http://www.bostonbibliophile.com/2009... ( )

A long, unique novel with interweaving narratives that appear to have absolutely nothing in common, apart from both being about Arabs. One narrative takes place in the days of yore and features Arabian Night style tales which include magic. Another takes place in contemporary Lebanon and is realistic.

It was hard to keep track of the many, many characters introduced, but ultimately this is an interesting read, especially if you are familiar with Arab folklore. ( )

An amazingly talented, writer, Rabih Alameddine’s previous fictions, Koolaids (which mixed AIDS, the Lebanese Civil War, and Tom Cruise fantasies), his “Novel in First Chapters” I, The Divine, and the short stories in The Perv (whose titular story is told by a very unreliable, possibly insane, narrator) have shown him to be a first class literary trickster and fabulist. With The Hakawati he proves he has a story – many stories -- for us all. This is alive, vibrant, and life-encompassing novel deserves a space on the shelf beside the classic tales it remixes, to be read and reread. The best stories are the ones you can hear told again and again.

I couldn't get into this. It's a tale within a tale interwoven into the story of several generations of a Lebanese Christian family. Lots of characters and to add to the confusion the characters from the story are woven into the tales and use the same names. Ay yi yi. ( )

Hakawati is reflecting the modernity of islamic life merged in the fast phased society with the extremists effects of all nature with an international sense interwoven with humor and myth.i am enjoying reading this.in Sri Lankan context our amateur writer Samara Wijesinghe is one of this type of and he writes some short stories that legendry writers had missed though.

“Never trust the storyteller,” advises one of the thousands of characters who inhabit Rabih Alameddine’s 2008 novel, The Hakawati, “but always trust the stories.”

It’s good advice, and the reader will be well-rewarded by trusting the hundreds of tales that comprise this chaotic and brilliant novel that deftly interweaves Islam, magic carpets, automobile sales, every possible form of sexuality, Hell, the Lebanese civil war, slavery, the Crusades, jinni, princesses, witches, Greek myth, Gibson guitars, Palestinian militias, deserts, crossdressing, serpents, crossdressing serpents, and everything but an Aladdin’s lamp.

At its most basic level, The Hakawati exposes the conflicting feelings of an Americanized Lebanese ex-pat who returns home to attend to his father’s dying. The ex-pat comes from a line of professional Hakawatis, or storytellers. His grandfather was court hakawati to the local royalty. His father, uncle and sister prove to be hakawatis, too; they are Toyota salespeople in war-torn Beirut. Within the stories they tell are other hakawatis, who give birth to additional tales-within-the-tale. The result is a dense and exhilarating 512-page magic carpet ride. The proof of Alameddine’s skill is that one never confuses the thousands of characters (even though several bear the same name). Each of his men, women, and monsters is a distinct creation, however wrought out of very familiar Thousand-and-One-Arabian-Nights material.

For the gay crowd, this book has peculiar rewards. It begins with an older man on a seven days’ journey trying to seduce a younger one solely through storytelling around a campfire, and ends with a tragic, powerful homosexual interracial pairing of royal demon-spawn with a gift for makeovers and spa treatments. Among the comic figures inbetween are eight apparently gay imps with Old Testament names, each of whom has his own bright skincolor (collectively, the original rainbow flag?) and diverse talents with which he assists the warrior heroine of one of these tales to achieve her conquests.

Many of these tales have surprise endings, but none is achieved with gimmicks. The whole is organic, vines growing through one another in a dense weave, making it sometimes hard to determine where one tale ends and another begins – and I mean that in the best way: Alameddine has created a whole separate and complex world where there are no simple lessons and nothing can be divorced from its context. The storyteller might be a bit of a liar, but the stories are all true. ( )