Abstract: Framed around the city of Mosul, Haris al-Shams (Guardian of the Sun) by the Emirati Eman Alyousuf—a story in which the forces of life and death collide—is structured around three categories of place: non-places whose anonymity and lack of specificity form the foundations of a dysphoric world; referential places that call on the reader’s prior knowledge and highlight the city’s history; the land, a space that is both heterotopian and utopian, incarnating hope for a better life.
