Anatomy of a Disappearance

Nuri is born into exile, the son of worldly parents who've fled their Arab country in the wake of a revolution. After his mother's death, Nuri and his dashing father live a life of strange emptiness in their Cairo apartment, with only the occasional hint of the father's risky political activities intruding . . . until they meet Mona. The young, beautiful half-English, half-Arab woman sitting by the pool of the Magda Marina Hotel transfixes both the father and Nuri. But the life the three create is shattered when the father disappears.

Anatomy of a Disappearance is written with all the emotional precision and intimacy that has won Hisham Matar tremendous international recognition. In a voice that is delicately wrought and beautifully tender, he asks: When a loved one disappears, how does that absence shape the lives of those who are left;

Hisham Matar's own father, an anti-Gaddafi activist, "disappeared" in 1990 from Cairo and was taken to a Libyan prison. His fate is still unknown.