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The Tyrant's Novel
Imagine a Middle-Eastern country that was once a friend of the West becoming an enemy, its people starving and savagely repressed by a tyrant known as Great Uncle. As a celebrated writer and war hero, the man who here relates his story has a better life than most, until he is made an offer he can't refuse. He must write a great novel, telling of the suffering of his people under the enemy's cruel economic sanctions and portraying Great Uncle as their saviour. This masterpiece must be completed in time for its international debut in three months - or else. If the writer cannot -- or will not - meet the tyrant's deadline, he and anyone he cares for will pay the ultimate price. Stark, terrifying and utterly compelling, THE TYRANT'S NOVEL is both a gripping thriller and a chilling glimpse of a fictional world that seems all too real.
304 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2003
12 people are currently reading
181 people want to read
About the author
Thomas Keneally
112 books1,254 followersThomas Michael Keneally, AO (born 7 October 1935) is an Australian novelist, playwright and author of non-fiction. He is best known for writing Schindler's Ark, the Booker Prize-winning novel of 1982, which was inspired by the efforts of Poldek Pfefferberg, a Holocaust survivor. The book would later be adapted to Steven Spielberg's Schindler's List (1993), which won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
Often published under the name Tom Keneally in Australia.
Life and Career:
Born in Sydney, Keneally was educated at St Patrick's College, Strathfield, where a writing prize was named after him. He entered St Patrick's Seminary, Manly to train as a Catholic priest but left before his ordination. He worked as a Sydney schoolteacher before his success as a novelist, and he was a lecturer at the University of New England (1968–70). He has also written screenplays, memoirs and non-fiction books.
Keneally was known as "Mick" until 1964 but began using the name Thomas when he started publishing, after advice from his publisher to use what was really his first name. He is most famous for his Schindler's Ark (1982) (later republished as Schindler's List), which won the Booker Prize and is the basis of the film Schindler's List (1993). Many of his novels are reworkings of historical material, although modern in their psychology and style.
Keneally has also acted in a handful of films. He had a small role in The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (based on his novel) and played Father Marshall in the Fred Schepisi movie, The Devil's Playground (1976) (not to be confused with a similarly-titled documentary by Lucy Walker about the Amish rite of passage called rumspringa).
In 1983, he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO). He is an Australian Living Treasure.
He is a strong advocate of the Australian republic, meaning the severing of all ties with the British monarchy, and published a book on the subject in Our Republic (1993). Several of his Republican essays appear on the web site of the Australian Republican Movement.
Keneally is a keen supporter of rugby league football, in particular the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles club of the NRL. He made an appearance in the rugby league drama film The Final Winter (2007).
In March 2009, the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, gave an autographed copy of Keneally's Lincoln biography to President Barack Obama as a state gift.
Most recently Thomas Keneally featured as a writer in the critically acclaimed Australian drama, Our Sunburnt Country.
Thomas Keneally's nephew Ben is married to the former NSW Premier, Kristina Keneally.
Often published under the name Tom Keneally in Australia.
Life and Career:
Born in Sydney, Keneally was educated at St Patrick's College, Strathfield, where a writing prize was named after him. He entered St Patrick's Seminary, Manly to train as a Catholic priest but left before his ordination. He worked as a Sydney schoolteacher before his success as a novelist, and he was a lecturer at the University of New England (1968–70). He has also written screenplays, memoirs and non-fiction books.
Keneally was known as "Mick" until 1964 but began using the name Thomas when he started publishing, after advice from his publisher to use what was really his first name. He is most famous for his Schindler's Ark (1982) (later republished as Schindler's List), which won the Booker Prize and is the basis of the film Schindler's List (1993). Many of his novels are reworkings of historical material, although modern in their psychology and style.
Keneally has also acted in a handful of films. He had a small role in The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (based on his novel) and played Father Marshall in the Fred Schepisi movie, The Devil's Playground (1976) (not to be confused with a similarly-titled documentary by Lucy Walker about the Amish rite of passage called rumspringa).
