About the Book In 2005, the Italian secret service receives intel that a group of Muslim immigrants in Rome is planning a terrorist attack. Christian Mazzari, a young Sicilian, goes undercover to infiltrate the group. He soon meets Sofia, a young Egyptian immigrant who lives in the neighborhood with her husband Said, an architect who has reinvented himself in Italy as a pizza cook. Book Synopsis Secret identities, criminal conspiracies, and forbidden love converge in this whimsical and at times heartbreaking look at the Muslim communities of Rome ( The New York Times ). The Italian secret service believes that a group of Muslim immigrants is planning a terrorist attack. Christian Mazzari, a young Sicilian translator who speaks perfect Arabic, goes undercover in Romes Egyptian neighborhood, Viale Marconi, to infiltrate the group. Posing as a recently arrived Tunisian in search of a job and a place to sleep, Christian soon meets Sofia, a young Egyptian immigrant whose arranged marriage is anything but fulfilling. While Christian attempts in vain to uncover terrorist activity, Sofia is on another kind of secret mission--in defiance of a husband who forbids her to work. In alternating voices, Algerian-born Italian author Amara Lakhous examines the commonplaces and stereotypes of life in modern, multicultural Italy. Divorce Islamic Style mixes the rational and the absurd as it depicts the conflicts and contradictions of todays globalized world. Review Quotes Praise for Divorce Islamic Style The authors real subject is the heave and crush of modern, polyglot Rome, and he renders the jabs of everyday speech with such precision that the novel feels exclaimed rather than written. --The New Yorker A satirical, enigmatic take on the racial tensions that afflict present-day Europe. --Brooklyn Rail Whats memorable about Lakhous novel is what he shows us of an often inward-looking nation confronting the teeming vibrancy of multicultural life. --NPRs Fresh Air Do we have an Italian Camus on our hands? Just possibly...No recent Italian novel so elegantly and directly confronts the new Italy. --Philadelphia Inquirer Praise for Amara Lakhous French and British literatures have long been enriched by the biculturalism of authors like Tahar Ben Jelloun, Amin Maalouf, Gaitam Malkani, and Monica Ali. With talented new writers like Lakhous, Italy is closing the gap. --The New York Times As a novelist of culture clash, Lakhous has the faculty to maintain colorful voices with the luxury of introducing political themes as instantiations of character. --Bookforum About the Author Amara Lakhous was born in Algiers in 1970. He has a degree in philosophy from the University of Algiers and another in cultural anthropology from the University la Sapienza, Rome. Clash of Civilizations Over an Elevator in Piazza Vittorio (Europa Editions, 2008) was awarded Italys prestigious Flaiano prize and was described by the Seattle Times as a wonderfully offbeat novel. Lakhous lives in Italy. Ann Goldstein is an editor and head of the copy department at The New Yorker. Her translations for Europa Editions include novels by Elena Ferrante, Alessandro Piperno, Romano Bilenchi, and Giancarlo de Cataldo.