Charles Akl, "Red Like Orange" (Hoopoe, 2026)

Summary

Podcast Summary: New Books Network – Charles Akl, "Red Like Orange" (Hoopoe, 2026)
Aired July 27, 2026
Host: Turo Mende
Guest: Charles Akl (Author)

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Episode Overview

In this episode of New Books in Middle Eastern Studies, host Turo Mende interviews Charles Akl, author of the acclaimed novel Red Like Orange, newly translated into English by Sarah Enney. Originally published in Arabic (2020), the novel explores the Egyptian indie music scene of the 2000s through the journey of a fictional band. Akl discusses his unconventional path to writing, the culture of Egyptian musicians, his creative choices, and how communal experiences and nostalgia shape both his art and the contemporary cultural landscape.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Author’s Background and Path to Writing

• Charles Akl’s professional journey: Akl clarifies that while sometimes referred to as a journalist, his main career is in culture management, not journalism. Writing about music and technology stems from personal passion rather than professional obligations. He found arts management to be a sustainable way to stay close to creative work (03:34).
• Immersion in the music scene: His proximity to alternative music circles in Cairo informed his novel. “Music…had this incredible communal feel. So there is this togetherness, there is this enthusiasm of a special thing, there is this humbleness of being a part of something bigger…” (04:54). He notes how rapid change and social media disrupted these communities, creating nostalgia for even very recent times.

2. Premise and Structure of "Red Like Orange"

• Story concept: The novel chronicles the coming-of-age journey of an amateur band through Egypt’s indie music boom in 2006-2011. The focus is on growth and the fleeting sense of community, not on achieving stardom (09:02).
• Character names and satire: Akl intentionally chooses whimsically translated, absurd band and character names, reflecting the real-life naming trends among Egyptian indie bands circa 2008–2010 (11:51).

“There was this hype of indie rock music…all of them had this very absurd naming and titles for the groups. And the thing is, it just starts from being a very random thought, very haphazard thing. And then just by keep saying it turns normal.” (10:15)

• Album-as-novel structure: Instead of traditional chapters, the novel is broken into “tracks,” making it resemble an album with standalone, yet thematically linked, vignettes. Akl likens the reading experience to sampling songs on an album:

“An album doesn’t have to have a story beginning to end…Sometimes you do some performative things, you do some numbers, you do a wide range of feelings and also topics…” (13:31)

3. Language and Style

• Colloquial, dynamic Arabic: Akl crafts a blend of colloquial structure and classical vocabulary. He draws on the rhythm and playfulness of spoken Egyptian, mixing in deeper, poetic moments, aiming for a pleasurable textural experience (18:16).

“It’s very…I would say colloquial but with some decent vocabulary. So it just has the form and structure for colloquial language. But I take from classical language the vocabulary and words I need. So it’s…I would say it’s a good mix. It’s a funny mix.” (18:16)

4. Literary Influences and Approach

• Prefers nonfiction inspiration: Akl reveals that his literary process is shaped less by novels than by nonfiction about music and its industries—highlighting Stephen Witt’s How Music Got Free as a major influence (17:03).

“If what I’m consuming are already novels...I’m only doing repackaging. So that’s the idea. So I read a lot about and nonfiction books about…music, about music making, about music industry.” (16:20)

5. Translation, Humor, and Voice

• Translation collaboration: Sarah Enney translated Red Like Orange independently, largely without back-and-forth with the author. Akl embraced the unpredictability of how character names and jokes would mutate in translation, acknowledging humor often changes across languages (22:54).

“She translated [the names] again from the already translated thing, and this produced more dynamic and a completely fresh turn to the language…If the jokes work the same way…I’m sure it never will.” (23:14)

6. Nostalgia, Community, and Politics

• Capturing a lost moment: The book’s setting (2006–2011) was deliberately chosen to capture a crucial but now-lost cultural moment in Cairo’s music history, just before the disruptions of revolution and social media (25:45).
• Subtle political resonance: While not overtly political, the novel comments on the loss of togetherness and creative spaces under societal and technological shifts.

