New Release: Someone's Daughter
A short story written by Ahmad M. Elkhuwaja and co-illustrated by Ahmad M. Elkhuwaja and Maria Ahmed.
We are excited for the release of Someone’s Daughter. Fast-moving and tender, this is the first part of a groundbreaking and breathtaking four-part series, entitled Lives on the Shore.
About the collection
Lives on the Shore is a four-part collection of short story zines unfolding across the 2023–2025 genocide in the Gaza Strip, Palestine. The stories trace the intertwined lives of Palestinians and the Israeli military. The collection captures not just the destruction of a place, but the persistence of ordinary existence within it.
Lives on the Shore invites the reader into a suspended world, one where human lives, time, and memory blur into each other like the tide. Together, these stories form a constellation of simultaneous experiences, reflecting a shared, haunted world where every life is a shore to another.
What does love look like under drones?
Can you still plan dinner, send a message, or dream when the world is collapsing around you?
Between dust and memory, hunger and tenderness, these stories hold on to what it means to be human.—Ahmad M. Elkhuwaja
About the story
A young couple meets in the ruins, defying everything, stealing moments to feel human once again. Above them, an eye watches from a distance. Between the watcher and the watched, a single moment will decide everything.
Opening
The morning breeze was mixed with gunpowder. Wind rattled the tent’s patchwork flaps and scattered the ashes of last night’s fire into the shape of a circle. Salma lay on her thin mattress, staring at the shadow of the plastic ceiling. Her father’s cough marked the hours better than any clock. The call to the morning prayer had been gone for more than two years.
Read by Ahmad M. Elkhuwaja
Want a copy of this stunning new zine?
Ahmad’s fundraiser is sponsored by Arablit. To ensure all funds are directed to him, please specify that your payment is for “Ahmad Elkhuwaja’s zine: Someone’s Daughter.”
To receive a digital or print copy of Someone’s Daughter, send your proof of donation to coastallinespress@gmail.com. For print copies, include your full name and address in the email.
Find out more about digital, print and translated copies on Get Your Copy.
If you’re a bookseller, bookstore or printing press and want to support this fundraiser by printing and distributing zines, contact the writers directly or email coastallinespress@gmail.com for PDF copies or more information. Proof of donation required. The QR code on each zine serves as the point of sale, and all profits go to the authors.
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The opening image of Salma staring at the tent ceiling while gunpowder mixes with the morning breeze is so powerfull. This story captures somthing essential about trying to hold onto love and humanity when the world is literally collapsing. The idea of a young couple meeting in ruins, with an eye watching from above, speaks to both the surveilance and the resilience of ordianry life under impossible circumstances. These kinds of intimate moments existing alongside violence is what makes this work so important.