Frankenstein in Baghdad
In American-occupied Baghdad, junk dealer Hadi collects the body parts of suicide-bombing victims from the streets and stitches them into a single corpse, hoping the government will count the dead as a person and give them a burial. The corpse reanimates and begins working its way through the city, killing the people responsible for each of its parts. Saadawi writes the novel from inside an ensemble of journalists, government officials, neighbors, and the Whatsitsname itself, building a war satire that doubles as a horror novel and a meditation on whether the violence can ever stop.
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A Baghdad junk dealer stitches bombing victims into a single corpse that reanimates and begins killing in this Iraq War horror-satire.
Yes. Frankenstein in Baghdad won the 2014 International Prize for Arabic Fiction (the Arabic Booker). Jonathan Wright's English translation won the 2018 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation. It was shortlisted for the 2018 Man Booker International Prize.
Yes, in concept. Ahmed Saadawi reimagines the Frankenstein premise in U.S.-occupied Iraq, where a scavenger sews together a creature from victims of bombings. The novel uses the metaphor to grapple with the chaos of post-invasion Baghdad.
Frankenstein in Baghdad was written by Ahmed Saadawi, published in 2018 by HARPER COLLINS.
Frankenstein in Baghdad is 290 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Frankenstein in Baghdad takes most readers 4 to 6 hours to finish.
Frankenstein in Baghdad is a standalone novel by Ahmed Saadawi, not part of a series.
Frankenstein in Baghdad is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.