“It’s not a piece of nostalgia, but it’s also pointing out what did we miss of disrupting the scene…” (28:08)

7. Recognition and Future Work

• Impact of the Sawiris Prize: Winning the prestigious Egyptian Sawiris Prize for emerging writers in 2023 brought recognition and added pressure to experiment less in future work due to heightened expectations (20:21, 21:58).
• Future creative plans: Akl remains experimental with form and is reflective about how the changing “economy of writing” and digital era alter the practicalities and possibilities of book-making (29:22).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Togetherness in Music:

  “You would never see someone looking at an artwork or a painting and then scream their lungs out. But you can definitely see that in music…” (05:38, Charles Akl)

• On Indie Band Names:

  “Are you talking about basturma? Life of Party is comparing us to basturma, I said. To us, stinks to high heaven, but we form a harmony when we're together.” (01:46, reading from the novel)

• On Nostalgia:

  “We are of a generation that we have nostalgia of a very recent era. It's very strange. ... We do have nostalgia for two years ago.” (07:06, Charles Akl)

• On Not Reading Novels:

  “I don't read so many novels, you know. And I feel that if I read novels, what am I going to produce? It’s something like a cook that...if what I’m consuming are already novels… I’m only doing repackaging.” (16:20, Charles Akl)

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Important Timestamps

• 00:54–02:53 — Akl reads a passage from Red Like Orange, capturing the novel’s humor and atmosphere.
• 03:34–08:28 — Discussion of author’s background, Cairo’s 2000s music scene, and the deep sense of community.
• 09:02–12:30 — Overview of the novel’s premise, period setting, character naming, and themes.
• 13:30–16:00 — Structure of the novel as musical “tracks”; Akl’s creative reasons for fragmentation.
• 16:20–17:41 — Akl’s influences and reasons for avoiding fiction as inspiration.
• 18:16–19:34 — On language: combining colloquial and classical Arabic for everyday flavor and literary depth.
• 20:21–21:58 — Winning the Sawiris Prize and its impact on the author.
• 22:54–25:45 — Collaboration with translator Sarah Enney, and thoughts on carrying humor across languages.
• 26:09–27:39 — Why the novel stops at 2011; the effect of revolution and technology on the music scene.
• 28:08–29:02 — The novel’s subtle political undercurrents and what was lost in the cultural shift.
• 29:22–30:35 — Future plans, the challenge of book-writing in the digital age.

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Closing

This episode offers an engaging, insightful window into how Charles Akl’s Red Like Orange immortalizes a pivotal moment in contemporary Egyptian music, community, and youth culture. Balancing nostalgia with irony, and humor with subtle commentary, Akl’s work is both a playful homage to Cairo’s indie scene and a meditation on what can be lost amid rapid social change.

Transcript

[A]

Welcome to the New Books Network. Hello everybody, and welcome back to New Books in Middle Eastern Studies, a podcast channel on the New Books Network. I'm Turo Mende, the host of the channel. Today we'll be talking to author and journalist Charles Ackel about his novel Red Like Oranges that was translated newly by Sarah Enney and was published by Hopofiction, which is an imprint of the American of University Press. And the original Arabic novel was published in 2020, I think. Charles Right, and it won the Saviris arat in 2023. Thank you so much for joining us to the podcast today, Charles.

[B]

Thank you for having me.

[A]

And before we delve into the novel, maybe you wanted to read like a small passage from the book.

[B]

Sure, I'll try to read a very small snippet just to give the feel of the novel.

[A]

Thank you so much.