In 1983, he was made an Officer of the Order of Australia (AO). He is an Australian Living Treasure.
He is a strong advocate of the Australian republic, meaning the severing of all ties with the British monarchy, and published a book on the subject in Our Republic (1993). Several of his Republican essays appear on the web site of the Australian Republican Movement.
Keneally is a keen supporter of rugby league football, in particular the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles club of the NRL. He made an appearance in the rugby league drama film The Final Winter (2007).
In March 2009, the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, gave an autographed copy of Keneally's Lincoln biography to President Barack Obama as a state gift.
Most recently Thomas Keneally featured as a writer in the critically acclaimed Australian drama, Our Sunburnt Country.
Thomas Keneally's nephew Ben is married to the former NSW Premier, Kristina Keneally.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
January 30, 2011
Keneally writes a novel which is all about the fate of intellectuals and artists in Iraq in the UN sanctions period. He then saddles himself with two very awkward conventions which do the book no favours at all. First, I guess if you're writing about a contemporary government, you cloak the country's real name and change all the names of the towns and rivers and so forth. Maybe this is to avoid the lawyers or an icepick in the back of the head. The ghost of Salman Rushdie must appear to writers at this point. So Saddam Hussain is called Great Uncle throughout.
But furthermore, Keneally gives all his Iraqis Western names, such as Peter Collins, Matt McCloud, Sarah, Bernie, Alan Sheriff, and so on. This is because he wants to remove the otherness from his characters. "I would very much like to be the man you meet in the street. A man with a name like Alan. If we all had good Anglo-Saxon names...or if we were not, God help us, Said and Osmaa and Saleh. If we had Mac instead of Ibn." Thus says the narrator right at the beginning. This device, well-intentioned as it may be, unfortunately turns out to have the opposite effect. The Western reader is alienated even more from the peculiar situations and melodramatic twists and turns because stuff like this doesn't remotely happen in Western countries. (Stuff like visiting your country's supreme leader who could at any moment pull out a revolver and shoot you, and being forced to dress in a sterile surgeon's suit for the interview because of Great Uncle's health paranoia). So this naming convention saps a lot of the reality out of the whole thing.
But even so, this novel reads like a cerebral exercise anyway, all about a guy who is given (by Saddam) an impossible deadline to write a novel exposing the Western sanctions as pointless and inhumane, and whilst the guy agrees with this argument he hates Saddam (naturally) and wants nothing to do with helping him, and conflicted loyalties and artistic compromise and blah blah blah. Oh, and the most beautiful woman in Iraq being the narrator's wife, and the second most beautiful woman in Iraq proposing to the narrator once the other one dies. And blah blah blah.
I mean, really.
But furthermore, Keneally gives all his Iraqis Western names, such as Peter Collins, Matt McCloud, Sarah, Bernie, Alan Sheriff, and so on. This is because he wants to remove the otherness from his characters. "I would very much like to be the man you meet in the street. A man with a name like Alan. If we all had good Anglo-Saxon names...or if we were not, God help us, Said and Osmaa and Saleh. If we had Mac instead of Ibn." Thus says the narrator right at the beginning. This device, well-intentioned as it may be, unfortunately turns out to have the opposite effect. The Western reader is alienated even more from the peculiar situations and melodramatic twists and turns because stuff like this doesn't remotely happen in Western countries. (Stuff like visiting your country's supreme leader who could at any moment pull out a revolver and shoot you, and being forced to dress in a sterile surgeon's suit for the interview because of Great Uncle's health paranoia). So this naming convention saps a lot of the reality out of the whole thing.
But even so, this novel reads like a cerebral exercise anyway, all about a guy who is given (by Saddam) an impossible deadline to write a novel exposing the Western sanctions as pointless and inhumane, and whilst the guy agrees with this argument he hates Saddam (naturally) and wants nothing to do with helping him, and conflicted loyalties and artistic compromise and blah blah blah. Oh, and the most beautiful woman in Iraq being the narrator's wife, and the second most beautiful woman in Iraq proposing to the narrator once the other one dies. And blah blah blah.
