A Flat Place: Noreen Masud in conversation with Suad Aldarra

Noreen Masud has always loved flat landscapes, from beaches when the tide is out to drained farmland and open plains with ruler-straight horizons.

In her memoir, A Flat Place (Hamish Hamilton, 2023), shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, Noreen explores the complexities of the British landscapes she loves, reckoning with colonialism, patriarchy and her own family history.

Join Noreen in conversation with Suad Aldarra, the Rooney Prize-winning author of I Don't Want to Talk About Home (Transworld, 2022), for a discussion on nature writing, belonging and the hidden histories of landscape.

Noreen Masud is a Lecturer in English Literature at the University of Bristol, and an AHRC/BBC New Generation Thinker. Her memoir-travelogue, A Flat Place (Hamish Hamilton [Penguin] and Melville House Press, 2023), was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize for Non-Fiction, the Sunday Times Charlotte Aitken Trust Young Writer of the Year Award, the Jhalak Prize, the RSL Ondaatje Prize and The Books are My Bag Readers’ Awards.

Suad Aldarra is a Syrian writer and engineer based in Dublin. She is the winner of the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature 2024. Suad holds a Masters in Data Analytics from the University of Galway. Suad's debut memoir, I Don’t Want to Talk About Home, was published by Penguin in July 2022, and shortlisted for the the An Post Irish Book Awards – Biography of the Year. Suad has written several pieces for The Irish Times and The Independent, among other places. 

Suad Aldarra appears at Belfast Book Festival 2025 courtesy of the live literature organisation Speaking Volumes, as part of their Breaking Ground Ireland event, funded by Arts Council England