The novel “Screams from the Basement” is a broad collection of intertwined stories, where tales of passionate love and yearning intersect with narratives of politics, gallows, wars, and extermination during the Italian occupation. It also includes stories of departure and migration into the unknown and migration to the north in search of freedom.
The narratives intertwine and converge, bearing witness not only to intentions but also to the impact they create. Through enchanting flashes of illumination, the novelist Dr. Fatima Al-Hajji explores the layers of the wounded Arab name and the pain of screams, specifically in the lower layers of the state and society in modern Libya.
The novel’s characters meet on the gallows of darkness, swimming in circles of confusion through vast spaces of places and times, encompassing the entirety of existence. It brings together the present political times in modern Libya with a past that extends to ancient and modern myths. Hopes and burning eternal questions emerge in politics, revolution, and divinity, where fear, anxiety, and concern blend with passion and infatuation simultaneously.
These are the stories of Libyan women, whose love ignites in the labyrinthine corridors of the system. However, all of them end with a tragic, mournful wailing and a sorrowful Karbala-like consolation.
