Guest Privileges, written and read by Gaar Adams
Update: 2025-08-19
Description
Brought to you by Penguin.
An intimate and illuminating account of queer lives and migration, homemaking and community in the Gulf, from a brilliant new voice in narrative non-fiction
**LONGLISTED FOR THE RSL ONDAATJE PRIZE**
Upon moving to the Gulf States – where penalties for queer acts include deportation, imprisonment, torture and death – Gaar Adams wants to understand why LGBTQ+ migrants might choose to live amid such peril. He begins riskily gathering interviews outside the tightly controlled state media, leading with what he thinks is a simple question:
Isn't it harder for you to make a life here?
But as unforgettable residents share a kaleidoscope of stories – from uproarious Filipino salon workers throwing secret drag parties to a courageous Pakistani farmhand who helps his compatriots smuggle themselves across borders – deeper questions and fault lines begin to emerge alongside the halting steps into Gaar’s own clandestine relationship.
Weaving intimate and illuminating memoir with unprecedented reportage, Guest Privileges is a decade-long journey of dislocation – not just through the Gulf States, but into the very nature of home, belonging and how we form a life and community.
'An eye-opening tour de force' ALEX ESPINOZA
'Exhilarating' SUSAN ORLEAN
'Tender and insightful' MOHAMED TONSY
©2024 Gaar Adams (P)2024 Penguin Audio
An intimate and illuminating account of queer lives and migration, homemaking and community in the Gulf, from a brilliant new voice in narrative non-fiction
**LONGLISTED FOR THE RSL ONDAATJE PRIZE**
Upon moving to the Gulf States – where penalties for queer acts include deportation, imprisonment, torture and death – Gaar Adams wants to understand why LGBTQ+ migrants might choose to live amid such peril. He begins riskily gathering interviews outside the tightly controlled state media, leading with what he thinks is a simple question:
Isn't it harder for you to make a life here?
But as unforgettable residents share a kaleidoscope of stories – from uproarious Filipino salon workers throwing secret drag parties to a courageous Pakistani farmhand who helps his compatriots smuggle themselves across borders – deeper questions and fault lines begin to emerge alongside the halting steps into Gaar’s own clandestine relationship.
Weaving intimate and illuminating memoir with unprecedented reportage, Guest Privileges is a decade-long journey of dislocation – not just through the Gulf States, but into the very nature of home, belonging and how we form a life and community.
'An eye-opening tour de force' ALEX ESPINOZA
'Exhilarating' SUSAN ORLEAN
'Tender and insightful' MOHAMED TONSY
©2024 Gaar Adams (P)2024 Penguin Audio
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