The Ruins of Us

Travel Guide

Author Keija Parssinen has lived in both the USA and Saudi Arabia so the contrasts between the two cultures and lifestyles comes from first hand knowledge. She was born in Saudi Arabia and so has a unique insight of the country from an early age.

Rosalie moves to Saudi Arabia with her Saudi husband. The move for any woman from another land cannot be easy and for Rosalie, who is American, is is no easy ride as she has a lot to deal with in her new everyday –

“The taking of a second wife is just one cultural shift that she will have to deal with but it’s a major one and one that is just too hard to bear in this dusty, unforgiving place.”

Faisal becomes an extremist as he has confusing feelings about their lifestyle and starts to question his mother’s background and culture. Faisal becomes  radicalised whilst his family remain oblivious to the fact. But then this is a scary thing in itself for is this not how bored men from relatively normal families end up being adopted by terrorists and other groups. A boy feeling lost and at a cultural crossroads, guilty at being half American whilst his father is Saudi through and through could be representative of many more men like Faisal.

This side to Saudi life – through Faisal’s eyes was perhaps the most unique viewpoint we’d read about it a long while.

Her daughter on the other hand becomes a blogger and activist for women’s rights.

But Rosalie remains in love with her adopted land despite the problems it causes her –

“Rosalie searched her memories for those moments in which she might have constructed her obsession with Arabia. A land that did not want her, that perhaps did not want anybody.”