Algeria Is Beautiful Like America

Algeria Is Beautiful Like America by Burton, Olivia. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9781941302569.

Olivia had always heard stories about Algeria from her maternal grandmother, a Black Foot (a "Pied-Noir," the French term for Christian and Jewish settlers of French Algeria who emigrated to France after the Algerian War of Independence). After her grandmothers death, Olivia found some of her grandmothers journals and letters describing her homeland. Now, ten years later, she resolves to travel to Algeria and experience the country for herself; she arrives alone, with her grandmothers postcards and letters in tow, and a single phone number in her pocket of an Algerian, Djaffar, who will act as her guide. Olivias quest to understand her origins will bring her to face questions about heritage, history, shame, friendship, memory, nostalgia, fantasy, the nature of exile, and our unending quest to understand who we are and where we come from.