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(The Times, Magnus Linklater 29/06/05)

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Title: Djinn's Apple

Author: Djamila Morani

Translator: Sawad Hussain

Illustrator:

Publisher: Neem Tree Press

Date Published: 2024

Format: Paperback

Genre:

Book Category: Fiction

Age Range: 12+

Original Title: First published in Arabic as Tuffa7 al-djinn, El-Muthaqaf, Algeria, 2017

Country of Origin: Algeria

Djinn's Apple

by Djamila Morani
Age Range: 12+

When twelve-year-old narrator Nardeen’s family are brutally murdered she somehow manages to escape. Alone and frightened she returns to the house where she discovers men ransacking her father’s study frantically in search of something or someone. Discovered and badly beaten in the belief she knows where a valuable manuscript is hidden, her persecutor plans to sell her as a slave but before he can do so her injuries require attention. Nardeen finds herself in the bimaristan (hospital) where she slowly begins to recover. Here she meets Muallim Ishaq, the eminent professor and respected scholar. Ishaq recognises Nardeen’s rare talent and knowledge of herbs that she has learned from her father and he offers her a home and a chance to study as his apprentice.

Nardeen is a clever and sassy young woman who is on a mission to avenge the murder of her family and to bring the man she believes to be responsible – Al-Aasefi – to justice whatever the cost to herself.

Set in Baghdad during the Abbasid caliphate from 786 to 809 CE, considered to be the golden age during the reign of Harun Al-Rashid, Algerian author Djamila Morani’s award-winning YA novel has all the ingredients of both a historical and crime fiction with a ruthless murder, mysterious manuscript and a secret herb known only to a few.

Morani’s short chapters allow the mystery to slowly begin to unravel together with some interesting twists and turns along the way demonstrating that there is a lot more packed into this novella than just a historical murder mystery. She gets deep into the psyche of Nardeen and her teacher with lyrical prose, exquisitely translated into English by Sawad Hussain. Powerful paragraphs which often hold a profound meaning give the story real depth as the reader can share Nardeen’s inner turmoil battling with her desire to have revenge.

On another occasion, Ishaq tells Nardeen he’d always thought that the moment you reveal your sorrows to others, is when you lose the right to be sad. “ No matter how bad the pain, bury it, bury it deep. Pain was created to be buried. Let it go as deep as possible to melt, dissolve, and flow through your veins. Pain is what keeps us alive when you think about it.”

Nardeen tells us that Ishaq made her realise that everything that awakens uncertainty in us is fear. “Fear over what we own, over ourselves, our family, our reputation, our health. Loss saves us the trouble of looking back. All that is behind us is destruction, and what’s to come won’t be worse than what we left behind. When you lose everything, you have nothing left to lose, and so you’re a winner. ”

Morani successfully weaves her mystery against a historical background of a ‘golden age’ of medical and scientific advancement as well as the intense political intrigue and vying for power that occurred during the caliphate of Harun Al-Rashid.

There are also resources at the back of the book including a glossary, information on Harun Al-Rashid and the bimaristan, a set of questions for readers to explore the book in further detail as well as a map of the region covered by the caliphate.

Winner of the English PEN Award, Djinn’s Apple is an intense, engaging and powerful story.