Our Lady Of Alice Bhatti

Mohammed Hanif

ISBN 10: 0224082051 / ISBN 13: 9780224082051

Published by Jonathan Cape, London, 2011

About this Item

A fine unread 1st impression in a fine dustwrapper, Signed and dated (8-10-11) by the Author on the title page.

Seller Inventory # 006105

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Our Lady Of Alice Bhatti
• Publisher: Jonathan Cape, London
• Publication Date: 2011
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0224082051
• ISBN 13: 9780224082051
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First Edition
• Condition: New
• Dust Jacket Condition: New
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Modern Fiction

About this title

Synopsis

The patients of the Sacred Heart Hospital for All Ailments are looking for a miracle, and Alice Bhatti is looking for a job.

Alice is a candidate for the position of junior nurse, grade 4. It is only a few weeks since her release from Borstal. She has returned to her childhood home in the French Colony, where her father, recently retired from his position as chief janitor, continues as part-time healer, and full-time headache for the local church. It seems she has inherited some of his gift.With guidance from the working nurse's manual, and some tricks she picked up in prison, Alice brings succour to the thousands of patients littering the hospital's corridors and concrete courtyard. In the process she attracts the attention of a lovesick patient, Teddy Bunt, apprentice to the nefarious 'Gentleman Squad' of the Karachi police. They fall in love; Teddy with sudden violence, Alice with cautious optimism.Their love is unexpected, but the consequences are not.

Alice soon finds that her new life is built on foundations as unstable as those of her home. A Catholic snubbed by other Catholics, who are in turn hated by everyone around them, she is also put at risk by her husband, who does two things that no member of the Gentlemen Squad has ever done - fall in love with a working girl, and allow a potentially dangerous suspect to get away. Can Teddy and Alice ever live in peace? Can two people make a life together without destroying the very thing that united them? It seems unlikely, but then Alice Bhatti is no ordinary nurse...

Filled with wit, colour and pathos, Our Lady of Alice Bhatti is a glorious story of second chances, thwarted ambitions and love in unlikely places, set in the febrile streets of downtown Karachi. It is the remarkable new novel from the author of A Case of Exploding Mangoes.

About the Author

Mohammed Hanif was born in Okara, Pakistan, in 1965. He graduated from Pakistan Air Force Academy as Pilot Officer, but subsequently left to pursue a career in journalism. He has written plays for the stage and BBC radio, and his film, The Long Night, has been shown at film festivals around the world. His first novel, A Case of Exploding Mangoes, won the Commonwealth Writers' Prize for Best First Novel in 2008.