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You Exist Too Much: A Novel Kindle Edition

by Zaina Arafat (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 740 ratings
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A “provocative and seductive debut” of desire and doubleness that follows the life of a young Palestinian American woman caught between cultural, religious, and sexual identities as she endeavors to lead an authentic life (O, The Oprah Magazine).

On a hot day in Bethlehem, a 12–year–old Palestinian–American girl is yelled at by a group of men outside the Church of the Nativity. She has exposed her legs in a biblical city, an act they deem forbidden, and their judgement will echo on through her adolescence. When our narrator finally admits to her mother that she is queer, her mother’s response only intensifies a sense of shame: “You exist too much,” she tells her daughter.

Told in vignettes that flash between the U.S. and the Middle East—from New York to Jordan, Lebanon, and Palestine—Zaina Arafat’s debut novel traces her protagonist’s progress from blushing teen to sought–after DJ and aspiring writer. In Brooklyn, she moves into an apartment with her first serious girlfriend and tries to content herself with their comfortable relationship. But soon her longings, so closely hidden during her teenage years, explode out into reckless romantic encounters and obsessions with other people. Her desire to thwart her own destructive impulses will eventually lead her to The Ledge, an unconventional treatment center that identifies her affliction as “love addiction.” In this strange, enclosed society she will start to consider the unnerving similarities between her own internal traumas and divisions and those of the places that have formed her.

Opening up the fantasies and desires of one young woman caught between cultural, religious, and sexual identities, You Exist Too Much is a captivating story charting two of our most intense longings—for love, and a place to call home.
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  1. Print length
    272 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Sticky notes
    On Kindle Scribe
  4. Publisher
    Catapult
  5. Publication date
    June 9, 2020
  6. File size
    2818 KB
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From the Publisher

Tony Tulathimutte Private Citizens

Weike Wang

Editorial Reviews

Review

An Entropy Best Book of the Year

"At once complicated and engaging, this is the kind of debut novel that announces the arrival of a powerful new author who, besides writing beautifully, has a lot to say." —Gabino Iglesias, NPR 

"This story about love, identity, gender and family is brilliantly written and questions the effects of maternal love." —Good Morning America

"[A] provocative and seductive debut . . . Novels like these don't exist enough." ―O, The Oprah Magazine

"This multifaceted story reflects the ever-tricky journey to finding one’s place in the world." —Matt Ortile, Esquire

"Her novel is an unlimited space for those whose identities have always been too uncomfortable for society . . . When being a queer Muslim seems too complex for the world to handle, You Exist Too Much is a testimony as otherwise. There is nothing more of an attestation to our narratives than an LGBTQ Muslim author with a bisexual Palestinian-American main character." —Zainab Almatwari, Teen Vogue

"Thankfully we have moved beyond tedious questions about the 'likability' of fictional women, because the most interesting characters rarely are at all times. Arafat's heroine is no exception, but the author writes her with great tenderness and just enough self-aware dark humor to allow readers to become invested in this young woman's efforts to make herself whole." —Erin Keane, Salon

"As a narrative with an insistence on revisiting ruptures in memory, and unpacking the trauma therein, Arafat’s novel is a direct resistance to pinkwashing and other homo-nationalistic ideologies, one that centers Palestinian memory and generously unpacks the underlying sociopolitical contexts of Palestinian society for non-Palestinian readers." —George Abraham, Public Books

"You Exist Too Much gets desire at a deep level: where it comes from, how it pushes and tugs, and how it's virtually never just about who it's about. As the narrator pinballs from one disastrous affair to the next, we get more than the chronicle of a young full-blown love addict, but a keen study in how our wants are bound to place, race, gender, religion, psychology, and family. Zaina Arafat speaks for the persistently hungry." ―Tony Tulathimutte, author of Private Citizens

"What a breath of fresh air! Zaina Arafat takes a familiar figure―the restless, womanizing narrator of many a canonical novel―and reimagines it to mordant and delightful effect. Her queer, Palestinian American, love-addict protagonist is pining mostly for a sense of belonging and purpose. She's a deeply relatable character who beautifully conveys the anguish of trying to figure out a life between categories of various kinds. You Exist Too Much is a moving, irreverent, darkly entertaining novel about the agony of family, the mysteries of romantic love, and the painful work of learning where we stop and others begin. Arafat is a true original." ―Nina Renata Aron, author of Good Morning, Destroyer of Men's Souls

About the Author

Zaina Arafat is a Palestinian-American writer. Her stories and essays have appeared in publications including the New York Times, Granta, the Believer, Virginia Quarterly Review, the Washington Post, the Atlantic, BuzzFeed, VICE, and NPR. She holds an MA in international affairs from Columbia University, an MFA from the University of Iowa, and is a recipient of the Arab Women/Migrants from the Middle East fellowship at Jack Jones Literary Arts. She grew up between the US and the Middle East and currently lives in Brooklyn.

