Reviewed by: Adieu Oran par Ahmed Tiab Jennifer L. Holm Tiab, Ahmed. Adieu Oran. L'Aube, 2019. ISBN 978-2-8159-3191-5. Pp. 256. Kémal Fadil, an altruistic and clear-eyed police chief in Oran, must piece together the death of three Chinese businessmen, the rape of a young Cameroonian refugee, a trail of missing and sexually exploited children, and the gruesome murder of several Algerian men. These gripping crimes quickly proliferate in the novel's opening, transporting readers and Fadil through the streets of Oran into the unsavory slums and to the country's desert frontier. While advancing the plot, these horrifying scenes foreground a critical assessment of contemporary Algeria. Through Fadil's musings and the unveiling of clues, the narrator develops a second storyline demonstrating how the unchecked power of the military, a seemingly defunct political leader, a growing population of discarded and disaffected citizens, and the increasingly indistinguishable relationship between Islam and the Algerian state have led to unbridled corruption, rampant human trafficking and prostitution, the dissipation of human rights for immigrants and women, and eventual violent protest. In this way, Ahmed Tiab's narrative anticipates real events that have played out in Algeria since the novel's publication as much as it reacts to the nation's recent past. The prevailing sentiment is sadness and regret. Fadil's mother, Léla, finds solace living in her old apartment. She quietly laments the state of the land that she once fought to defend. In her eyes, Algeria has become "de plus en plus intolérante, enfermée dans un quotidien impitoyable qui ne laissait de répit à personne" (284). Fatou, Fadil's girlfriend and a refugee from Niger, is a nurse who tends to the nation's poorest and to marginalized immigrant communities. Fadil is equally altruistic, though more cynical. His unwillingness to compromise his values and his country, to play political games and succumb to the enticement of power and money, causes Fadil and his family to find themselves at the center of the entangled web of crimes he is trying to unravel. Thus, in the middle of his investigation, Fadil must rescue Fatou and ultimately alter his family's destiny. Ultimately, Fadil, his family, and his colleagues are characters of the past, representative of a bygone era. Elaborate descriptions of the smells and sounds of Oran punctuate the narrative. Fadil and his companions enjoy sumptuous meals of couscous and gather in communion and laughter. These sensory experiences develop a certain nostalgia for an Oran and an Algeria of the past, for a time that, as the novel progresses, seems to be slipping away with increasing haste, never to be recaptured. Indeed, the novel's title portends the impossibility of return—for Fadil, his family, and his country, there may be no return to the nation's better days and better ways. At the end of this fourth installment of the Kémal Fadil series, we are left to wonder what the future holds for this character and this country. [End Page 246] Jennifer L. Holm University of Virginia's College at Wise Copyright © 2021 American Association of Teachers of French
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Sep 28, 2023
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