[B]

That's all. We all went to Abduz to get sandwiches. Abduz is a restaurant in Alexandria. Sausages, pastrami with tomato sauce, meat and cheese. Abduz was one of the sandwich places known for being open very late. It served an exclusive clientele of druggies, drunk yards smokers, pill takers and sleepwalkers. Life of the party, munching on his pastrami and sauce sandwich, contemplated the loaves of of pastrami hanging around the store like pretty decorations, and appeared struck by a worrying thought, an uncommon occurrence. Do you see that pastrami? Yeft. It's astonishing. Each ingredient of it bears no relation to the other. Each of them alone has a nightmarish stink. Garlic, fenugreek, spoiled meat. But together they make a delicious pastrami, or pasturma, in this case the Greek version. Are you linking our playing to Basturma? I asked. Huh? What's wrong with Basturma? The yes man butted in. Are you talking about Basturma? Life of Party is comparing us to basturma, I said. To us, stinks to high heaven, but we form a harmony when we're together. The yes man guff out, laughing until he nearly fell over. True, true. What's wrong with Basturma? We can sell Basturma. Life of Party chimed in. But there is no rush. I recommend, I said, it's enough right now to adopt it as a good name for a piece of music or a track, maybe for the whole band, said the yes man. Life of the Life of the Party looked at the pasta and saw sandwich in his hand. Glad to have grasped the simil, perhaps for this entire music generation, he said.

[A]

Thank you so much, Charles, for reading this page from the novel and you are first, I think a journalist and then you are an author publishing this first novel debunkle in 2020. But you've been publishing in Egypt as well, articles, for example, with Mada masr earlier in 2014, for example, article about the music scene, which was in response to the musician Rami Abadir, as far as I remember. And can you tell us a bit about your background and why did you want to choose this kind of context as a music scene for a novel?

[B]

Yeah, sure, if you have the time, I can give you a small glance. Well, first of all, it's a stretch to call myself a journalist. I'm not a journalist. I write sometimes about music or sometimes about tech, just of pure interest in the field. I always. But it's never my domain, never my career. I started my career or my career of choice was culture management. So anything that helps or go around culture and art management, I found that more sustainable to be close to arts while still having a job. So I found that a good compromise to have my parents happy, to have myself having a job and still close to the things I love. And then I was running a theater back then at 2014 and I rig unregularly. I write about music. I write about music in Madam Muscle and on one of the major websites back then, maybe still now relevant Mazif about things that I like just generally. And that's why also when I chose to or not chose, but when I wrote a novel, I also wrote about the things I know most. I am in the middle of music making. It's not the music making industry, not the commercial music making industry, but I'm still very close to the circles, I'm very close to the artists. It's the things that I know about and the thing that I have a great appreciation of. And music for me had had this very special connection that I didn't find in any other art form or any other career or so to say. So music, and especially in theater, theater, concert, live music, had this incredible communal feel. So there is this togetherness, there is this enthusiasm of a special thing, there is this humbleness of being a part of something bigger, of admiring someone or a piece of work. And music. Music also covered a very wide range of. Of feelings and expressions and accepts some extremes of dealing or interacting with those feelings. So you would never see someone looking at an artwork or a painting and then scream their lungs out. But you can definitely see that in music. And also it's not just being about Happiness also it can be about being violent. You can have them, the metal concerts and people would hit each other or make a mash pit and so on. So it was for me really a very emotional time and place to be there personally for me and also to be at the right time and at the right moment. In Cairo in 2010, there was something happening and you can see it and you can feel it and you can see the amount of artists and musicians coming up. And there was a moment and then this moment got disrupted pretty heavily, not only in Egypt, but everywhere for some political reasons in Egypt, but also for a more wider technical reasons and the invasion of social media and so on that disrupted completely this togetherness feeling, this very special experience that was about to happen. And this made me think of, yeah, everyone say, yeah, the music was better, the music before the past was nicer, everything. Yes, indeed. But we are of a generation that we have nostalgia of a very recent era. It's very strange. I see my father talking about the 70s or so on or the 40s, but we do have nostalgia for two years ago. We were in 2014 and we already have nostalgia for 2012 because change was very fast and very radical and changed everything around us. So for that reason I needed to kept some memory something about this feeling.

[A]

Thank you so much, Charles. And the novel takes place in the early 2000s, so a bit earlier than when you were in Egypt. Can you maybe without giving too much spoilers, I mean you are choosing very different names for the characters in comparison to other novels. And can you tell us about why you do that? And a bit about what they are witnessing and what the events that are happening around the characters maybe so they listeners get to feel about what the novel is about.

