Wafa Hallam’s newly released memoir The Road from Morocco is the true story of a feisty thirteen year old Arab girl wed against her will to a much older man in French-occupied Morocco and of her daughter’s rise as a Merrill Lynch financial advisor years later. It culminates in the harrowing realization that the fabled American Dream had become the harbinger of their downfall.

“As a young woman, my mother’s struggle to win a divorce in a country and time where only men had that privilege and the single-minded pursuit of her independence in a Morocco divided between French Western and Arab traditional cultures paved the way for her children to leave for America and for me, her oldest daughter, to thrive in that bastion of American male dominance, Wall Street. But the land of freedom and opportunity did not shield us from a tragic destiny. A violent marriage, mental illness, the 9/11 terrorist attack, the Iraq war and economic turmoil, successive stock market crashes, and devastating infirmity all conspired to bring about my mother’s demise, my emotional breakdown and the end of my career. Then, through the redemptive power of a newfound spirituality my life was transformed.”

The introductory presentation of the memoir is meant to encourage discussions around its various themes, including but not exclusive to:

Girls' under-age marriage in Morocco

The changing status of Muslim women from independence to post-Islamist resurgence.

What does it mean to be a Muslim Arab-American woman in post 9/11-Iraq War America.

Abusive marriages and co-dependency syndrome.

Mental illness and how it affects families.

The potentially destructive nature of symbiotic mother-daughter relationships.

The way to awareness and the redemptive power of spirituality.

PRESENTER: Wafa Hallam

Born and raised in Morocco, Wafa F. Hallam lived in Europe and traveled to over thirty-five countries before she moved to the U.S. in 1980 to attend college. A graduate of the University of Florida, she was awarded a series of fellowships to attend New York University where she earned a Master’s Degree in International Relations and Middle Eastern Studies. Wafa currently lives in Sag Harbor, NY.