Yasmina Khadra (Mohamed Moulessehoul)

[Al-khiyal]

Autumn of the Phantoms by Yasmina Khadra

Khadra's third Inspector Llob mystery (after 2005's 'Double Blank') searingly portrays present-day Algeria's brutal realities. Llob faces expulsion and death threats after writing — under the pen name Yasmina Khadra — a series of books detailing Algeria's civil war and corruption from the inside out. This narrative doubling, which might seem overly postmodern in another story, deepens the menace hanging over Llob. Following the funeral of one of Llob's oldest friends, killed by the radical Islamists who are waging war on the Algerian government, Llob lives through bombings, terrorist attacks and waves of threats from superiors who could have him killed without the slightest repercussion. Like an existential novel, Llob's book aims to speak hard truths in simple language, and there's more than a touch of Camus in its bleak view of a society in which power and cruelty are synonymous.

~ Publishers Weekly


Unlike 'Morituri' (2003) and 'Double Blank' (2004), the third book featuring Algiers police superintendent Brahim Llob isn't a detective story. It's a story about a detective who has reached the end of the line emotionally as well as, it seems from the second chapter, professionally. Llob is back in his hometown for the burial of an old friend murdered as a warning - "Hi, we're back!" - by Islamic fundamentalist freebooters, and to console the victim's broken brother, one of Algeria's greatest painters. He returns to work in Algiers only to find that he has been "retired" because of that book he wrote under a woman's name ('Morituri'). For the rest of this book, friends and not-exactly-friends commiserate with him, he encounters gloating superiors and at least one wealthy ****heel he once grilled, a goon tails him, and he survives a bomb blast. Llob's despair over what fundamentalism has made of Algeria keens throughout, and readers hoping for a continuing series are bluntly disabused in the end. Powerful, anguished, and anguishing stuff.

~ Ray Olson, Booklist

[Al-khiyal]

The Sirens of Baghdad by Yasmina Khadra

Publication date May 8th, 2007

"The narrator of 'The Sirens of Baghdad' is a young man from a small desert village who is pulled into the radical insurgency engulfing Iraq. Forced to leave the University of Baghdad when the Americans invade, he has returned to his village where he witnesses three horrifying events that transform him. First, American soldiers at a checkpoint kill the sweet and beloved “village idiot.” Several days later, an American plane bombs a wedding on the outskirts of the village. The most devastating incident takes place in his own home, when soldiers looking for terrorists humiliate his father in full view of the terrified family. Consumed by the desire to avenge this unspeakable act, the young man goes to Baghdad to join the resistance.

Searching for a place to stay in a city going up in flames, the narrator is taken in by a radical group and convinces them that he is willing to do anything to help their cause. After proving his mettle by participating in several attacks, he is sent to Beirut to undertake a super-secret mission which will take him to London. As the time to board the plane nears, the narrator struggles to reconcile the act with his own moral principles.

A masterful and chilling look at violence and its effects on ordinary people, 'The Sirens of Baghdad' probes situations few writers dare examine. As powerfully written as Khadra’s previous novels, it explores humanity’s basest acts and shows that even in the most horrific circumstances, the good in human nature can prevail."

[Al-khiyal]

Wolf Dreams by Yasmina Khadra

Nafa Walid is a handsome aspiring actor in 1990s Algiers when he stumbles on a position as a driver for the Rajas, a wealthy and influential family. Instead of providing the springboard for his career he'd hoped for, however, the job serves as a brutal encounter with economic disparity and the amoral, inhumane world of his employers. When the demands of the work push him too far, he returns home, disillusioned. Frustrated with poverty and the inequalities of the Algerian social order, Nafa sees the mosque as his ticket to dignity and a better life, including marriage. Yet his plans go awry again, as Nafa is hurtled into Islamism, the revolutionary Islamic Salvation Front and a nihilistic desire for destruction. Khadra ('In the Name of God'), a.k.a. Mohammed Moulessehoul, a former Algerian army officer living in exile in France, charts with stark, unsparing prose the conditions of civil war-torn Algeria, and offers a profound glimpse into lives subsumed by violent, unquestioning faith.

~ Publishers Weekly


"The book that best describes how an Islamic Fundamentalist is formed."

