CHICAGO: Jabbour Douaihy’s “June Rain” depicts the political divisions that left a northern Lebanese village suffering from the aftermath of a tragedy for generations. In the summer of 1957, a gun fight in a church leaves 24 people dead, dividing the town into two halves, the Al-Ramis in the north and the Al-Semaanis in the south. They have been neighbors for decades, their roots are embedded in the same soil, but divisions create distinctions that cannot be overlooked.
Readers are introduced to Douaihy’s main character, Eliyya, a young “Barqa kid” in the 1960s who wears thick glasses, loves to fight, and whose mother’s overprotective nature keeps the villagers ever aware of his whereabouts. But Eliyya is no ordinary boy, he was born and raised in Harat Al-Isaaba, the Gang Quarter, which is pronounced by the villagers as Horit AI-Isaabeh. Weary of strangers, their mannerisms, their accents, and even the way they walk, Eliyya is no stranger to the townspeople. He is the son of “one who paid the price in blood” for the quarter during the Burj Al-Hawa incident, and therefore is immune from rebuke or bullying.
Constantly afraid for her son because of political tension, Kamileh sends him to boarding school near Beirut where Eliyya quickly forgets his roots.
As Eliyya moves into the future, moves to America and does not return for decades, the village remains in the old world, with its memories and its tragedies, its divisiveness where families are torn apart, friends are no split, mourners never heal and those who spent generations in Lebanon are forced to leave.
There is a humorous undertone to Douaihy’s characters and their way of life, although the tragedy at the heart of the story lives on in them and through them. His characters are resilient in the face of dire circumstances, and do not change for anyone. They see things in their own perspectives, they do not submit to anyone else’s view. Each character recalls what happened those many years ago in the village from their own perspectives, moving backwards in time as Eliyya moves forward. When he returns to find out what happened on that fateful summer afternoon, he learns more than just the answers he’s looking for.
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