PositiveAir Mail... the book says nothing explicitly, but still manages to read like a thriller, in part because the lives of the marginalized are inherently full of suspense ... filled with light, sharp remarks ... The humanist screeds, delivered in lowbrow speech, come off not as moralizing but revelatory ... when Older Brother was published in France in 2017, it was praised for its convincing use of the banlieue vernacular. There are traces of that original genius in the translated edition, but much of the cadence of the language is lost—such is the tragedy of translated work. In its wake, there are American colloquialisms which distract, taking us away from the entirely believable world that the author Mahir Guven has constructed ... Guven makes elegant and confident connections between the lack of choice in the banlieues and the civil war in Syria, between immigration and terrorism.
