In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar

In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar

Libya, 1979. Nine-year-old Suleiman's days are circumscribed by the narrow rituals of childhood: outings to the ruins surrounding Tripoli, games with friends played under the burning sun, exotic gifts from his father's constant business trips abroad. But his nights have come to revolve around his mother's increasingly disturbing bedside stories full of old family bitterness. And then one day Suleiman sees his father across the square of a busy marketplace, his face wrapped in a pair of dark sunglasses. Wasn't he supposed to be away on business yet again? Why is he going into that strange building with the green shutters? Why did he lie?

Suleiman is soon caught up in a world he cannot hope to understand--where the sound of the telephone ringing becomes a portent of grave danger; where his mother frantically burns his father's cherished books; where a stranger full of sinister questions sits outside in a parked car all day; where his best friend's father can disappear overnight, next to be seen publicly interrogated on state television.

In the Country of Men is a stunning depiction of a child confronted with the private fallout of a public nightmare. But above all, it is a debut of rare insight and literary grace.

Hisham Matar was born to Libyan parents in New York City and spent his childhood in Tripoli and Cairo. In the Land of Men, his debut novel, was a Man Booker Prize, Guardian First Book Award, and National Book Critics Circle Award finalist. The Commonwealth Writers' Prize Best First Novel award for Europe and South Asia, the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, and the inaugural Arab American Book Award were among the six international literary accolades it received. It's been dubbed in twenty-eight other languages. Matar is an associate professor at Barnard College in New York City and lives in London.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780385340434
ISBN 10	0385340435
Title	In the Country of Men
Author	Hisham Matar
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Paperback
Publisher	Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group Inc
Year published	2008-02-26
Number of pages	272
Prizes	Winner of Commonwealth Writers' Prize of Europe and South Asia 2007, Winner of Library Journal Best Books of the Year 2007, Winner of New York Times 100 Notable Books of the Year 2007, Nominated for National Book Critics Circle Awards 2008
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.