[B]

All right, yeah, sure. Well, so the. The book is more or less of a journey of this small band being formed from being people who didn't know anything about music end up to a quasi success story or growing up story, let's just say the neutral word growing up because we all grow up. There is no success about it. So it's just the moving on or the phases of it. And it takes kind of four. I would assume it's not very rigid or written in the novel, but it somehow you feel from the technological happening, the technology progress happening through the novel that is from 2006 to 2010. 11. Something like this. Yeah, 11. And at this time there was. So that's, that's. And through this journey they meet a lot of characters and from these characters we see different perspective from the music industry, from everyone. The music, not just the music makers, but the people who manufacture music instruments and the religious groups, the Christian religion groups and the choir and the school music teaching and the pirates, the music piracy. And we see different areas that is surrounding music and also a little bit of my side of this music management and so on. So through this journey they meet people and we know the stories of those. So many people. And if you remember, at that phase from 2008, 2010, there was this hype of indie rock music. Yeah. And all of them had this very absurd naming and titles for the groups. And the thing is, it just starts from being a very random thought, very haphazard thing. And then just by keep saying it turns normal. And I wanted to play a little bit with this concept and even go a little bit step further. So I took some names of the bands that were about to be something at that time and then went to nothing. You never hear about them today. And I took this strangeness and I kept feeding to a translator until it goes to something completely different. So for example, there was a band that was called how to Dress well.

[A]

Right.

[B]

It's a very absurd name of a band. It's unthinkable to have this name of a band. And oddly enough, I give it to a translator and kept progressing it until it lost all connection to the real name. But it kept its absurdness without referring to the actual band and has no relation to the actual band, just the strangeness of the name. So that's most of the characters you would. If you look into it, you will find a famous band of this era that has resembling meaning.

[A]

That's interesting. Thank you so much. And I mean while reading the novel and there is of course a structure and you are naming the chapters. Not chapters, but tracks actually like from a album or anything like this. But it doesn't have like an. I think it doesn't have like maybe a momentum of a novel. Like in that something is happening and that everything is fine. But it's like you're meeting these characters and they're coming together on this journey and experiencing how to do music and learn from each other. It's a bit, I think, fragmented. Fragmented in some ways. Did you want to write this in this way or was it like something that was happening just like by accident that you thought this was like the best way to express this novel?

[B]

Yeah, well, first of all, I had to have a structure. So I like to have a structure. And then I have at many to cut the a longer Project into pieces and then fulfill each piece. So that was my main idea. Is that okay? Yeah, I'll just cut it down. That was the main idea. But then it turns more and more into this idea of an album. Like an album doesn't have to have a story beginning to end. It doesn't have to say the protagonist went from point A to point B. But you give a collection of emotions and you present what you can do. Sometimes you do some performative things, you do some numbers, you do a wide range of feelings also topics and so on. This I thought will give more freedom of giving different. A wider range of stories forms and so on. And you know what many of you of the stories where stuff that I thought about at one time, I write it down and I said okay, that would be a good idea for a story. And then when I had the project and I said okay, I have enough snippets and I have enough stories to have this, this sort of album. So I collected down and the growing up story or the background story of this group going from point A to point B is actually not, not, not it. If, if you're. If you're looking to read a success story and then oh, what's happening? It's not a page turner of this sort. You. It's just an album of. Exactly like a music album of. Yeah, I like. I want to hear this track more. I want to read this chapter one more time.

[C]

If.

[B]

If it's an enjoyable. You can read it by. By its own. Its unit, its snippets. And I find this more suitable to the Internet age and to the. We focus and the way we deal with media is that we cannot read anymore a 300 or 400 pages book. Just skim through, check what's nice, what you want to read. Each chapter is a completely different story. Completely different story.

[A]

And while writing the novel in the early 2000 and twenties, did you had other authors in mind that you admired or had inspiration from while writing your debut novel? Or do you have any favorite author that you go back to while writing this novel?

