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Every Moment Is a Life: Gaza in the Time of Genocide
Not yet published
Expected 10 Feb 26Compiled by bestselling author susan abulhawa, an Arabic-English bilingual anthology of essays from eighteen young Palestinian writers trying to survive the genocide in Gaza.
In early 2024, writer and activist susan abulhawa managed to enter Gaza twice using her medical credentials. There, at the Culture and Free Thought Association, susan held a series of workshops for young people who had been displaced to tent encampments. The lives of all participants were marked by unrelenting Israeli violence and extraordinary loss—of home, family, safety, education, electricity, and all the structures of life. They’d fled from place to place as Israel’s colonial violence swirled around them, complete with food and water insecurity and constant threat. Still, despite the bitterness of life in tents and the dangers of travel, they came together to share in the refuge of writing and community.
Samya recounts a tender moment with an old man mending shoes in the street, while her cousin Saja hides books in her closet, hoping they and her home will still be there when she returns. Ghassan is haunted by the baby he rescued from the rubble, who for a time became his son. Fatima risks it all retrieve her clothes from a danger zone buzzing with drones and warplanes. Maram’s loving aunt is gone, and chaos inhabits Amr’s mind. Samah, Lubna, Rizq, and Nebal take us by the hand through raining death, trails of tears, classroom shelters, and shared clothes in crowded tents.
Every Moment Is a Life delivers rare, unfiltered portraits of life in the holocaust of our time, platforming the emerging voices struggling to survive in Gaza today. These essays are raw and real, capturing human moments—buying bread, going to the bathroom, sharing a meal, drinking coffee—all set against the backdrop of history’s first livestreamed genocide. With courage, anger, love, agony, and—impossibly—hope, these achingly tender voices from Gaza will stay with us, captured in these pages, forever.
*All proceeds go to the contributors and to Palestine Writes Literature Festival to be redistributed as aid in Gaza
In early 2024, writer and activist susan abulhawa managed to enter Gaza twice using her medical credentials. There, at the Culture and Free Thought Association, susan held a series of workshops for young people who had been displaced to tent encampments. The lives of all participants were marked by unrelenting Israeli violence and extraordinary loss—of home, family, safety, education, electricity, and all the structures of life. They’d fled from place to place as Israel’s colonial violence swirled around them, complete with food and water insecurity and constant threat. Still, despite the bitterness of life in tents and the dangers of travel, they came together to share in the refuge of writing and community.
Samya recounts a tender moment with an old man mending shoes in the street, while her cousin Saja hides books in her closet, hoping they and her home will still be there when she returns. Ghassan is haunted by the baby he rescued from the rubble, who for a time became his son. Fatima risks it all retrieve her clothes from a danger zone buzzing with drones and warplanes. Maram’s loving aunt is gone, and chaos inhabits Amr’s mind. Samah, Lubna, Rizq, and Nebal take us by the hand through raining death, trails of tears, classroom shelters, and shared clothes in crowded tents.
Every Moment Is a Life delivers rare, unfiltered portraits of life in the holocaust of our time, platforming the emerging voices struggling to survive in Gaza today. These essays are raw and real, capturing human moments—buying bread, going to the bathroom, sharing a meal, drinking coffee—all set against the backdrop of history’s first livestreamed genocide. With courage, anger, love, agony, and—impossibly—hope, these achingly tender voices from Gaza will stay with us, captured in these pages, forever.
*All proceeds go to the contributors and to Palestine Writes Literature Festival to be redistributed as aid in Gaza
- GenresNonfictionEssays
224 pages, Paperback
Expected publication February 10, 2026
3 people are currently reading
270 people want to read
About the author
Susan Abulhawa
13 books5,898 followersAlso Susan Abulhawa
(Arabic: سوزان أبو الهوى)
susan abulhawa was born to refugees of the 1967 war when Israel captured what remained of Palestine, including Jerusalem. She currently lives in Pennsylvania with her daughter. She is the founder and President of Playgrounds for Palestine, a children’s organization dedicated to upholding The Right to Play for Palestinian children. Her debut novel, Mornings in Jenin, was an international bestseller, translated into 30 languages. Her second novel, The Blue Between Sky and Water, was likewise a bestseller, translated into 20 languages. The reach of her books and volume of her readership have made abulhawa one of the most widely read Arab authors in the world. Her latest novel, Against the Loveless World is out August 25, 2020.
(Arabic: سوزان أبو الهوى)
susan abulhawa was born to refugees of the 1967 war when Israel captured what remained of Palestine, including Jerusalem. She currently lives in Pennsylvania with her daughter. She is the founder and President of Playgrounds for Palestine, a children’s organization dedicated to upholding The Right to Play for Palestinian children. Her debut novel, Mornings in Jenin, was an international bestseller, translated into 30 languages. Her second novel, The Blue Between Sky and Water, was likewise a bestseller, translated into 20 languages. The reach of her books and volume of her readership have made abulhawa one of the most widely read Arab authors in the world. Her latest novel, Against the Loveless World is out August 25, 2020.
