Vulture

"I grew up in Gaza and covered it until I left in 2017. This novel reminded me that fiction can reveal more about the people who bring us the news than reportage ever can. It shows the relentless stress of the work, the creeping numbness, and the small moments of humanity that survive in spite of everything. I was struck by how accurately it captures the younger version of myself: ambitious, chasing the biggest and riskiest stories, never stopping long enough to understand what that drive was doing to me. Vulture grasps the moral and personal cost of that pursuit with remarkable clarity. Its emotional center is the relationship between the Western correspondent and the local journalist, two people trying to report honestly in a place sealed off and constantly in danger. The novel also exposes the gendered hierarchy of war reporting, where young women are taken seriously only when catastrophe surrounds them. By the end, it reminded me what it meant to live that life and why I stepped outside it."