LUSINE KHARATYAN JOINS THE ARI AGENCY LIST OF AUTHORS
We have a new author joining our list of Armenian contemporary authors. With the arrival of Lusine our list becomes more gender balanced. Only a couple of years ago, we had a different picture. We value the equal representation of men and women in our list, but never intentionally work with either of them for solely that purpose. But we are happy that there are more women who submit their work to us and eventually join our list.
Now, please meet Lusine Kharatyan.
Lusine Kharatyan is a cultural anthropologist and fiction writer. Her writing is significantly influenced by her anthropological research and fieldwork. Lusine holds a Master’s degree in Public Policy from the University of Minnesota, General Diploma in Demography from Cairo Demographic Center, and a Bachelor’s Degree in History and Socio-Cultural Anthropology from Yerevan State University. Her short story collection Dead End Forget-Me-Not, was shortlisted for the European Union Prize for Literature 2021 and her latest novel The Syrian Affair was nominated from Armenia for the same prize in 2023. She is the President of our Women Writer’s Committee of PEN Center Armenia.
Her latest novel, The Syrian Affair, is nominated for the European Prize for Literature 2023.
About The Syrian Affair
Astghik, Ester and Shushan are researchers from Armenia recruited by an unknown American organization to conduct a research on Syrian and Lebanese Armenians. For that purpose, the women have to travel to first Syria and then Lebanon, where they should meet and interview local Armenians. Upon their arrival in Syria, they catch the attention of the Syrian Secret Service, the Mukhabarat, as foreign agents spying for Israel and the USA. As they move in time and space, the women encounter different people and their stories. Woven into the main storyline of the novel, each story or encounter is also an autonomous, self-sufficient story in itself, thus creating and recreating a complex and multi-dimensional reality of the multiple contexts. On top of everything, the trio has to deal with each other and their pasts, while doing research and being followed and interrogated by the Secret Service. Loosely written in a travelogue style, the novel A Syrian Affair is a semi-documentary fiction with some elements of science fiction. Set in the pre-war Syria, it is an atmospheric, fast-pace, multi-layered and engaging story dealing with the themes of trust, fear, political beliefs, research ethics, womanhood, sexuality, violence, conspiracy, authoritarianism, and history.