I mean, really.
March 20, 2020
I read this book soon after it was published in 2003, when the idea of locking up ‘illegal arrivals’ without visas in detention centres, introduced in the 1990s by the Keating Government, had been ramped up to the the mandatory off-shore detention of all arrivals by boat under what was euphemistically called the ‘Pacific Solution‘. The book has only increased in power in the 17 years since, especially with the very public face of Iranian journalist Behrouz Boochani, whose book No Friend But the Mountains received widespread critical acclaim. It’s as if Keneally’s book has been brought to life.
Keneally’s novel is in three parts. Part 1, ‘The Visitor’s Preface’, told in the first person, frames the novel. An unnamed journalist narrator accompanies a female colleague to a thinly disguised Villawood Detention Centre. There he meets ‘Alan Sheriff’, the name adopted by an Iraqi refugee incarcerated there, who proceeds to tell him “the saddest and silliest story you will ever hear”.
The bulk of the body is in Part 2, ‘Alan Sheriff’s Story’. It is also told in the first person as a memoir, although on occasions Alan breaks off to note the detention-centre conditions under which the story is being told. ‘Alan Sheriff’ is a writer, who after the moderately successful publication of a book of short stories in an unnamed Middle Eastern country, had been working quietly on a novel. When tragedy strikes suddenly and without warning, he puts the novel aside, feeling that his life and work is futile in the face of his grief. Suddenly the summons arrives from Great Uncle (a thinly disguised Saddam Hussein) for him to write a novel within a month which will be published under Great Uncle’s name. His loyalties to friends who have also become enmeshed in Great Uncle’s web of power, and his fears for their safety, push him to acquiesce.
The novel closes with ‘After-Tale’ which tells of how ‘Alan Sheriff’ has ended up in the detention centre.
The continued bloody-mindedness of our mandatory detention system has, if anything, worsened, and the increasing presence of so many ‘strongmen’ in politics world-wide means that this book is more relevant today than it was in 2003. Written with a clear political purpose at the time, those politics are even more urgent now.
For my complete review, please visit
https://residentjudge.com/2020/03/20/...
Keneally’s novel is in three parts. Part 1, ‘The Visitor’s Preface’, told in the first person, frames the novel. An unnamed journalist narrator accompanies a female colleague to a thinly disguised Villawood Detention Centre. There he meets ‘Alan Sheriff’, the name adopted by an Iraqi refugee incarcerated there, who proceeds to tell him “the saddest and silliest story you will ever hear”.
The bulk of the body is in Part 2, ‘Alan Sheriff’s Story’. It is also told in the first person as a memoir, although on occasions Alan breaks off to note the detention-centre conditions under which the story is being told. ‘Alan Sheriff’ is a writer, who after the moderately successful publication of a book of short stories in an unnamed Middle Eastern country, had been working quietly on a novel. When tragedy strikes suddenly and without warning, he puts the novel aside, feeling that his life and work is futile in the face of his grief. Suddenly the summons arrives from Great Uncle (a thinly disguised Saddam Hussein) for him to write a novel within a month which will be published under Great Uncle’s name. His loyalties to friends who have also become enmeshed in Great Uncle’s web of power, and his fears for their safety, push him to acquiesce.
The novel closes with ‘After-Tale’ which tells of how ‘Alan Sheriff’ has ended up in the detention centre.
The continued bloody-mindedness of our mandatory detention system has, if anything, worsened, and the increasing presence of so many ‘strongmen’ in politics world-wide means that this book is more relevant today than it was in 2003. Written with a clear political purpose at the time, those politics are even more urgent now.
For my complete review, please visit
https://residentjudge.com/2020/03/20/...
April 8, 2023
Not my usual read, but still gripping, insightful and creative.
