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From their privileged childhood in Egypt, the paths of once-inseparable twins Taher and Aisha diverge early:
When the USSR invades Afghanistan, Taher abandons their shared plans to study medicine in Europe, instead joining their cousin, Ahmed, as a medic for the mujahideen fighting the Soviets. As Aisha’s Western perspective grows, so does her fear for her brother, who is becoming increasingly radicalized during the civil war between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance. With powerful imagery, Danuta Hinc’s When We Were Twins shows how innocence and loyalty to those we love can be twisted by political forces, leading a young man to choose a fateful path that changes the course of history.
“The questions Hinc’s novel explores—about love and war, about family, peace, and the price of freedom—couldn’t be more urgent. Her imagination revs at full throttle, and we would be wise to go along for the ride.”
— ASKOLD MELNYCZUK, author of The Man Who Would Not Bow
“Infused with urgency and propelled by a sense of the world in catastrophe mode…”
— SVEN BIRKERTS, author of Changing the Subject: Art and Attention in the Internet Age
“A deceptively simple novel brimming with visions and allegories…Hinc has created a work of historical imagination.”
— MARIA BUSTILLOS
“Taher is a memorable protagonist…A psychological snapshot of radicalization, intelligently charted by the author…”
— KIRKUS REVIEWS
"With empathy and compassion, Danuta Hinc’s fine novel erases the line between “us” and “them,” shedding light on the variety of human circumstances and delivering the uncomfortable truth that extremism is often in the eye of the beholder. When We Were Twins is a lean, beautifully written, important book."
—Clifford Thompson, author of What It Is: Race, Family, and One Thinking Black Man’s Blues and Big Man and the Little Men: A Graphic Novel
Danuta Hinc is a Polish American novelist, short story writer, and essayist. She holds an MA in Philology from the University of Gdańsk, where she won Poland’s National Competition for Best Dissertation in the Humanities, and she received an MFA in Writing and Literature from Bennington College, where she was awarded the Barry Hannah Merit Scholarship in Fiction. She teaches writing at the University of Maryland.
Evocations
Twins
Home
Sacred Room
Ahmed
Refugees
Little Omar
Escape
Beautiful Life
Naim
Tiny Mirrors
Wings