'We will have to learn to live together better.' Writer Julia Navarro explores the why of terrorism in her new novel

Navarro's eighth novel From nowhere revolves around Lebanese-French Abir Nasr, whose parents and sister are shot dead before his eyes by Israeli soldiers. Abir vows to take revenge one day. He and his little brother Ismail end up with strictly religious family in Paris, who later move to the Molenbeek district of Brussels.

While Abir's cousin Noura prefers the freer lifestyle of the West - and is expelled from the family - Abir and Ismail are increasingly drawn to the extremist side by their uncle. A humiliating rejection from Noura's friend Marion and the realisation that he will never truly be part of this society prompt Abir to put his plans for revenge into action.

Another protagonist is Jacob Baudin. Like Abir, he was born in Lebanon, and moved to Paris with his parents as a child. When his father dies on his 12th birthday, his mother tells him he is Jewish and they will move to Israel. There, as a young man, he becomes one of the soldiers taking part in the fatal mission in which Abir's family is killed.

Years later, Jacob is still haunted by guilt and by the hatred that could be read in the surviving son's eyes. On the day Abir puts his plan into action, their lives become intertwined once again.

The 2016 Brussels attacks were the breeding ground for this novel, I presume?

'Certainly, and also all the other attacks elsewhere in Europe: Barcelona, Madrid, Paris and London. The novel grew out of the lack of understanding between Western and Eastern countries. One of the biggest problems of this 21st century is the uprooting people experience after moving, usually by necessity, from one country to another. They have had to flee war, violence or other misery, and have to build a new life in a different society. Their circumstances are often not pleasant or easy.'

Your novel puts a finger on a sore spot: fear of foreigners, especially Muslims and their religion, leads to them never being truly assimilated into society and thus unable to feel truly at home in their new homeland.

'This xenophobia is alive and well across Europe. Refugees come from countries with different customs and values, and host countries know little about their backgrounds and therefore find it difficult to connect with them. The unknown evokes fear, and that leads to exclusion. This increases the likelihood that migrants will withdraw and cling more strongly to their religion, for example, in order to preserve a sense of identity.

We would make more effort reciprocally to understand each other. We in the West should try more to empathise with the plight of migrants, with what it means to have to leave home and hearth behind and try to settle in a country where beliefs, customs and behaviour, and social norms and values are completely different.'

Globalisation

As a result of climate change, migration is expected to become much more significant.

'Indeed, more and more people are fleeing their countries because of climate problems, or because of violence. The biggest challenge facing the European Union is managing globalisation. Countries have become much more heterogeneous; there is no longer such a thing as the Netherlands for the Dutch or Spain for the Spanish. Every country has inhabitants from as many as ten cultures. But there is now mistrust above all. Our democracies will have to find a solution to live together in a decent way.

The public space should be a safe place for every person, no matter where you were born. So we will have to learn to coexist better with each other and each other's differences. Not imposing one culture on another, but being more open to each other and learning from each other, instead of thinking one culture is superior to another. That also means that all should have the same rights and obligations, so that everyone feels respected and valued. We must preserve and guard the safety of the public space in which we live together, and that concerns us all.'

What can literature, a book like yours, mean in that?

'A novel can show an issue from different perspectives, and invite the reader to step into someone's shoes for a moment and think about it. My novel is about the impact of violence, being uprooted, the West versus the East, the role of the media. I hope you get closer to that by reading about the history of the characters and so maybe, just for a moment, get into their skin. Not to justify their actions or evoke pity, not to condemn them, but to understand them. To understand why someone like Abir, who wants to become an engineer, ends up as a suicide bomber.'

Miss why

How difficult was it for you to empathise with your characters? They are quite distant from you.

'I am interested in human beings and that is what I write about, every novel. My grandfather used to call me 'little why', because I always wanted to know why something happened, why someone did something. I was constantly asking questions. Working as a journalist, I met many different people, from prime ministers and Nobel laureates to criminals. That gave me the opportunity to look behind the news, a great wealth for a writer.

In my work, I travel through the light and dark places that are in each of us. I have travelled Abir's road, which starts in southern Lebanon and ends in Brussels, with him. And I have learned that there is much we are not yet doing right in this area in Europe.

It is not my intention to tell my readers what to think. Nor do they have to identify with the protagonist or become complicit. What I aim for is to show what is happening, now, in our society. To make readers think about that and draw their own conclusions.

The one person I think readers might come to love a little is Noura. She is paying a high price to become the master of her own life. To me, she embodies the difficult path that women have to take, and I don't just mean Muslim women but women in general. Women have had to fight for their freedom and control over their lives step by step; nothing is given to us. Women like her, who want the right to decide their own lives, must be supported in this.'