Salah Hatam

Babylon's Shadow Salah Hatam

Publisher Marketing: Born in Baghdad, Iraq in 1962, after the death of his father. Salah S Hatam was raised by his grandmother. He wrote his first book in the fifth grade. In middle school, he joined the Television Programs, where he won the Reading award. Middle school is also when he wrote his first short story. In high school, in 1978, Salah traveled to Beirut and worked in the press. He returned to Baghdad and began to write, publishing short stories. In the year 1980 - 1981, he enrolled in university, to study engineering. In 1991, Saddam Hussein executed Salah's mother due to her work with the Communist Party. After the execution, he left university and devoted himself to literary writing. He was drafted to the Iran-Iraq war in 1980, and the Kuwait war in 1991. He was arrested due to him writing a short story, which condemned the siege. Salah was then banned from publication in the Iraqi newspapers. As a result of the siege, he enter the psychiatric hospital. He later traveled to Jordan to work in the Jordanian Press. Salah returned to Baghdad, where he then fled with his family to the No-Fly Zone in Northern Iraq. Salah, along with his family fled to Turkey, where they received Political refugee through the United Nations. After arriving in Canada, he was admitted into hospital for Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT) to control the sharp depression he suffered from. He has written five novels in Arabic and won a number of awards. He now lives in Hamilton, Ontario. This is his first novel that has been translated to English.