~ New York Times

[Al-khiyal]

The Swallows of Kabul by Yasmina Khadra

Khadra is the nom de plume for Algerian army officer Mohamed Moulessehoul ('In the Name of God'; 'Wolf Dreams'), who illustrates the effects of repression on a pair of Kabul couples in this slim, harrowing novel of life in Afghanistan under Taliban rule. Gloomy prison guard Atiq Shaukat is tired of his grim duties, keeping watch over prisoners slated for public execution. Life at home, where his wife, Musarrat, is slowly dying of a chronic illness, is no better. Mohsen Ramat, meanwhile, clings to the remains of his middle-class life together with his beautiful, progressive wife, Zunaira, after the Taliban strip them of their livelihood and dignity. Khadra's storytelling style recalls that of Naguib Mahfouz in the early chapters, in which the tense dissatisfaction of both couples is revealed. The pivotal event occurs when Ramat discharges his frustrations by participating in the brutal stoning of a female Taliban prisoner. The incident changes the dynamic of his marriage; after an extended argument about the incident, Ramat persuades Zunaira to go for a stroll in downtown Kabul and the couple is harassed and nearly brutalized by Taliban soldiers. Zunaira continues to bridle at her situation, and when their next argument turns physical, Ramat falls and dies after hitting his head on the wall. Shaukat is given the assignment of guarding Zunaira after she is arrested and charged with murder, and his instant infatuation with her sets off a remarkable chain of events. Khadra's simple, elegant prose, finely drawn characters and chilling insights ("Kabul has become the antechamber to the great beyond") prepare the way for the terrible climax. Like Khaled Hosseini's 'The Kite Runner', this is a superb meditation on the fate of the Afghan people.

~ Publishers Weekly


Two men struggle to keep their sanity in a brief, despairing novel written pseudonymously by a former Algerian Army officer. Before the destruction wrought by the Soviet war and Taliban rule, Mohsen was an affluent merchant; now he wanders the streets while his beautiful wife is confined to home and burka. Atiq, a volatile ex-mujahideen, guards the prisoners awaiting public execution. One day, Mohsen stops to observe the public stoning of a prostitute, one of Atiq's charges. Caught up in the frenzy, he joins in, initiating a series of tragic events. Khadra's prose is gentle and precise, but the violent climax of the book makes a powerful point about what can happen to a man when "the light of his conscience has gone out."

~ The New Yorker

[Al-khiyal]

Autumn of the Phantoms by Yasmina Khadra

Review by Richard Marcus:

Like so many days in the world of the Algerian policeman Superintendent Llob, Autumn Of The Phantoms begins with a funeral. This one is for the brother of a childhood friend who was killed by fundamentalists who have begun terrorizing rural communities.

In this case, the community is the village where Llob and his friend, Algeria's greatest painter, were born. Which is of course why his brother was killed, for there was no other reason to kill a simple shepherd except that he was the brother of a despised intellectual.

Like the "devout" everywhere, the fundamentalists in Algeria behave as if they are jealous of anyone who can appreciate the beauty of creativity, and are afraid of anyone who is willing to have an original thought. Blind obedience doesn't allow for originality and so must be stamped out to ensure that there isn't anybody to pervert the minds of the weak and easily swayed.

But it's not just the terrorists one has to worry about in Algeria, there are always those who are able to take advantage of the unrest and create little empires for themselves. They aren't too thrilled that some nosy police superintendent has caught on to the way they use fundamentalists to cover their own attempts to subvert the lives of the people. That he had the nerve to publish a book making those accusations public is just too much for their delicate sensibilities.

So when Llob returns from the funeral, it's to discover that he has been dismissed from the police force for daring to write that the emperor's clothes are being sewn from the funeral shrouds of the people. In spite of his success in rounding up a good number of the carrion feeders who do business in Algeria in Double Blank (the preceding book), there are apparently enough of them left able to pull the right strings to make a functionary in the Interior Ministry fire Llob.

With his wife and children already sequestered safely with her family, at least with what minimal safety there is to be had in Algeria, Llob finds himself alone in Algiers. Dragged to a party in a wealthy enclave, he listens as car bombs and fire fights rock the surrounding city and business men make the excuse of "it's not just Algeria, but all countries like us who have this problem".

