WRITE-PLACE

                           Crossing Borders - Brenda Abou El Ola

                         Published by Write-Place Publishing  

                                 ISBN 978-0-9559013-0-0

“I was a middle aged British teacher with grown up children. He was a Palestinian living in a notorious refugee camp in Lebanon, a member of Fatah the major Palestinian political party, with teenaged boys. I went to Lebanon and lived with my new family in Ein El Helwa camp, in Saida, (despite advice against this) Crossing Borders records the journey that we undertook to become a family and the problems that we seemed to hit at every turn. It tells of the gradual understanding through my experiences of the little that most of us know (or care) about other cultures and societies and how pre-conceived ideas, from the media or other, have a major impact on our impressions and comprehensions of the world, the people in it and the way we live. It is also an understanding of the barriers we humans put between ourselves, culturally, socially and emotionally, and the extent of the borders we are willing to cross.”

Reviews:

"...if someone self publishes and sends me a copy, it is rare for me to read it from cover to cover and even rarer for me to do that in a single day.

Reading "Crossing Borders" left me wanting more when I got to the end and found she did not go on to tell what it was like when they all came back to England. I am assured there is a sequel ... but when, I ask her, when?
The writing style is informative and almost chatty and drew me in to the whole scenario.
That's it, you want to know more, ask Brenda. For me it was an amazing read and left me full of admiration for her courage and her great, great love." 

        Dorothy Davies - Editor, and author of "Captain of The Wight"

“Brenda Abou El Ola’s book is a perceptive account of one woman’s experience of crossing borders – Britain’s and Lebanon’s. Two ‘ordinary’ people – both divorced, both with children – come face-to-face with red tape, misconceptions and each other as they struggle with language, customs and their own personalities. The author shows particular insight into her own character. “

        Jay Mandal – Author of  “The Dandelion Clock” “Slubberdegullion” “Different  Kind of Love” “Loss of Innocence” and others (BeWrite Books)

“It was hard to believe this was non fiction at some point, so descriptive and so flowing.”
         

                                                  www.write-place.co.uk

                                   Email : brendagunning15@hotmail.com

                                               info@write-place.co.uk     

                                           “Crossing Borders”

                  ISBN 978-0-9559013-0-0     

                                 Brenda Abou El Ola

                                         On Sale Now

                                              The Author

Brenda Gunning was born in Sunderland, in 1957, and came to Maltby in 1977 where she now lives. She has three children, four grandchildren, two step-children and two dogs.

After a variety of jobs whilst bringing up her children, she went to Sheffield Hallam University and became a Primary School teacher, working in Rotherham, Sheffield and Doncaster.

She has been writing most of her life and has had articles, short stories and poetry published in a number of magazines and newspapers.

"Crossing Borders" is her first published book.

The sequel to Crossing Borders will shortly be  available.                              

Extract :                 

                                 Chapter 3  -  First Days
A sound like a 1940’s air raid siren being slowly cranked up gradually penetrates my sleep disoriented ears. As I struggle into wakefulness it seems as if the siren has now been joined in disharmonic reverie with some ancient bagpipes. Then, after a struggle the sounds become almost recognizable as a voice, strangely stretched and wailing, distorted almost beyond human capability. It grows clearer and as it does so another voice joins with it from close by, then another from further away, echoing and reverberating across the roof tops and tree tops, and back around the town where I am sleeping.
‘God is great….there is no God but God..’
If I knew Arabic I would know that this is what we are being told in the first of the five exhortations to prayer of the day. This is the fajjer, the prayer of the sunrise, and though it is dark still, it must be approaching dawn. I reach for my watch in the darkness and see that it is 4.30am. It is easy for an infidel such as I to close eyes and ears against the calls and fall back asleep.
When I open my eyes again the heat is banging against the walls and windows with an incredible intensity and immediately my eyelids are raised I have to close them again against the glare of the sunlight. The brilliance and blueness of the sky is almost unnatural and for one moment I wonder if it’s this that has seeped into my sleeping brain but then I realise that it is another sound that has awoken me. The sound of a very loud repetitive voice coming through a loud speaker attached to a van. I assume it’s a van as the sound keeps moving away into the distance then back again, mingled with the rumble of an engine. I again have no idea of what is being said but it sounds to me like “matata, matata, matata” A few children’s voices can be heard also shouting back the words. I lay for a few more moments, studying the sounds and trying to decipher the meaning. I wonder if perhaps it is a party political broadcast or something of this kind and consider waking Ghassan to ask what is being said, as I do not want to miss the potential start of a political situation. How anyone can sleep through this noise is beyond me as there is now a further commotion starting outside and at last I get up to investigate.

     

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