The Parisian

By Isabella Hammad, Jonathan Cape, 576pp, £14.99

It is startling to think this ambitious tour-deforce was written into life by someone at the start of their literary career. Weaving together history and personal tragedy, this debut novel from Isabella Hammad starts with Midhat, a Palestinian teenager who finds himself studying in France at the outbreak of the First World War. Having fallen disastrously in love, the young man returns home and settles down to a life worthy of his father’s expectations, while Palestine struggles for independence. But an unexpected betrayal, surfacing years later, threatens to unravel the life he has built. Complicated and panoramic, yet with even the tiniest of details meticulously observed, this debut follows the changing desires of a boy as he is moulded into a man, the irresistible pull of family loyalty and the search for peace, as much within, as on, the global stage.