Islington PSC and Housmans Bookshop welcome Heba Hayek for the second session of ‘Alareer Book Club for Solidarity with Palestine’ to discuss her debut book, Sambac Beneath Unlikely Skies.

Sambac Beneath Unlikely Skies is written for those who had to leave — collected remembrances of a childhood in Gaza by a woman far from Palestine’s sun and sea. Overindulgent, chaotic and sentimental, Heba Hayek’s narrator struggles to navigate life in colder, unfamiliar worlds. She holds tightly to memories of home, hoping they will lead back to her sisters and mothers.

Many of the places and characters within the book have been targeted by Israel military over the past year and half and are no longer with us. This book honours the memories these spaces hold and acts as a witness to a time and place that has been obfuscated and distorted by Zionists.

Heba Hayek is a London-based, Gaza-raised Palestinian author, creative and facilitator. She completed an MFA in Creative Writing at Miami University, Ohio, and studied for an MA in Social Anthropology at SOAS University of London. Sambac Beneath Unlikely Skies won the Creative Award in the 2022 Palestine Book Awards and was chosen as a 2021 Book of the Year by The White Review, Middle East Eye and The New Arab.

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