In this unique memoir, renowned poet, fiction writer, critic, and activist Marjorie Agosin writes in the voice of her mother, Frida, the daughter of European Jewish immigrants, living in Chile in the years before, during, and after World War II.

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.

Freya Stark’s most famous work, Valley of the Assassins, stems from this period, and indeed she was so intrepid in venturing into remote areas of Luristan that the governor of Husainabad commented, ‘No wonder that yours is a powerful nation. Your women do what our men are afraid to attempt.’ This volume includes much previously unpublished material.

First published in 1960, Kings and Camels is a straightforward account of how an American went to work in Saudi Arabia and came home to America to realize how little the average American appreciated the strategic importance of the area and, more crucially still, how little he understood the people in the area.