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November 11, 2025abulhawa talks in the intro about how she told those young writers to focus on details, on precise feelings, on what their own senses could record. and i wish she didn't, because that just ensured those stories slice through your heart so much harder. it's unbearable. after over two years of watching a live-stream of a genocide, a simple written story can still make you wanna scream.
October 28, 2025
Susan Abulhawa, a world-class writer and exemplary literary citizen, has broken through the walls of censorship to bring the voices of Gaza to the English speaking world. In these deeply personal stories, Palestinians tell us what it is like to live through the mass murder and wanton destruction imposed by Israel on Gaza. The writings are detailed, specific in their renderings of the daily cataclysm. From sleeping with strangers, the frailty of tents, the sounds of killing, the fear and then reality of endless loss, from the indignity of over-crowded latrines, to panic of dreams, these writers bravely document their memories, desires, transitions from comfort to deprivation, the importance of a cup of coffee, of a memento of a previous life, of the recollection of a hope. A frontline teacher, Abulhawa makes describing the impossible, doable, and the world is made more intelligent by this massive accomplishment.
January 7, 2026
This is a very short book of narratives by young Palestinians about their experiences during the war in Gaza. I struggled with the editor’s framing of the book—the very first page refers to October 7th as an “indigenous resistance operation” rather than the insane massacre I know. But I don’t agree with the mass bombing of Gaza, and I was grateful to read these narratives about people’s experiences as refugees and struggling through it all. The repeated mentions of coffee were striking—when you have lost almost everything, what makes someone feel they can keep going? Apparently, coffee.
The short narratives are almost all very well written. I was disappointed to realize that the English part of the ebook ends at about 40% of the total pages—the rest is in Arabic.
I received an advance reader copy of this book from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review.
The short narratives are almost all very well written. I was disappointed to realize that the English part of the ebook ends at about 40% of the total pages—the rest is in Arabic.
I received an advance reader copy of this book from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review.
January 11, 2026
Thank you so Atria Books for an arc copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
This was a deeply emotional collection of stories. The writings brought me to tears many times. Each story was detailed and very compelling. They exhibited a range of emotions from grief to love to hope.
It is hard to put into words the importance of this book. It is one that everyone should read.
This was a deeply emotional collection of stories. The writings brought me to tears many times. Each story was detailed and very compelling. They exhibited a range of emotions from grief to love to hope.
It is hard to put into words the importance of this book. It is one that everyone should read.
Review of advance copy received from Edelweiss+
Susan Abulhawa’s Every Moment Is a Life is a searing, uncompromising testament to human suffering and endurance in Gaza in the wake of the Israeli incursion following the October 7 massacre in Israel. Slim in volume yet immense in emotional and moral weight, this collection of essays bears witness to lives shattered by violence, displacement, and relentless loss. It is not a book one reads casually or quickly; rather, it demands pauses, silences, and a willingness to sit with profound discomfort.
Abulhawa curates and presents the voices of Gaza’s survivors with a restraint that heightens their power. These are not abstract political arguments or distant statistics, but intimate accounts of indignities endured, families torn apart, and the daily terror of existence under siege. The language—rendered with care in both English and Arabic—retains a raw immediacy that makes the reader feel less like an observer and more like a witness. The pain expressed in these pages is unvarnished and deeply human, so much so that reading more than a few essays at a time can feel overwhelming.
What makes Every Moment Is a Life especially devastating is its insistence on the individuality of suffering. Each essay affirms that every life lost, every childhood interrupted, every moment stolen by violence carries its own irreplaceable weight. In doing so, the book resists the numbing effect of large-scale tragedy and restores moral clarity: these are not faceless casualties, but people whose inner lives, memories, and hopes matter.
At its core, this work forces readers to confront the enduring truth of humanity’s capacity for cruelty—man’s inhumanity to man—while also illuminating the fragile persistence of dignity amid devastation. There are glimmers of resilience and love threaded through the darkness, but they do not soften the horror; instead, they underscore what is at stake. Abulhawa does not offer easy answers or consolations. The hope that emerges is tentative and hard-won: a hope that bearing witness might itself be an act of resistance, and that acknowledgment may one day give way to justice.
Every Moment Is a Life is a painful, necessary book. It asks much of its readers—empathy, courage, and moral attention—but what it offers in return is profound: a reminder that to look away is to participate in erasure, and that to read, to listen, and to remember is to affirm life itself, even in the darkest of times.
Thank you to Edelweiss and the publisher for an ARC in return for an honest review.
