The Emissaries have arrived

Ten years ago, when I was Youssef Rakha and a revolution was breaking out in Tahrir Square…

They come with spring. The equinox on the heals of the Iraq War’s twentieth anniversary. And I am thinking again of that mysterious scene in Genesis when three strangers stop at Abraham’s tent in the desert and he kneels and begs them to accept his hospitality. God has come to tell him and his wife Sarah that, even though the two are terrifically old, they will still bear the child they were once promised. It is not clear quite whether Abraham, who last spoke to God only a chapter ago, immediately recognizes the three men as his Lord, or in what way He manifests in them. But it makes me think of that pink beam that hit Philip K. Dick—another prophet past his prime—telling him his son needed medical attention when no one on earth could have known, saving the little boy’s life. It makes me think of downtown Cairo that afternoon twelve years ago when, as a character named Youssef says in The Crocodiles (in Robin’s Moger’s English), “millions streamed out of Cairo’s mosques onto the streets after the Friday prayers [and] I felt that God had appeared for real.” And I want to tell you, too, that when I held the book in my hand, for a moment Cairo became Berlin and I was there as I had been for one glorious month many lifetimes before all those Arab Spring faces made it their city. Before the people who are releasing Emissaries today even thought of setting up shop in Charlottenburg. So they come with all that, too. They come with Cairo’s meteorologically glitchy spring, Mother’s Day and Ramadan. And with this picture that I made only the other day in the place where I was born, even though it belongs in a place where no revolution ever happened and no one thought of writing about one.

EMISSARIES can be ordered direct from Barakunan, which will deliver anywhere in the world (for Egypt residents it is available at a reduced price). It is also available at The Mosaic Rooms in London and A-P Berlin. In the next few weeks, EMISSARIES will be the subject of a three-episode podcast with Radio AlHara. Together with the author and publisher, fascinating guests will be discussing the state of English language writing today, the legacy of the Arab Spring, and the meaning of speculative fiction in the context of history. The podcast features extracts from the audio book, which can be accessed on major audio platforms. Review copies of EMISSARIES—which Alexander Wells just called “wild, intelligent, superrealistic, and totally moreish”—can be requested from the author or publisher.