[4] It evokes a Beirut of night bars, student life, sectarian and class divisions, sketching out the first lines of what would later be called the literature of war.

After being injured by a stone thrown at a protest, Tamimah is taken to the hospital, where she meets Hani al-Ra'i, a Maronite Christian student.

In addition to telling the story of Tamimah's coming-of-age, the novel also discusses Lebanese politics, and a reform effort among university students led by Hani al-Ra'i.

The novel discusses what 'Awwad refers to as "the factories of intolerance and the street demagoguery, and the traditional leaders and influential merchants" who infiltrated the ranks of the students, motivated by their partisan interests, their own lusts, and their ideologies.

She writes that she has decided to join the fedayeen, Palestinian fighters resisting Israel's incursions into southern Lebanon, a decision she connects to the violence she experienced at the hands of both her brother and Hani.

The novel has been translated into English, (as "Death in Beirut")[9] German, French (as "Dans les meules de Beyrouth"),[10] and Russian.