Whispers and fears intensify around a young boy in Hisham Matar’s gripping depiction of childhood confronted with the effects of revolution.
An intensely moving novel about three friends living in political exile and the emotional homeland that friendship can provide
Khaled and Mustafa meet at university in Edinburgh: two Libyan 18-year-olds expecting to return home after their studies. In a moment of recklessness and courage, they travel to London to join a demonstration in front of the Libyan embassy. When government officials open fire on protestors in broad daylight, both friends are wounded, and their lives forever changed.
Over the years that follow, Khaled, Mustafa and their friend Hosam, a writer, are bound together by their shared history. If friendship is a space to inhabit, theirs becomes small and inhospitable when a revolution in Libya forces them to choose between the lives they have created in London and the lives they left behind.
My Friends was longlisted for the Booker Prize 2024.
Hisham Matar
About the Author
Hisham Matar was born in New York to Libyan parents, spent his childhood in Tripoli and Cairo and has lived most of his life in LondonA complex and powerful meditation on what friendship means and a moving exploration of how exile impacts those forced to navigate a world where they cannot rest
— The 2024 judges on My Friends
Other nominated books by Hisham Matar