Zehra Jane Naqvi is a full-time voice-over artist, actress, and singer of Anglo/Indian origin. Originally from Australia, Zehra Jane has been based in the U.K. for the past twenty years, where she has enjoyed a successful career spanning stage and screen. From leads in West End shows to Bollywood movies and Dr. Who radio plays, her career has been diverse, to say the least! Zehra set up her home studio in 2013, and, by immersing herself in the voice-over world, quickly discovered her passion for narrating audiobooks. Her mixed race heritage gives her a unique versatility that makes her completely convincing across age, ethnicity, class, and period.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07XQ2K4SM
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Catapult (June 9, 2020)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ June 9, 2020
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 2818 KB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 272 pages
  • Page numbers source ISBN ‏ : ‎ 0349701776
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 740 ratings

About the author

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Zaina Arafat

Zaina Arafat

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Zaina Arafat is a Palestinian-American author. Her debut novel, You Exist Too Much, won a 2021 Lambda Literary Award and was named Roxane Gay's favorite book of 2020. Her work has appeared in publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, VICE, BuzzFeed, Granta, Guernica, The Believer, Harper’s Bazaar and Virginia Quarterly Review. She holds an MA in international affairs from Columbia University and an MFA from the University of Iowa. In recognition of her work, Zaina was awarded the Arab Women/Migrants from the Middle East fellowship at Jack Jones Literary Arts and named a Champion of Pride by The Advocate. She is currently at work on an essay collection. You can follow her on Twitter at @ZainaArafat.

Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
4.2 out of 5
740 global ratings
painfully beautiful
5 Stars
painfully beautiful
“I’d been clinging to her I-love-yous like a refugee clings to a threatened nationality. They were the homeland that validated my existence.”You Exist Too Much follows an unnamed woman seeking the realism behind her identity and the true meaning of love. We begin with our main character at 12 years old, entering the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem where she is yelled at by a group of men. She is baring her legs in the biblical city and she is uncertain of when her body, her very skin, went from innocent to offensive. She switches trousers with her uncle in order to enter the church and finds that she likes the way the clothing fits on her.Our main character grows up. We move with her between Lebanon, Palestine, New York City, California, the midwest. We experience her heartache, her inability to form healthy relationships, lost in the ambiguity of her sexuality and her fragmented definition of unconditional love. We experience generational trauma, a frail bond between a mother and daughter, the language between them impossible to translate, one always trying to consume the other.When I picked up this book I did not expect its words to burrow so deep beneath my skin, tucked away now in the folds of my brain. And perhaps that is because of my lived experience. Perhaps you will not relate to this story as I did. But, my god, what a harrowing reflection of the lives and struggles of many first generation immigrants. It reminded me a bit of A Little Life (although not as explicitly traumatic), the heaviness and burden of this existence is almost too much to bear. But there’s a glimmer of hope. And what is more gorgeously human than to strive for the light?I implore you to read this book. Borrow it from your local library. Raise up Palestinian voices and read about the differing experiences of those around you. 🖤🍉
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Top reviews from the United States

Morgan
5.0 out of 5 stars Great Read
Reviewed in the United States on April 23, 2024
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I really enjoyed this honest story about a girl trying to find herself. I tore through this novel in a week!
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Cynthia S.
4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent character study
Reviewed in the United States on April 16, 2024
If you like examining the complexities of human psychology and you don’t mind a lack of plot, You Exist Too Much might be the right pick for you. You can practically feel the narrator’s pain seep through the pages of this character study, and the messiness of her life makes complete sense as you gain access to her torrential upbringing.

The story was a bit heavy with cliches, but I do believe the purpose was to illustrate how pseudo help often comes in the form of platitudes. I don’t believe the narrator was passing these trite statements along to the reader. She was simply sharing all of the pacifying phrases doled out to those who are struggling. A good portion of the novel demonstrated how ineffective many overused therapeutic methods are, and this seems true (in reality) because they lack individualism. We are infrequently treated as singular beings with specific needs unique to only us, and it’s disheartening to see how prevalent this is in places treating the disordered patterns that rule a person’s life.

There were many passages that aptly demonstrated attempts to eradicate all forms of identity, and this erasure even extended to the narrator’s name, which we are never given. The book’s title contradicted the text, although it suited it, as well, since this is what the narrator was taught to believe about herself. However, it seemed like she was barely existing at all.

It was interesting to bear witness to the toxicity of the the main character’s relationships, especially in how she was plainly the perpetrator at times, and often enough the victim, as well. What made this story especially impactful was how real it all felt.

It’s strange that a book full of noxious energy can end up feeling like a beautiful and subtly inspirational thing, but You Exist Too Much embraces the possibility of finding oneself and, in doing so, understanding the person who influenced the initial loss of self. How can I not feel inspired by that?
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Jen
3.0 out of 5 stars Would read more from this author
Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2024
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Our protagonist is a Palestinian-American woman who has been raised in the United States, but who frequently travels back to see her family who live in Gaza. She is bi and struggling with revealing this to her family, but especially to her mother.

