Shell : Memoirs of a Hidden Observer. This item is unavailable.Shell : Memoirs of a Hidden Observer

This compelling first novel is the astonishing story of a Syrian political prisoner of conscience - an atheist mistaken for a radical Islamist - who was locked up for 13 years without trial in one of the most notorious prisons in the Middle East. The novel takes the form of a diary which Musa keeps in his head and then writes down upon his release. In Tadmur prison, the mood is naturally bleak and yet often very beautifully captured. The narrator, a young graduate, is defiant and stoical, and somehow able to pick out humour and irony in the shocking events and characters he describes.

Mustafa Khalifa is a Syrian novelist living in exile. Besides writing fiction, he is an eloquent and insightful political commentator on the situation in his native country.<br /><br />Paul Starkey has translated works by Adania Shibli, Mansoura Ez Eldin, Edwar al-Kharrat, and others. He won the 2015 Saif Ghobash Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation for his translation of Youssef Rakha's novel The Book of the Sultan's Seal.