After receiving a creativity award for her book “Methaly Kal-Qahwa” in 2019, as well as the “youngest novelist in CIBF 2019”, Merna Assem, 20, will have three novels in this year’s Cairo International Book Fair. “Methaly Kal-Qahwa”, a romantic novel that revolves around a rare psychological disorder, as well as “Aada Ghareeban” that discusses bullying and how it brings out a person’s evil side as a result of all the bullying they face.
Assem’s newest novel that enters the book fair for the first time this year is titled “Marionette: Le’abet Al-Jenn” by “Al-Olya” Printing and Publishing House and “Dar Al-Rasm Bel Kalimat”, which is about black magic with a horror twist and a slight romantic addition at the end.
“This book fair adds value to literally any book, as it provides a chance to all publishing houses to market for the books they will be representing, as well as the fact that it is going on for 15 days straight, with more than 30,000 people visiting daily and seeing the books,” said Assem, adding that there were authors who published their books in bookstores last year when the CIBF was postponed, and later on regretted their decision as their books didn’t receive that much recognition and therefore not many sales.
Assem doesn’t expect many book signing events to take place, as not all authors would be able to do so, considering the coronavirus’ impact. And the fact that tickets are reserved initially online with specific numbers of people to visit the fair daily, will make it a bit difficult to align one’s wish to get a book signed by their desired author.
At first she used to write just for the sake of enjoying writing, but the Cairo Book Fair encouraged her to develop her writing skills and create novels that were accessible and enjoyable for readers. Her first novel received great recognition, which she did not expect at all, “it was something I wouldn’t have even dreamt about”.
The book fair motivates her to read and write more, “I am obliged to keep working on becoming better and each year present a better novel than the one before,” said Assem, adding that her coming novel contains a different theme with a new idea that hopefully attracts more readers.