In Dan Mayland's gorgeous, demanding novel The Doctor of Aleppo, American Hannah Johnson can't leave Syria. At first, she doesn't want to go home: as the daughter of a Syrian immigrant to the United States, she's both tied to the country and hopeful that her work on a municipal park project will bring beauty to a struggling Aleppo. But as the civil war intensifies, Hannah's freedom of movement - and her personal ties - make leaving the country nearly impossible.
Another character clinging to Syria is Rahim, a leader in Assad's secret police. When Rahim's son is injured in a car accident, he meets Hannah, who sits by her Swedish boyfriend's bedside as he recovers from surgery on his leg. Standing between them is Dr. Sami Hasan, a Syrian surgeon whose hope to practice medicine while staying neutral in the battle between the rebels and the Assad regime backfires after a seemingly accidental mix-up at the hospital. Hannah, Dr. Sami, and Rahim float through each other's orbits in The Doctor of Aleppo, their fates increasingly bound up together and dependent upon their resiliency, conviction, and ability to forgive.
Mayland, who is described as a "geopolitical forecaster" in his biography, demonstrates an extensive knowledge of the civil war in Syria and seems to possess a strong understanding for the literal geography of the city as it was during the 2010s, when this story takes place. While sensitive readers may want to skip The Doctor of Aleppo because of its frank depictions of gruesome injuries, torture, and extrajudicial killings, a novel about Aleppo's brutal civil war would not be complete without these elements.
The book's Iraqi-Canadian narrator Fajer Al-Kaisi brings even more life and spirit to an already vibrant novel. Al-Kaisi bears a heavy load, reading in the accents of Syrian, Swedish, American, and British characters, but he manages it well while imbuing both urgency and empathy into every line.
Blackstone Audio (2020)
[Review originally published at SoundCommentary, a now-defunct journal for audiobook reviews, Dec. 2021]