Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah

A vivid love letter to the 1980s and one woman's struggle to overcome the challenges of immigration.

It's 1986, and Muna Heddad is in a bind. She and her son have moved to Montreal, leaving behind a civil war filled with bad memories in Lebanon. She had plans to find work as a French teacher, but no one in Quebec trusts her to teach the language. She needs to start making money, and fast. The only work Muna can find is at a weight-loss center as a hotline operator.

All day, she takes calls from people responding to ads seen in magazines or on TV. On the phone, she's Mona, and she's quite good at listening. These strangers all have so much to say once someone shows interest in their lives-marriages gone bad, parents dying, isolation, personal inadequacies. Even as her daily life in Canada is filled with invisible barriers at every turn, at the office Muna is privy to her clients' deepest secrets. (From Vehicule Press)

Hotlinewill bechampioned by Bhangra dancer Gurdeep PandheronCanada Reads2023.

TheCanada Readsdebates will take place on March 27-30. This year, we are looking for one book to shift your perspective.

• Meet theCanada Reads2023 contenders

They will be hosted byAli Hassanandwill be broadcast onCBC Radio One,CBC TV,CBC Gemand onCBC Books.

LISTEN | Dimitri Nasrallah on making the Canada Reads longlist:

Hotlinewaslonglisted for the 2022 Scotiabank Giller Prizeand was named one of thebest works of Canadian fiction in 2022 by CBC Books.

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• How Dimitri Nasrallah's mother inspired his novelHotline
• 24 Canadian books to get the historical fiction fan

Dimitri Nasrallah is a writer from Lebanon. He is the author of novelsThe Bleeds,NikoandBlackbodying. Nasrallah lives in Montreal and is the fiction editor at Vhicule Press.

Why Dimitri Nasrallah wrote Hotline

"Hotlineis loosely inspired by my mother's own story. My parents applied for immigration to Canada. One of the things that ended up moving them further up the list was my parents' French skills, specifically my mother being a French teacher by profession.

But now I see just how profoundly complicated it is for someone who just arrivesin Canada and in Quebec specifically to navigate their way through thissociety in the first year or two.- Dimitri Nasrallah

"I'm in my mid-40s now, and I find myself in roughly the same space that she was in when she first arrived here. Obviously, I have a much bigger head start because of how long I've lived here, but I understand better now what she had to go through. At the time, I don't think I saw that as clearly. I saw it more from the perspective of this child who was maybe being ignored, who was left to the side. But now I see just how profoundly complicated it is for someone who just arrivesin Canada and in Quebec specifically to navigate their way through thissociety in the first year or two."

Read more from his interview on CBC Radio's Let's Go.

More interviews withDimitri Nasrallah

Other books by Dimitri Nasrallah