From the mouths of people who are stuffing themselves with delicacies that might cost enough to feed a family of four for a week come platitudes of belt-tightening and suffering for the betterment of the country. Complainers, they say shooting dirty glances in Llob's direction, are the ones who will conspire to see us fail (meaning the stalwart Captains of Industry) and then where would poor Algeria be?

When the reply is "much better off" and comes complete with an explanation as to why that is, even Llob is surprised it doesn't come out of his mouth. Especially so when the answerer accuses the erstwhile Captains of deliberately inciting the fundamentalists so that they can ride to the rescue, much the same thing that Llob has been discovering in recent months and had published in his book. It's almost too much of a coincidence for Llob that he is there to hear that with some of the people who were surely behind his firing.

What's even more troubling is that when he returns home he finds that four armed men had ransacked his apartment. They've taken all the time in the world as if knowing he was out for the evening. In rapid succession events begin to overtake him; a car bomb explodes outside the café he and his former colleagues are drinking in while they are exhorting him to leave town, and shortly after another childhood friend dies.

Once again he makes the return journey to his home village for a funeral. Memories of days when all that mattered was spying on a girl, or getting into trouble and having fun ambush him but they aren't the worst things laying in ambush for him. Like the Taliban in Afghanistan, the fundamentalists are trying to control the rural areas of Algeria.

When they have no local popular support they resort to terror tactics and try to strangle the life out of the town. Already other towns have had school buses blown up killing dozens of children, shepherds have been forced to either abandon their flocks or move them closer into town where the grazing is quickly exhausted, and the farmers can no longer safely work their fields.

But the people haven't survived French colonial rule only to be re-subjugated by their own countrymen. They have formed their own militia and have started to patrol the area. As one of his older friends tells him their goal is to make life as normal as possible for the children. But even the best-prepared people can't prevent a car bomb from devastating a street, and bullets from being shot. All you can do is fight back. But how long can you keep fighting when the battle doesn't seem to have an end and the faces of the enemy keep changing from year to year?

After 35 years of police work, Llob is still fighting what feels like a delaying action. So even though the urgent summons he receives to return to Algiers is to welcome him back into the fold with open arms, he decides he's had enough. He wants to spend time with his children – give them something approaching a life of normalcy before it's too late. He wants to find his wife again, the woman whose eyes from behind their veil smiled their way into his heart.

In Autumn Of The Phantoms Yasmina Khadra again delivers not only a intelligent and startling story, but insight into a profoundly foreign world. In North America we have any conception of what it's like to wake up in the morning and wonder if this is the day your car blows up when you turn the key over. Will your children come home from school or will you be forced to try and piece together an identification from their remains?

Reading these books make our Homeland Security and colour codes sound like the games of children playing at fighting terrorists. There is no such thing as a War on Terror in the streets of Algiers and the countryside of Algeria. You merely try to keep things as normal as possible and survive until the next day.

The three books featuring Superintendent Llob should be required reading for anybody wishing to understand the reality of living with terrorism. Morituri, Double Blank, and Autumn Of The Phantoms aren't going to let you say "I know how you feel" to an Algerian or someone else who lives like that. But it will make you a hell of a lot more grateful for what you do have.

[liberte]

I haven't read the Loeb ones, I'm not one for detective stories but have read Swallows of Kabul, Wolf Dreams and The Attack. Reallly highly recommended.

[Al-khiyal]

In the Name of God by Yasmina Khadra

Review by Richard Marcus:

Despite history's repeated evidence to the contrary, it is never easy to believe the potential that human beings have to commit atrocities. When it is people you've known your whole life, families that have shared villages for generations, belief is even slower to flower. Let it be anybody else, you whisper, as if that would lessen the horror of finding a mutilated body in the morning. Let it be a stranger.

It's not until your childhood friend turns up at your door carrying the rifle he plans on using to kill you that you truly believe that anybody can be capable of anything. Ask the Bosnian Muslim, Serb, or Croatian what they thought of their chances for survival? Or how about the Rwandan when their neighbours picked up machetes and old tires?

