The Automobile Club of Egypt: A novel

The Automobile Club of Egypt: A novel

From the most popular Egyptian novelist of his generation (â€œa suitable heir to the mantle worn by Naguib Mahfouzâ€ â€”The Guardian), a rollicking, exuberant and powerfully moving story of a family swept up by social unrest in postâ€“World War II Cairo.

Once a respected landowner, Abd el-Aziz Gaafar fell into penury and moved his family to Cairo, where he was forced into menial work at the Automobile Clubâ€”a refuge of colonial luxury for its European members. There, Alku, the lifelong Nubian retainer of Egyptâ€™s corrupt and dissolute king, lords it over the staff, a squabbling but tight-knit group, who live in perpetual fear, as they are thrashed for their mistakes, their wages dependent on Alkuâ€™s whims. When, one day, Abd el-Aziz stands up for himself, he is beaten. Soon afterward, he dies, as much from shame as from his injuries, leaving his widow and four children further impoverished. The familyâ€™s loss propels them down different paths: the responsible son, Kamel, takes over his late fatherâ€™s post in the Clubâ€™s storeroom, even as his law school friends seduce him into revolutionary politics; Mahmud joins his brother working at the Club but spends his free time sleeping with older womenâ€”for a fee, which he splits with his partner in crime, his devil-may-care workout buddy and neighbor, Fawzy; their greedy brother Said breaks away to follow ambitions of his own; and their only sister, Saleha, is torn between her dream of studying mathematics and the security of settling down as a wife and saving her family.

It is at the Club, too, that Kamelâ€™s dangerous politics will find the favor and patronage of the kingâ€™s seditious cousin, an unlikely revolutionary plotterâ€“cumâ€“bon vivant. Soon, both servants and masters will be subsumed by the brewing social upheaval. And the Egyptians of the Automobile Club will face a stark choice: to live safely, but without dignity, or to fight for their rights and risk everything.

Full of absorbing incident, and marvelously drawn characters, Alaa Al Aswanyâ€™s novel gives us Egypt on the brink of changes that resonate to this day. It is an irresistible confirmation of Al Aswanyâ€™s reputation as one of the Middle Eastâ€™s most beguiling storytellers and insightful interpreters of the human spirit.

From the Hardcover edition.
Country USA
Manufacturer Vintage
Binding Kindle Edition
ReleaseDate 2015-08-18
Format Kindle eBook
EANs 9781101875797

Country	USA
Manufacturer	Vintage
Binding	Kindle Edition
ReleaseDate	2015-08-18
Format	Kindle eBook
EANs	9781101875797

The Automobile Club of Egypt: A novel

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