The beautiful west & the beloved of God - 105 (First edition.)

In the spring of 2008 Elena, who recently moved to Montreal with her seven year old daughter, Sharon, finds a job in a retail store on Sherbrooke Street. She meets Mahfouz working in his family's fast food outlet on The Main. Partially as an antidote to her chronic loneliness, partially influenced by Sharon's spontaneous affection for him, Elena commits to a deepening relationship. Together the three of them enjoy a wonderful spring. That summer, however, Mahfouz doesn't return from a visit to Cairo, and his father is picked up and held indefinitely for unknown charges on undisclosed evidence. Elena and Mahfouz, no longer in any contact with each other, must separately come to terms with their historical situation, and prepare for a future shaped by forces they struggle to understand.