Algeria, like other Muslim countries, in the late 1980s saw an upsurge in activity by fundamentalist Islamic groups. Primarily they were preparing themselves as a political force for the next round of elections so they could set about establishing an Islamic state like that in Iran. In 1988 "spontaneous" demonstrations across the country on their behalf turned into rioting and violence. When it looked like the fundamentalists were about to win the general election, the army annulled the election, outlawed the fundamentalists and arrested all of their leaders.

All of this did was turn them into terrorist groups who began a campaign of wanton destruction. In the cities this took the form of car bombs and random murders and kidnappings. Usually the targets of the attacks were those considered enemies of the movement - intellectuals, police officers, and artists. In the countryside it was a similar story, except the extremists would target towns.

For those trying just to live out their lives it was a horrible period of trying to retain vestiges of normalcy amid a period of unremitting terror. You didn't know who to trust; whom you could confide in, as it seemed that anybody who spoke out against the terrorists, no matter how privately would, end up dead.

The terrorists acted with the abandon of those who know that they can't be touched. In the small towns, people often knew who the members of the groups were; they were the same people who had been members of the groups when they were legal. But it was easier to find reasons to excuse the killings and violence than stand up to it. After all, they said, hadn't they, the fundamentalist been treated badly, and weren't they doing the work of God anyway?

This is the atmosphere that we are thrust into in Algerian writer Yasmina Khadra's novel In The Name Of God. The small rural town of Ghachimat has existed without too many changes since the end of the colonial rule, and probably hadn't been changed much by the appearance of the French as their lords and masters.

The only people who have felt any differences in their lifestyles were those who had done work for the French during colonial times and the large landowners who had had their land "redistributed" through agrarian reforms. The former are now spat upon and reviled, even though it's been decades since the French left (it's become a habit - a way of feeling superior) and the latter have seen their once luxurious existences reduced to being the same as their neighbours.

The children of these people are a cauldron of resentments and anger from slights both real and imagined. It's in them that the seeds of the fundamentalists take root. They are promised the power of the righteous and the weapons of God in the exercising of their vengeance against all who are seen to have slighted them.

Of course there are also those who find a way to profit from all of the activity. Working both sides against each other to whip up ferment against either their personal enemies or to steer events in such a way for them to have personal gain. They prey on the corpses and the misery of the village. It doesn't matter to them who "wins" in the end because no matter who is left standing, it's the vultures who are always the best fed after a battle.

The village of Ghachimat is Khadra's microcosm of all of Algeria to exemplify how little any of this movement has to do with religion. He shows how the leaders cynically exploit the feelings of alienation and resentment felt by those who feel they should have everything handed to them on a platter. Jealousy and personal glory have more to do with motivations than establishing a society based on the laws of God.

Speeches in the mosque take on all the subtlety of the Nuremberg rallies staged by Hitler, as they are designed to whip up hatred rather then belief in anything sacred. Society will be remade in an image that best suits those holding the reigns of power tightly in their hands, not necessarily one that the writers of the Koran would recognise.

Khadra does a brilliant job of not overstating anything. None of his characters foam at the mouth or are rabid, but it is that very calmness that makes this so horrifying to read. The physical violence is not the true horror of this book, although it is present and somewhat graphic. But it pales beside the depiction of how casually and easily people are able to become those who can mutilate women and children with no qualms or twinges of conscience.

Imagine waking up in the morning not knowing whether something you have said has marked you to be killed during the day. Imagine walking down the street of your hometown and wondering behind which smiling face lurks an informant ready to point the finger at anyone who displeases them. You are afraid of saying anything or getting angry with anyone because it could mean yours is the next head found in a burlap bag.

You wonder who among your friends might be the one to show up at your door to kill you because you have not become one of them or because you have been fingered as saying the wrong thing or holding the wrong belief. You worry about it every day as you make the walk to work.

Maybe it would be safer to be one of them, just for now. You wouldn't kill anyone of course, unless there was no way of avoiding it - a matter of them or me for instance, of having to prove my sincerity and commitment to the cause. Yes that would really be the safest thing to do - who could blame you?

You see it's not that hard to become a terrorist; it might just be harder not to.