[B]

Well, I have this a little bit strange theory. I don't read so many novels, you know. And I feel that if I read novels, what am I going to produce? It's something like a cook that I need to have prime material in order to cook them and present them. If what I'm consuming are already novels are already things that is already made. I'm only doing repackaging. So that's the idea. So I read a lot about and Nonfiction books about. About music, about music making, about music industry. One terrific book. I just love this book so much. It's called how music got Free.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

It's such an amazing read. It's not just it is a nonfiction but also the craft and the creativity of writing a story that already exists. You would think. Yeah. There is nothing more to add. But each paragraph ends with a very smart twist. Each, not just each chapter, each sentence ends with a nice smart idea. And for me that. That was one of the main reference for this book. I think it was made a series afterward.

[A]

Ah, okay.

[B]

Yeah, I'm not sure. I'm not sure but. But the book is really awesome.

[A]

And I mean looking at the original novel in Arabic, what kind of language did you use? Did you use like that it's suitable for this people in this age, how would they talk? Like an everyday basis like in colloquial or would you choose like maybe like modern standard Arabic or how. How would you choose the writing styles while writing the novel?

[B]

Yeah, I, I just developed my, my. Through the years I developed my. My own style. It's. It's very. I would say colloquial but with some decent vocabulary. So it just has the form and the structure for colloquial language. But I take from classical language the vocabulary and the words I need. So it's. I would say it's a good mix. It's a funny mix. It's something to enjoy very much in Arabic. I don't know if the English reader will enjoy that much, but many people told me that the textile, the material of the language is very enjoyable. And I know for example, Yusuf Raha is also an incredible writer who experiment. It's not always his style, but he has one book Altura and it have very much the style. I would assume it's. I didn't try to be a little bit like him, but it might be comparable to have this very dynamic everyday language with you have you have punches in the middle of deep thoughts and that's him, not me. I would only dream of having something of this level.

[A]

Thank you so much, Charles. And I mean the novel wonders Sabrius Cultural about 2020. What does it have an effect for you as a writer? Does it like give you that validation of your writings or how do you feel like? I think it's quite an prestigious award in Egypt for novelists. There's different categories. And you want it for emerging writers? I think so. How did you feel and what did it had an effect. Did publishers approach you more to Write new novels or material or what did it do to you?

[B]

Well, in Egypt there is not a lot of prizes. There is very few and very few are for more established writers. I guess there is some stuff for very, very established writer. And Sawida's prize is the one that gives space for young writers. It has a branch for nonfiction. It has a branch for many things. So I would consider it one of the very few. So even though the character or the foundation might be questionable or some people would rely. Not questionable, but. But people would say, yeah, he's not a writer. Why does the. Does the prize have its name and so on. It's a. It's a discussion that. That's a long discussion that I would like to have some. Some other day. But anyway, it's. So it's an important price. Let's. Let's keep it at this. And through the surprise, you know, it. It's. It's very random what wins and what does not win. And people many times look for authenticity and not quality. So I'm sure there is very, very qualified and very amazing thing. But this book has probably give something new. Give a new form, new language, something new. And for that I like very much the appreciation and the recognition and. And I'm really thankful for it.

[A]

And yeah, sorry.

[B]

But of course it puts on your back more responsibility, you would think. The people now are waiting. So what are you going to do next? And then you will be a little bit more afraid to experiment as you previously were.

[A]

I can imagine. And I mean coming to the translation now, which was translated the novel by Sara Ina, who is herself a quite established and respected academic and translator and has a long relationship with AUC Press too. Did you had a chance to talk with her about the translation process or while working on it or while you know English yourself if you read it, what did you thought about the translation? Would you do it something differently or did she capture your voice correctly? So what did you thought about the process?

