LONDON: Join us for a conversation between Tareq Baconi and Saleem Haddad their brand new books: Fire in Every Direction and Floodlines.

They’ll discuss memoir and fiction, politics and intimacy, exile and return. Two writers who brilliantly fuse the political and private, they will reflect on queer awakening, fractured family ties, and the enduring question of what it means to return—emotionally, imaginatively, and geographically—when home itself is defined by rupture.

Tareq Baconi is a Palestinian writer, scholar, and activist. The grandson of refugees from Jerusalem and Haifa, he grew up between Amman and Beirut. His essays have appeared in the New York Review of Books and the London Review of Books, and he is a frequent commentator in regional and international media. He has also written for film; his award-winning BFI short One Like Him, a queer love story set in Jordan, screened at over thirty festivals. Baconi serves as President of the Board of Al-Shabaka and was formerly Senior Analyst for Israel/Palestine and Economics of Conflict at the International Crisis Group in Ramallah. He is the author of Hamas Contained, shortlisted for the Palestine Book Award.

Saleem Haddad was born in Kuwait City to an Iraqi-German mother and a Palestinian-Lebanese father. His critically acclaimed first novel, Guapa (2016), was awarded both a Stonewall Honour and the Polari Prize. His writing spans novels, short stories, essays, film, and television. His directorial debut, Marco, premiered in 2019 and was nominated for the Iris Prize for ‘Best British Short Film’. His writing has been supported by institutions such as Yaddo and the Literarisches Colloquium Berlin. His second novel, Floodlines, will be published in February 2026. He lives in Lisbon, with roots in Amman, Beirut, and London.

Co-presented with Ibraaz, Hodder & Stoughton and Europa Editions. 

Doors open at 5.30pm; talk starts at 6pm and finishes at 7.30pm.