"The Open Door" explores a middle-class Egyptian girl's coming of sexual and political age, in the context of the Egyptian nationalist movement. Young Layla and her brother become involved in the student activism of the 1940s and early 1950s and in the popular resistance to continued imperialist rule. The novel traces the pressures on young women and young men of that time and class as they seek to free themselves of family control and social expectations.

Translated by: Marilyn Booth