Abulhawa curates and presents the voices of Gaza’s survivors with a restraint that heightens their power. These are not abstract political arguments or distant statistics, but intimate accounts of indignities endured, families torn apart, and the daily terror of existence under siege. The language—rendered with care in both English and Arabic—retains a raw immediacy that makes the reader feel less like an observer and more like a witness. The pain expressed in these pages is unvarnished and deeply human, so much so that reading more than a few essays at a time can feel overwhelming.
What makes Every Moment Is a Life especially devastating is its insistence on the individuality of suffering. Each essay affirms that every life lost, every childhood interrupted, every moment stolen by violence carries its own irreplaceable weight. In doing so, the book resists the numbing effect of large-scale tragedy and restores moral clarity: these are not faceless casualties, but people whose inner lives, memories, and hopes matter.
At its core, this work forces readers to confront the enduring truth of humanity’s capacity for cruelty—man’s inhumanity to man—while also illuminating the fragile persistence of dignity amid devastation. There are glimmers of resilience and love threaded through the darkness, but they do not soften the horror; instead, they underscore what is at stake. Abulhawa does not offer easy answers or consolations. The hope that emerges is tentative and hard-won: a hope that bearing witness might itself be an act of resistance, and that acknowledgment may one day give way to justice.
Every Moment Is a Life is a painful, necessary book. It asks much of its readers—empathy, courage, and moral attention—but what it offers in return is profound: a reminder that to look away is to participate in erasure, and that to read, to listen, and to remember is to affirm life itself, even in the darkest of times.
Thank you to Edelweiss and the publisher for an ARC in return for an honest review.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Able to enter Gaza a few times because of her medical credentials, Susan Abulhawa held a series of writing workshops in early 2024 with Palestinians who had been displaced to tent encampments because of the ongoing g*nocide. This book is a compilation of the stories those individuals wrote about their experiences with i*raeli colonial violence, and the refuge they shared together in writing and sharing their stories in these workshops.
“Palestinians in Gaza should be given every platform to narrate this extraordinary moment in history, the terrible details of which only they can truly know” - Susan Abulhawa.
As i*rael’s relentless g*nocide against Palestinians continues, we must do everything we can to centre their voices, stories, and more. This anthology serves as a way to amplify Palestinian voices and stories, especially when social media and western news sources do everything they can to shadowban and censor Palestinians and those trying to spread awareness.
The stories compiled in this collection are filled with loss, d*ath, grief, violence, colonialism, hope, love, family, and so much more. They are heartbreaking to read, and with each story I wondered whether the writer was still alive. Because according to Dr. Gideon Polya and Professor Richard Hil (see link in bio for article) the d*ath toll in Gaza between October 7th, 2023, and April 2025, is at least 680 000 Palestinians. Please think about that for a moment, not just the numbers but the idea of reading an anthology and wondering and hoping that the writers are still alive. And then, once you’ve realized the significance of that, tell everyone you know about this, because the d*ath toll continues to rise as i*rael attempts to m*rder an entire population for land, greed, racism, the list goes on.
Each story in this compilation is honest and raw. Ghassan Salam wrote about the care he gave to an unknown baby whose family d*ed, and the connection they fostered with them. Salam named the baby Ma’rouf, which means both “known,” and “a kindness.” Saja Laham reflected on their bedroom, a place of comfort and solitude, that they had to leave behind when they were displaced. And Maram Hammou wrote a heartbreaking story of when they found out their aunt had d*ed when their house was b*mbed by the occupation. These are just three of the many stories included in this anthology.
I’m very grateful to have read these stories, ones that will stay with me forever. Each detail and word felt important, and each story evoked so many emotions for me. This book encourages readers to think more critically about the effects of g*nocide and colonial violence. Palestinians are not numbers in injured and d*ath tolls we see in the news everyday; rather, they are humans, individuals who had/have lives, families, loved ones, aspirations, goals, dreams, etc. It’s unfortunately easy to forget something like this when we’re so far removed from it, when we have privilege, and this book serves as a stark reminder that we mustn’t forget this, that we have to continue to remember our shared humanity.
Every Moment Is a Life is a necessary book for everyone to read. Talk about it, SCREAM about it, because liberation is the only thing that matters.
Thank you One Signal Publishers for the ARC!
“Palestinians in Gaza should be given every platform to narrate this extraordinary moment in history, the terrible details of which only they can truly know” - Susan Abulhawa.
As i*rael’s relentless g*nocide against Palestinians continues, we must do everything we can to centre their voices, stories, and more. This anthology serves as a way to amplify Palestinian voices and stories, especially when social media and western news sources do everything they can to shadowban and censor Palestinians and those trying to spread awareness.
