My Friends by Hisham Matar

LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER PRIZE 2024

WINNER OF THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL FICTION

An intensely moving novel about three friends living in political exile and the emotional homeland that deep friendships can provide – from the Pulitzer prize-winning author of THE RETURN. Khaled and Mustafa meet at university in Edinburgh: two Libyan eighteen-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.