Her mother, who was born and raised in Palestine and only moved to the United States as an adult, can only be described as abusive to her daughter. We're told that in her upbringing she lived through a lot of trauma, which I don't doubt, but unfortunately we don't get a lot of details. We also see how her father, while there and appearing to 'pay the bills' so to speak, was also not a good parent. He appears to be cold and uncaring and the only time you glimpse any softness in his character has to do with him 'gazing upon his beautiful wife'. He's also a man who expects everything to be done for him, so when his wife finally divorces him he leans heavily on his children in his loneliness and also uses guilt as a manipulation tactic against them just like their mother.

Even as a child her mother was extremely hard on her her, possibly because she knew that she would be different or also maybe because she saw so much of herself in her. She constantly uses her love and the threat of withdrawal of said love as a threat and a punishment to attempt to get her daughter to do what she wants her to do. She comments on her appearance and her intelligence and generally just makes her daughter, even as a child, feel like she has to perform, and perfectly at that, in order to gain her mother's love and approval. Which from the outside perspective is obvious that this is an impossible and unaccomplishable task.

So, as an adult, our protagonist struggles with her complex feelings about her mother. She wants her approval, but after going to rehab for her love addiction she does find the strength to come to terms with the fact that her complex relationship with her mother is not her fault. Her relationships suffer as an adult, especially her romantic relationships, due to her not knowing what a healthy relationship looks or feels like. She seems to cling to people who are not good for her and some who are not even romantically interested in her, while treating the people who do love her terribly by cheating and lying to them. Throughout the novel we see her jump from one relationship to the next, without really seeing her mindset change which is a little disappointing, although as we discussed in book club it is probably more accurate to real life trauma.

Our author uses dual timelines in order to give us a perspective both from the present day but also from our protagonist's childhood. I really enjoyed this aspect of the book until about the halfway point where the timelines stopped flowing into one another well.

I thought the author's writing was poetic at times but at other times it felt rushed. Specifically before she enters rehab the book flows beautifully between the two timelines but after her stint everything feels very rushed and nothing feels very fleshed out as far as the plot goes. This was a general consensus in book club, that we felt that maybe the ending of the novel had been rushed and hadn't been given the time that the first part had because it felt like a different author had written it almost. I also really wished that we saw more about life in Palestine but we only got snippets of that from when our protagonist travels back to visit family. We do see a couple of scenes like her being made to wear pants because she wasn't allowed to show her knees in the mosque as a child, or her sitting for an entire day just trying to cross the border. I really wanted more like this, but I understand that it was limited because our character was only traveling back and forth and was doing so as a wealthy American which changes everything.

This is a 3.5⭐ but rounded down because I am trying to not be so Oprah like with my 4 & 5 ⭐ ratings this year.

This was my January 2024 book club pick and when I heard that it was written by a Palestinian American author I was pretty excited because I have recently been trying to read everything I can on the current conflict. I was hoping for a novel that would give me some insight into the way Palestinians have lived under occupation by the Israelis. Unfortunately that is not really what this book is about. I appreciate that the author did give us some insights, like towards the end where we see our main character sit at a border crossing all day for what seems like no reason other than the soldiers wanting to delay her crossing. I did enjoy this book even if it wasn't what I was expecting, and I would definitely read more from this author. I believe this is her debut novel and I think with a little more writing under her belt (and I hate saying that because she's a writer, she's got a lot of writing under her belt already, but not in novel form it seems) her work could be considered a great literary work. She also sent us signed book plates, which is really nice, not many authors do that for our book club but when they do it always feels special.
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Ceridwen
5.0 out of 5 stars Comforting
Reviewed in the United States on March 15, 2024
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As someone who identifies as pansexual, I felt INCREDIBLY seen and understood by this book, which does not happen often. Zaina does an incredible job placing you in the shoes of the narrator. I felt everything.
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Leila Sidawy
5.0 out of 5 stars Captivating & Poignant
Reviewed in the United States on August 5, 2020
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You Exist Too Much addresses a longstanding void of queer Arab-American literature. Zaina Arafat takes us through the narrator's multi-layered struggle of self-identity.

On one level, she's a daughter of Palestinian immigrants. Every child of immigrants, myself included, can relate to our narrator's wavering between her inherited culture and American lifestyle. But in this case, her country of origin, Palestine, isn't even recognized by her country of birth, the United States. On a second level, and the crux of the novel, is her bisexual orientation, hardly accepted let alone tolerated in most of the Middle East. And finally, in the third and foundational level lies her relationship with her mother, who embodies the disappointment our narrator feels within herself.

These internal conflicts reveal themselves through our narrator's multiple acts of self-destructive behavior. While she may not be likeable at times, she is very real. The reader follows her through self-exploration, self-reflection, and eventually a version of self-improvement.

The writing is captivating and the storytelling is a page-turner. You won't want to put it down.
9 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

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J. S.
1.0 out of 5 stars Ekelhaft
Reviewed in Germany on October 20, 2023
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Ich finde das Buch einfach ekelhaft. Es reproduziert einfach nur Stereotype und ist so geschrieben, dass es dem westlichen Leser gefällt. Es regt null zum Hinterfragen der eigenen Stereotype an. Antimuslimischer Rassismus vom feinsten. Das widert mich an!
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