Book Talk: "Waters Under Baghdad"
with Dr. Zaid Brifkani
We are pleased to welcome Dr. Zaid Brifkani, author of The Mountains We Carry, who will give a book talk about his much anticipated second novel, Waters Under Baghdad.
The novel concerns Faisal, a young man from Baghdad, who loses his family and home during wartime. He flees his country, and at the Belarus-Poland border, he is stranded in the infamous refugee crisis of 2019, along with thousands of other migrants. There he meets Gulistan, an Kurdish woman who reminds him of his mother and who lost family members of her own. Faisal vows to help her find them. Meanwhile he reflects on his own family’s history going back three generations, to the birth of a new Iraq amid the ashes of the Ottoman Empire.
The book becomes a multigenerational epic, tracing Faisal’s family through revolutions and coups to the US invasion, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, and its consequences. Shutting between past and present, the story feels equally urgent and timeless. It gives readers insight into how historical events affect ordinary people, as they deal with war wounds, economic stress, grief and loss, devastation and death, religious radicalization and dashed hopes.
Dr. Brifkani will be available to sign copies of the book after his talk. Enjoy our promotional video here, created by Aram Hassan Abdullah.
Zaid Brifkani grew up in Duhok, during a turbulent era of political unrest and war in Iraq. When he was 16, his family migrated to the United States and settled in Nashville. There he built a life as a U.S. citizen: he is a practicing physician specializing in kidney transplants, with a passion for serving rural America. He is a founding member of Kurdish Professionals and is president/CEO of the Kidney Care Clinic. All the while, he has maintained this connection to his Kurdish heritage and culture. He makes regular trips back home and donates his time to medical and community organizations.
The NYKCC Book Club read and enjoyed Dr. Brifkani’s debut novel, The Mountains We Carry, discussing it on October 4, 2022.
