WINNER OF THE ACCLAIMED SAWIRIS CULTURAL AWARD FOR CRITICISM AND LITERARY NARRATIVES 2026. When Dutch-born Gerda met Okasha, an Egyptian engineer in Egypt and fell in love, she chose to let her European past dissolve into the warmth of Egypt. Decades later, her daughter-bearing a foreign name but an entirely Egyptian soul-reconstructs her mother’s journey from World War II-era Holland to the industrial heart of Mahalla. Complete with intimate personal photographs, Al-Khawagaya is a heartbreakingly beautiful dialogue that documents Gerda’s ultimate battle with cognitive decline. Touted by critics as warmer and more expansive than Nobel laureate Annie Ernaux’s writings on maternal loss, this memoir is a luminous celebration of love, cultural hybridity, and the bittersweet preservation of family memory.