Being an émigré isn’t that unthinkable: Just imagine that you have to leave home forever, potentially never to return. Or imagine that you never had a home in the first place; that the very word “home” taunts and perpetually eludes you; that everywhere you go, you try to find or create it to no avail. Still can’t imagine it? Hisham Matar’s new novel My Friends will help. Following Khaled Abd al Hady, a young Libyan man, as he moves from Benghazi to London, this scintillating novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author is filled with equal parts history and fiction.
Khaled is the son of a school headmaster and a headstrong mother. Innately curious, he spends days reading books from his father’s vast library. When Khaled and his family hear a short story read over the radio about a man being eaten by a cat, broadcast by Libyan BBC reporter Mohammed Mustafa Ramadan (a real journalist who was assassinated in broad daylight in 1980), they are fascinated and discover that the author, Hosam Zowa, is a Benghazian living abroad to pursue university in the U.K. Khaled is inspired to apply to university in Edinburgh and is miraculously accepted. Although he is thrilled to embark on this adventure, his family seems hesitant: They know, though he doesn’t, that once Khaled leaves, he will never come back.
In Edinburgh, Khaled meets other Libyan students, though they all live under the shadow of the Qaddafi regime, unable to trust even one another. At a demonstration in front of the Libyan embassy in London, an actual event that took place on April 17, 1984, Khaled is shot by a gunman in the embassy and, in the aftermath, is outed as a radical. Eventually, he meets Hosam, the author of that strange short story, and his life is forever changed.
From its opening when Khaled and Hosam part ways for what is likely the last time, My Friends flows quickly and vividly. The story is structured around Khaled’s reminiscing as he walks around London, visiting the spots where the events he is retelling took place. This foundation of memory allows Matar to imbue each scene with rich, nostalgic emotion, especially as much of the book is based on reality. As Khaled reflects on the heartbreaking and life-affirming relationships he has had over the course of his life, readers are sure to be touched, coming to a deeper understanding of friendship, nation and home.