Have you been following the controversy over Forbidden Love? The Australian Is Covering It, Here Too, so is The Sydney Morning Herald. All the press seems to be Good For Sales. The story goes something like this.
The book tells of her lifelong friendship with a girl named Dalia in Amman, Jordan. In their 20s, Khouri wrote, she and Dalia started a hairdressing salon together. Dalia met and fell in love with Michael, a Christian army officer. When their chaste affair was discovered, Dalia was murdered – stabbed 12 times – by her father.
Khouri’s real name is Norma Majid Khouri Michael Al-Bagain Toliopoulos, and she only lived in Jordan until she was three years old. She has a US passport and lived from 1973 until 2000 in Chicago. She is married with two children, 13 and 11. She has four American siblings and a mother who are desperate to hear news from her. But she has managed to conceal this double life from her publishers, her agent, lawyers in several continents, the Australian Department of Immigration and, until now, the public.
If you’d rather listen than read, NPR’s Renee Montagne speaks with Malcolm Knox of the Sydney Morning Herald, who broke the story.
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