You often mention in the diary how blurry the frontiers between reality and fiction are; how reality often looks like a screenplay, a ferocious fiction. Would you say that this type of political environment makes fiction irrelevant?

The political environment didn’t necessarily make fiction irrelevant. What I was trying to say is that the horror I saw surpassed any kind of fiction imaginable.

Samar Yazbek’s book just came out in English, at Haus publishing. The book’s translation was supported by the Sharjah Book Fair.
Below are excerpts of the review by Francis Beckett for The Guardian, June 22, 2012.

“Mostly, I have shared in some people’s pain. Is there some point to secretly, in my own home, sharing in people’s pain? I don’t know. But once you’ve started, and you’ve found that you care about these people — these characters, these people — it’s also difficult to stop”

Le Monde reviews Samar Yazbek’s book, In the crossfire, that recently won the Pen award. “The chronicle of the Syrian carnage is weighing you down? Decoding the stakes of this multifaceted crisis discourages you? Read Samar Yazbek.

As Syria slides into a civil war that dares not speak its name, and to which the Kofi Annan plan is unlikely to bring an end, it is good to dive into ‘In the crossfire’, the diary kept by this Syrian novelist in the early months of the uprising, from March to July 2011, before going into exile in France.”

http://videos.www4.arte.tv/de/videos/samar_yazbek_schrei_nach_freiheit-6561098.html
(In German)

“Yazbek’s language is at times poetic, but mostly straightforward, with the factual sound of someone familiar with the various
places of Syria”