Upside-Down Love

With a message of hope that is both timely and timeless, Upside-Down Love is an extraordinary memoir--irreverent, funny, and profoundly uplifting--of an Israeli lawyer, a Palestinian professor, and a love that transcends all division.

Osama is a Palestinian professor, originally from Gaza, who cannot leave the West Bank city of Ramallah. Sari is an Israeli-American lawyer and long-distance runner who petitions Israel's Supreme Court for his right to travel freely. When the case began, neither expected to fall in love--and when it was over, nobody expected their love to endure.

First published in Hebrew in 2021, Osama and Sari's star-crossed romance--an intimate, vulnerable portrait of an astoundingly resilient Israeli-Palestinian relationship--has since become a beacon of hope in the aftermath of October 7, 2023. Now on its way to becoming an international cult sensation, Upside-Down Love speaks to the unique circumstances of this specific moment in history, while also illustrating a timeless truth: Love will triumph over bigotry and destruction.

Discussion questions provided by the publisher, Blackstone Publishing.

Book club questions for Upside-Down Love by Sari Bashi

Use these discussion questions to guide your next book club meeting.

What role does language play in the characters’ communication with each other?

The book is structured as alternating chapters in each of the characters’ voices. Is it a dialogue? An argument? What kind of story emerges from the two voices?

How did the descriptions of life in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank differ or resemble what you read about, know, or imagine? What are the benefits and limitations of learning about a place through memoir?

How honest were the characters in revealing personal and sometimes painful details about their lives? What might they be hiding from readers, and why?

What does the title Upside-Down Love represent in the context of the book?

Why do you think the characters at times referred to the act of writing itself as part of their stories? What if anything did that add to the narrative, and did you find it distracting?

Many people in Western countries understand the situation in Israel-Palestine as an ethnic or religious conflict between two peoples. Is that view supported by the picture presented in Upside-Down Love and if so, how? If not, what alternative picture emerged for you?

Were you surprised by the ending? What did you understand from it, and what questions did it leave unanswered?

Upside-Down Love Book Club Questions PDF

Click here for a printable PDF of the Upside-Down Love discussion questions