{"product_id":"9781668204986","title":"They Told Me Back Home Would Be Beautiful: A Palestinian Memoir","description":"\u003ctable\u003e\u003ctbody\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eAuthor\/Contributor(s):\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eDudum, Elena\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003eAtria\/One Signal Publishers\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDate:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd\u003e10\/27\/2026\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eBinding:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eHardcover\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eCondition:\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"\"\u003eNEW\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/tbody\u003e\u003c\/table\u003e\u003cb\u003e“A deeply felt memoir of race and history that defies social erasures of the diasporic Palestinian experience, \u003ci\u003eThey Told Me Back Home Would Be Beautiful\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cb\u003eboldly explores how politicized identities, especially within the US, are shaped and manipulated by broader agendas.” —The Whiting Award Judges Citation\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eMy father scours the web for century-old magazines about Palestine. For years, he would talk about these mysterious documents but rarely show them to anyone. “I have proof,” he would say to whoever would listen, “that Palestine exists.” —from the Prologue\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIn her Palestinian Christian home in San Francisco, Elena Dudum was raised in a household ruled by her father’s lectures. He taught her everything: the story of her grandparents’ flight from their homeland, the history of her family’s orange groves, and the ongoing occupation of Palestine. Above all, he taught her not to forget. Soon his lessons consumed her childhood, and Elena found herself shrinking from an inheritance that felt both sacred and suffocating.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eFor years, she resisted it all until a family trip to Palestine shattered the abstraction of her homeland. Checkpoints, razed olive groves, soldiers—it was all plainly in front of her, as were the ghosts of her family’s past. What was once always just out of reach, now pressed against her body. Back in the United States, something in her quietly unraveled. She tried to outrun what she now knew by burying herself in elite institutions and the rising world of tech, where ambition was rewarded and history was inconvenient.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eEventually, the inheritance she thought she could escape demanded reckoning.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003eBraiding rich personal narrative with archival fragments and cultural critique, \u003ci\u003eThey Told Me Back Home Would Be Beautiful\u003c\/i\u003e traces one woman’s journey as she returns—slowly, deliberately—to her father’s lessons, determined to claim them on her own terms.","brand":"Atria\/One Signal Publishers","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48218674135295,"sku":"9781668204986","price":29.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0452\/0886\/2873\/files\/9781668204986_s600x595.jpg?v=1780501035","url":"https:\/\/massivebookshop.com\/de\/products\/9781668204986","provider":"MASSIVE BOOKSHOP","version":"1.0","type":"link"}