The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) is a 2025 dark comedic novel by Rabih Alameddine which recounts six decades in the life of a Lebanese family. It won the 2025 National Book Award for fiction.
It has a non-linear format, told through a series of nested stories through the eyes of a gay 63-year-old philosophy teacher who confronts his past, his relationship with his mother, and his homeland. It covers the Lebanese Civil War, Lebanon's 2019 liquidity crisis, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the 2020 port explosion in Beirut, which killed more than 200 and injured thousands more.
I (2023)<br>
II (2001 - 2021)<br> The Banking Crisis<br> The Covid Pandemic<br>
III (1960 - 1975)<br> Pre-Civil War<br>
IV (1975)<br> The Civil War<br>
V (1975-2021)<br> The Port Explosion<br>
VI (2021)<br> Virginia<br>
VII (2025)
The book is inspired in part by Alameddine's own relationship with his aging mother, who was losing her memory.