ARAB OF THE FUTURE GRAPHIC MEMOIR SC (2025)

"The highly anticipated continuation of Riad Sattouf's internationally acclaimed bestseller, which was hailed by The New York Times as 'a disquieting yet essential read.' Riad, now settled in his father's hometown of Homs, gets to go to school, where he dedicates himself to becoming a true Syrian in the country of the dictator Hafez Al-Assad. Told simply yet with devastating effect, Riad's story takes in the sweep of politics, religion, and poverty, but is steered by acutely observed small moments: the daily sadism of his schoolteacher, the lure of the black market, with its menu of shame and subsistence, and the obsequiousness of his father in the company of those close to the regime. As his family strains to fit in, one chilling, barbaric act drives the Sattoufs to make the most dramatic of changes."

"The Arab of the Future is the widely acclaimed, internationally bestselling graphic memoir that tells the story of Riad Sattouf's peripatetic childhood in the Middle East. In this third volume, (1985-1987), Riad's mother, fed up with the grinding reality of daily life in the village, decides she cannot take it any longer. When she resolves to move back France, young Riad sees his father torn between his wife's aspirations and the weight of family traditions."

"In the fourth volume of The Arab of the Future, little Riad has grown into a teenager. In the previous books, his childhood was complicated by the pull of his two cultures, French and Syrian, and his parents' deteriorating relationship. Now his father, Adbel-Razak, has left to take a job in Saudi Arabia, and after making a pilgrimage to Mecca, turns increasingly towards religion. But Riad's mother Clementine has had enough. Refusing to live in a country where women have no rights, she returns with her children to live in France with her own mother until Abdel-Razak shows up unexpectedly to drag the family on yet another journey. "