Huna
Some books arrive with a story you can’t look away from. In 2013, at seventeen, Abdelrahman ElGendy and his father were arrested together at a mass demonstration in Cairo, and he spent the next six years as a political prisoner. Behind bars he earned an engineering degree and turned to reading and writing. The title comes from the protest song “Sawfa Nabqa Huna,” We Will Remain Here, which he first heard in a holding cell. This debut memoir is a Nonfiction finalist, and we want to put it in the hands of anyone who cares what writing can mean to someone with little else left.
Publisher’s description at Penguin Random House. Finalist status from the National Book Foundation.
A debut memoir and a 2026 National Book Award finalist for Nonfiction. The judges’ citation calls it “the story of political resistance, survival, and liberation in the face of authoritarianism.” Winners are announced November 18.
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