Wahid is a third-grader with an extraordinary lens on the world. To him, life is a mix of simple joys—Ismaily mangoes, professional wrestler John Cena, and the elegant structure of the Arabic language—and harsh realities, including an abusive household, a hatred for math, and a relentless war against the “cursed” black ants. Through Wahid’s unique, linguistic-driven philosophy, the reader is drawn into a hysterical, deeply moving vision of reality. Though he claims to be inept at rhetoric, Wahid dissects his surroundings with a child’s logic, searching for meaning in a world that is often a nightmare in disguise. Various Ways to Kill Ants is a haunting piece of dark comedy. Guided by a narrator who knows too much and too little at once, Mohamed El-Fouli crafts a story where innocence is tainted, and laughter and tears become indistinguishable. It is a brilliant, unsettling look at childhood survival, where the battle against tiny ants becomes a metaphor for the struggle to maintain one’s humanity in the face of domestic brutality.