The Caliph's House

A wonderfully entertaining book - Tahir Shah's talent is to make you laugh while you are admiring the insights given by his most original and lively view of life.

DORIS LESSING

Funny, moving, fast-paced and thoughtful, it confirms Shah as one of the best travel writers of his generation...a rich mosaic of a book as intricate, complex and beautiful as the Arabian Nights world it describes

JASON WEBSTER

Elegantly woven. The dominant colours are luminous...sheer delight

PUBLISHERS WEEKLY

Endlessly fascinating...Shah's own heritage as both Afghan and Briton blesses him with a unique and penetrating point of view

BOOKLIST

Reading about restoring houses overseas can be as tedious as watching paint dry...yet I can't fault this joyful and resplendent addition to the genre. Shah writes without artifice or condescension, his language is fluent and direct. His characters leap off the page...I couldn't put the book down.

RORY MACLEAN, SUNDAY TIMES

A book full of charm and humour, elevated by a consistent sense of the beauty and mystery of everyday life. What also shines through the narrative is the author's decency and respect for the people and the cultures he encounters, the sort of qualities we like to think of as fundamentally British ...a tribute to our potential for understanding and learning to live with irreconcilable differences

GUARDIAN

Shah...with good humour and wit...gives a vivid evocation of the spirit of the place...The Caliph's House is charmingly escapist, and combines the pleasures of good property porn with those of the best travel writing

DAILY TELEGRAPH

Painted with a novelist's rather than a reporter's eye...His descriptions are entertaining, his dialogue often hilarious.

SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

An extraordinary tale of exploratory daring, insatiable curiosity and excruciating humour...written with tremendous verve, colour, compassion and wisdom, it's a magical story...Don't miss this gem of a book.

GEOGRAPHICAL MAGAZINE

A year abroad, a house rebuilt, but with a difference. Extremely odd characters and the narrative drive of a good novel. Very funny.

JOHN MAN, author of Genghis Khan

Alluring...an exotic and thought-provoking read.

GOOD BOOK GUIDE

Maximum splendour, maximum squalor...Enlivened by well-wrought descriptions of life in Casablanca: a place suspended between modernity and the Middle Ages, between Europe and Africa.

NEW YORK TIMES

Highly readable...Shah writes an outrageously black comedy with the straightest of poker faces

WASHINGTON POST