[B]

Great question. Well, I expected to have some few questions from working with the translator, but I also understand the time and the amount of work this needs. And not everyone has the time to really work with questions and answers and wait for communication. So I also understand if she didn't do this at the end. I'm not the one to judge the English. I find it nice written language. And I also like that at some point I didn't have to explain the things and see how it will turn out. For example, the names of the character. I didn't explain this trick of, oh, the name, by the way, the names are this and that. And now you have to do this. So she, she translated them again from the already translated thing, and this produced more dynamic and a completely fresh turn to, to the language. If the jokes work the same way, if the, the textile, the, the, the material of, of the, of the language work the same, exactly the same way, I'm sure it never will. I'm sure that you will lose a lot into, into the translation because the wording has a lot of shocks in the wording. A lot of. She might be writing better than me, you know, but, but, but this, this, I, I choose sometimes words because they are funny. You know, it's funny to, to say it.

[A]

I mean, especially what you're saying about humor and satire in the language. It's, I think, always different to translate it into another language.

[B]

Exactly, exactly.

[A]

But if you read normal in English. But did she manage to convey the same funny feeling, even if it's not the same wording or the play with the words, but like the meaning behind it, into the new language or. Because it's always difficult to transform humor and the culture and everything? Yeah.

[B]

You know, for, For a writer, I'm the last one for, For a writer, I'm the last one to be asked about this because for a writer, you will read it. I will say, oh, it's not funny. I will say, oh, yeah, that's, that's the translation. That's not me. So I, I, of course I will say, no, it doesn't get all the jokes. Of course I will say that. But I also understand that she did an amazing job and I would expect the reader to. And an English speaker to tell me if, if it's all right if it's, if it's funny or not.

[A]

And coming one more time to the time period of the early 2000s, why did you choose exactly this time period and that, for example, like maybe having a more for general reader, more maybe interesting time, like the revolutionary times, like since 2011 or afterwards. So did you make a conscious choice of this or. Yes.

[B]

Yeah, it goes up until the revolution, and there is some, might be some mention in some chapters, but I found that the disruption, because the technological disruption that affected music and affected people already had this scene destroyed. Even, you know what the Revolution to 2011. Give it a kiss of hope or I don't know what's the correct English term, but like give it another push, another breath of hope. And there was some interest, some international interest of, for music coming from the middle east there was a lot of programs for funding and branding artworks. So it had pushed it two extra years, while in the whole world the indie music scene was already dead on 2011. And I think there was a very clear cut when that was 2012, that was not a thing anymore. And just people embraced pop music completely and it returned as if the 70s never happened. That's the expression. As if the 2000 never happened.

[A]

And coming to the last two questions of the podcast, obviously the main element of this nova is music and how maybe to become a local musician or how to navigate through the music industry. And does it, but does it have some maybe political elements though in it as well? Maybe on a, on a, on a. On a secondary context, maybe? Or would you say it's not political at all, the novel?

[B]

I know it's political in this. In narrower sense, I don't think so, but it's political in the sense of everything is political. So there is, as I started with the notion of this communal field. So it's not a piece of nostalgia, but it's also pointing out what did we miss of disrupting the scene,

[C]

what

[B]

has happened and this feel, this momentum that we had, what can we still keep from it? Or what can we still look for into the modern music scene to have some sort of entertainment, this sort of entertainment and this sort of togetherness and this sort of community.

[A]

Thank you so much. And as far as I know, you are currently based in Bonn in Germany, and would you still continue to write in Arabic if you would write a second novel? Or do you have in mind of a project like this? So as a writer, what you would look out in the future?

[B]

Yeah, well, the options are endless. But then we need to keep in mind who is our reader, what is our reader doing, what's their limit and attention, focus and so on. And then I think a lot about those things and like we hear now more often about the death of books and it's such a shame, but I'm not going to cry about it. You have a lot of new forms that gives you the same information, quick and more practical and everything. Yes, but also the economy of writing has been completely different. And the urge of writing a whole book that takes you incredibly long, long time and investment in time and effort to fulfill it is completely different. So I would play with the form, that's for sure. I keep playing with the form. I am still interested in a wide range of topics. Either I will do it in the same form or not. That's a question that is too early to ask.

[A]

Thank you so much, Charles, for joining us to the podcast today, and it was amazing to talk with you about your novel and your work as a writer. Thank you so much.

[B]

Thank you for having me.

[C]

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