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  • Published: 15 March 2012
  • ISBN: 9780241957073
  • Imprint: Penguin General UK
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 256
  • RRP: $24.99

In the Country of Men




A heartbreaking, beautifully told classic set in the heart of Gaddafi's Libya

Nine-year-old Suleiman is just awakening to the wider world beyond the games on the hot pavement outside his home and beyond the loving embrace of his parents. He becomes the man of the house when his father goes away on business, but then he sees his father, standing in the market square in a pair of dark glasses. Suddenly the wider world becomes a frightening place where parents lie and questions go unanswered. Suleiman turns to his mother, who, under the cover of night, entrusts him with the secret story of her childhood.

  • Published: 15 March 2012
  • ISBN: 9780241957073
  • Imprint: Penguin General UK
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 256
  • RRP: $24.99

About the author

Hisham Matar

Hisham Matar was born in New York City to Libyan parents and spent his childhood first in Tripoli and then in Cairo. His first novel, In the Country of Men, was published in 2006 and was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, the Guardian First Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award in the US. It won six international literary awards, including the Commonwealth Writers' Prize Best First Book award for Europe and South Asia, the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, and the inaugural Arab American Book Award. It has been translated into twenty-eight languages. Hisham Matar lives in London.

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