. In rebuilding his family home in southern Lebanon, Shadid commits an extraordinarily generous act of restoration for his wounded land, and for us all.” —Annia Ciezadlo, author of Day of Honey: A Memoir of Food, Love, and War
“Anthony Shadid brings humanity to a region that is too often reduced to victims and terrorists. His clarity and humanity have long shined through in his reporting from the Arab world. Now he turns his keen and compassionate gaze inward, as he works to. . . reconstruct his past in the land of his Lebanese ancestors. In this moving chronicle of a house coming back to life, Shadid offers meditations on war, politics, friendship, and village life. Alongside this stands the quintessentially American journey of his immigrant grandparents. Much humor, beauty, and wisdom can be found in these pages.” —Sandy Tolan, author of The Lemon Tree: An Arab, A Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East
