Rare that I complete a novel in one sitting, and while quite brief, Adnan's work is provocative and as reflective as its speed allows, not so much due to the exchange of arguments during the titular character's "questioning," but from the incisive prose which bares both the character psychologies and, disturbingly, our own. Much has been written of the novel's dual attacks not just upon war and partisanship in Lebanon but the larger Arab culture. I was drawn, too, to her points about individual will or choice (especially as it applies to women here), and the diagnosis of polarizing rhetoric: "You're practicing idolatry to the group you belong to." Of course, the more vehement and compelling is Rose's rhetoric, the less she is heard. When she praises her agenda of love, her terrorists become most threatened. Whether there is hope in this novel or not, Adnan's work is an unsubtle reminder of what we live without it.