Enfant née fille et élevée comme un garçon pour l'honneur de son père, Ahmed traverse son douloureux destin, affrontant l'incompréhension de sa famille et les tabous d'une société bridée. Ce personnage, digne des contes des Mille et Une Nuits inspiré d'un authentique fait divers, est le héros de ces deux romans tragiques et merveilleux.
Preparing to leave for work one morning, Youssef al-Firsiwi finds a mysterious letter has been slipped under his door. In a single line, he learns that his only son, Yacine, whom he believed to be studying engineering in Paris, has been killed in Afghanistan fighting with the Islamist resistance. His comfortable life as a leftist journalist shattered, Youssef loses both his sense of smell and his sense of self. He and his wife divorce and he becomes involved with a new woman. He turns for support to his friends Ahmad and Ibrahim, themselves enmeshed in ever-more complex real estate deals and h... continue