To complement the novels in Garnet’s award-winning Arab Women Writers series, In the House of Silence is a collection of autobiographical writings by thirteen leading Arab women authors. Through these testimonies the women describe their experiences and expose the often difficult conditions under which their narratives were woven. Patterns emerge, which run throughout their testimonies – experiences of confinement, subjugation, the struggle for education and the eventual use of writing as a way out. They speak of their own reasons for writing, of how experiences in family life, politics, exile and even imprisonment have affected them and their work, and of how their motivation has been both tested and reinforced by various setbacks and the struggle for recognition.

Startlingly honest, these testimonies will be essential reading for all those interested in women’s roles in Arab society and the ways that these roles are changing.