The stories compiled in this collection are filled with loss, d*ath, grief, violence, colonialism, hope, love, family, and so much more. They are heartbreaking to read, and with each story I wondered whether the writer was still alive. Because according to Dr. Gideon Polya and Professor Richard Hil (see link in bio for article) the d*ath toll in Gaza between October 7th, 2023, and April 2025, is at least 680 000 Palestinians. Please think about that for a moment, not just the numbers but the idea of reading an anthology and wondering and hoping that the writers are still alive. And then, once you’ve realized the significance of that, tell everyone you know about this, because the d*ath toll continues to rise as i*rael attempts to m*rder an entire population for land, greed, racism, the list goes on.
Each story in this compilation is honest and raw. Ghassan Salam wrote about the care he gave to an unknown baby whose family d*ed, and the connection they fostered with them. Salam named the baby Ma’rouf, which means both “known,” and “a kindness.” Saja Laham reflected on their bedroom, a place of comfort and solitude, that they had to leave behind when they were displaced. And Maram Hammou wrote a heartbreaking story of when they found out their aunt had d*ed when their house was b*mbed by the occupation. These are just three of the many stories included in this anthology.
I’m very grateful to have read these stories, ones that will stay with me forever. Each detail and word felt important, and each story evoked so many emotions for me. This book encourages readers to think more critically about the effects of g*nocide and colonial violence. Palestinians are not numbers in injured and d*ath tolls we see in the news everyday; rather, they are humans, individuals who had/have lives, families, loved ones, aspirations, goals, dreams, etc. It’s unfortunately easy to forget something like this when we’re so far removed from it, when we have privilege, and this book serves as a stark reminder that we mustn’t forget this, that we have to continue to remember our shared humanity.
Every Moment Is a Life is a necessary book for everyone to read. Talk about it, SCREAM about it, because liberation is the only thing that matters.
Thank you One Signal Publishers for the ARC!
January 5, 2026
This is a series of essays written by Palestinians in Gaza, curated by the author Susan Abulhawa. The essays are short - around 3 pages each- but the vignettes of a life in genocide are so stark and powerful. I found myself highlighting passages of each because I wanted to remember these experiences. The essay of a woman giving birth and packing what hand me downs she could find - no diapers, wrong season clothes (summer in winter) that won’t keep her newborn warm - was heartbreaking as a mother who remembers the joy and excitement of bringing a baby home. I’ve often wondered what happens to all the small children whose entire families are killed, who are too small to even know their name. One essay is by a man who finds such a toddler and cares for him as his own son, only to part with him to an aunt who heard the baby had been found, and then as he sat in terror thinking of his adopted son’s safety away from him. It ends as heartbreakingly as you think.
This collection is short and I think important. These are real people living through a genocide our tax dollars have paid for. We should know what they are living through.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the advance review copy. Every Moment is a Life comes out Feb 10, 2026.
This collection is short and I think important. These are real people living through a genocide our tax dollars have paid for. We should know what they are living through.
Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the advance review copy. Every Moment is a Life comes out Feb 10, 2026.
December 6, 2025
Somehow, some way, a group of Palestinians gathered in the midst of genocide to learn how to write the stories of their real lives.
Each chapter is a story, representing whatever each author wished for us to know. I can't do justice to the content here. I think this is one you just pick up and read yourself. You won't regret it. Also, keep reading past the last story to learn about and see each author.
"One charred fragment escaped the blaze ... It bore just two words, untouched by the fire: 'the living.'"
Note that half of the book is an English translation and the other half is the original Arabic.
Thank you to Edelweiss+ and Atria/One Signal Publishers | Simon & Schuster for the advance copy.
Each chapter is a story, representing whatever each author wished for us to know. I can't do justice to the content here. I think this is one you just pick up and read yourself. You won't regret it. Also, keep reading past the last story to learn about and see each author.
"One charred fragment escaped the blaze ... It bore just two words, untouched by the fire: 'the living.'"
Note that half of the book is an English translation and the other half is the original Arabic.
Thank you to Edelweiss+ and Atria/One Signal Publishers | Simon & Schuster for the advance copy.
November 20, 2025
How can one even give rating or review to the experiences of those actively living and existing during a genocide?
This anthology is a reminder that regardless of social media or general media displays, there will be (im)perfect victims, yet nevertheless all stories of Gaza should be shared and heard. The authors who contributed to this anthology hold steadfast to their truths with every page and every word; readers will have no choice but to listen and witness.
Though I was given an ARC, all proceeds from the book go directly to the contributors in Gaza and to the Palestine Writes Literature Festival, so I will be purchasing a copy once it is published
This anthology is a reminder that regardless of social media or general media displays, there will be (im)perfect victims, yet nevertheless all stories of Gaza should be shared and heard. The authors who contributed to this anthology hold steadfast to their truths with every page and every word; readers will have no choice but to listen and witness.
Though I was given an ARC, all proceeds from the book go directly to the contributors in Gaza and to the Palestine Writes Literature Festival, so I will be purchasing a copy once it is published
Displaying 1 - 9 of 9 reviews