by Ali Bader
First published in Arabic in 2008
as Hareth al-Tabghby Al-Moasasa by al-Arabiya lil-Dirasat wal-Nashr
First published in English in 2011 by
Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Publishing
This electronic edition published in 2012 by
Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation Publishing
Qatar Foundation
Villa 3, Education City
PO Box 5825Doha, Qatar
www.bqfp.com.qa
Copyright © Ali Bader, 2008
Translation © Amira Nowaira, 2011
The moral right of the author has been asserted
ISBN: 978 9 9921 9450 8
All rights reserved
You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The Tobacco Keeper is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
Visit www.bloomsbury.com to find out more about our authors and their books. You will find extracts, author interviews, author events and you can sign up for newsletters to be the first to hear about our latest releases and special offers.
Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Contents
Part One
I Lives, maps and special documents
II Ghost-writing: an imaginary paradise or a journey into the unknown?
III Journalists at the tobacconist’s
IV The imperial city and the emerald bars
V Boris, Samir and Farida Reuben’s letters
Part Two
VI The keeper of flocks
VII The protected man in the tobacconist’s
VIII Tobacco keeper
Part Three
IX Murder revealed, a life on the periphery and strange lands
A Note on the Translator
Imprint