Oroppa
Europe as seen through the disillusioned but loving gaze of migrants in this phenomenal mosaic novel
It’s rare for a debut to cause such a stir: rave reviews, a spot on the bestseller list and the highest number of mentions in ‘best of 2024’ round-ups in the Netherlands. Oroppa is an ode to Europe in the form of a kaleidoscope of stories from people living there or passing through.
Salomé Abergel, an established Jewish Moroccan artist and former political dissident, goes missing at the height of her career. A group of outcasts, all of them from migrant backgrounds, become involved in her mysterious disappearance. Hind el Arian, part-time waitress and full-time stoner, finds herself guarding Salomé’s paintings in her absence. Irad Abergel, Salomé’s son and the owner of a bar in Paris, is haunted by his mother’s past. And Yousef Slaoui, also known as The Pilgrim, arrives in Europe and tries to come to terms with his actions as an infamous interrogator in Morocco’s clandestine prisons during the Years of Lead.
We travel from Salomé’s deserted house in Amsterdam to Paris, Tunis, Cairo, and Casablanca. It’s a dazzling joyride through coffee shops, laundrettes and bars, crisscrossing the territory of the 21st arrondissement – a mythical place that cannot be pinpointed on any map. Polyphonic, splendidly human and thrillingly alive, Oroppa is an electrifying quest novel by a bold new talent that lifts the lid on a covert world. It’s a head-spinning, labyrinthine tale spanning the post-colonial histories of North Africa and Europe that makes us rethink what it means to be European.
Rights
Peters Frasers + Dunlop
Lisette Verhagen
lverhagen@pfd.co.uk
Sample Translation
“With boundless energy, El Khannoussi takes us to the hidden corners of Europe. Oroppa can only be compared with the best of South American literature.”
“The novel shows compellingly how Morocco’s colonial and political history still affects the lives of migrants in European cities today (Berlin, Amsterdam, Paris). I read it as a swirling ode to resistance, celebratory without being naive about the damage people suffer. Oroppa also shows that stories are like water, finding their way no matter what.”
“Oroppa is a metafictional masterpiece. It made me feel like I was reading a Salman Rushdie novel. Safae el Khannoussi writes stories in stories and effortlessly takes the reader into the present, the past and the imagination.”
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