Dalal Mawad

On August 4 2020, a huge explosion in the heart of Beirut killed hundreds of people - it was the apocalypse of a sequence of events that have led to Lebanon's unprecedented collapse.

Award-winning journalist Dalal Mawad was in Lebanon when the blast happened, and was one of the first journalists to report on the mysterious and devastating explosion. During her reporting, she discovered something else - that it is the women who stay behind, and it is through their stories that the history of the Middle East must be re-constructed.

The personal stories of the women in this book converged to tell the story of a nation whose glory days are long gone, now riven by protracted violence, lurching from crisis to crisis, and fighting to survive. It tells not only of what these women have lost, but also what Lebanon has lost.