August 12, 2016
I'm a little surprised and disappointed by the quantity of lukewarm and negative reviews this novel has accumulated. It strikes me as one of the most interesting titles to come my way this year (and on a quick check, fwiw, it looks like #44).
Much of my admiration is due to the excellent performance by the audiobook reader, who I think completely grasps the author's purpose in giving "good Anglo Saxon names" to a book full of Middle Eastern characters. When introduced, as a detained asylum seeker (in an unidentified country that might be Australia), "Alan" is obviously a foreigner who speaks English well but with a slightly uncomfortable accent. Then, when he takes over the narration of his story, all foreign-ness evaporates. The characters could be your neighbors. Having names like Louise and Matt and (as delivered by the reader) thoroughly familiar personas. gives them an immediacy they might otherwise lack. I personally know and care about people who live, or have lived, under oppressive governments (and some years ago I sponsored an asylee). But somehow the effect of this telling was to render the concept of life under oppression and despotism less theoretical. Yes, people just like we middle-class Western citizens, secure with our inalienable rights, could indeed find ourselves living in circumstances such as are described here. Perhaps we ought to contemplate the potential for that to happen.
(I might as well add that I saw something too familiar in the episode involving the herculean effort to put up the brick wall "requested" by Dear Uncle. In my jobs, I have at times been up against deadlines that felt almost as dire. This ought not feel abstract.)
Aside from that point, the characters and story are thoroughly convincing. I want to read more by this author.
Much of my admiration is due to the excellent performance by the audiobook reader, who I think completely grasps the author's purpose in giving "good Anglo Saxon names" to a book full of Middle Eastern characters. When introduced, as a detained asylum seeker (in an unidentified country that might be Australia), "Alan" is obviously a foreigner who speaks English well but with a slightly uncomfortable accent. Then, when he takes over the narration of his story, all foreign-ness evaporates. The characters could be your neighbors. Having names like Louise and Matt and (as delivered by the reader) thoroughly familiar personas. gives them an immediacy they might otherwise lack. I personally know and care about people who live, or have lived, under oppressive governments (and some years ago I sponsored an asylee). But somehow the effect of this telling was to render the concept of life under oppression and despotism less theoretical. Yes, people just like we middle-class Western citizens, secure with our inalienable rights, could indeed find ourselves living in circumstances such as are described here. Perhaps we ought to contemplate the potential for that to happen.
(I might as well add that I saw something too familiar in the episode involving the herculean effort to put up the brick wall "requested" by Dear Uncle. In my jobs, I have at times been up against deadlines that felt almost as dire. This ought not feel abstract.)
Aside from that point, the characters and story are thoroughly convincing. I want to read more by this author.
May 5, 2015
A novel for our times - Keneally's story tells of an Iraqi asylum-seeker whose work brought him dangerously close to Great Uncle, a fictitious parallel of Saddam Hussein. Like many of Keneally's works, there is well-documented historical fact to support a tragic human story. For Australians, there is a sinister message, and an even more sinister question from this 10-year-old story: we have treated refugees incredibly badly - but why have we been doing it for so long? Nothing has improved in the way our country treats the stateless person.
March 23, 2014
With more knowledge about the politics of the time this was written and more information about some of the people or events mentioned this would've been more enjoyable. Even without prior knowledge this was an interesting read though. Recommended if you're into politics, foreign affairs or anything along those lines.
November 8, 2017
This book is on my most favourite books of all time list. ‘The Tyrant’s novel’ reminds me very much of George Orwell’s 1984. It has a powerful message about human nature.
I was hooked from the beginning. I didn’t think it was my kind of book, but it is so well written and the characters are amazing.
Brilliant!
I was hooked from the beginning. I didn’t think it was my kind of book, but it is so well written and the characters are amazing.
Brilliant!
October 24, 2024
For some reason, novels with authors as lead characters haven’t had the greatest response but personally, I find such stories fascinating. This one, in particular, proves to be incredibly thought-provoking as it may come off as satirical at times. But the story possesses a great deal of pathos, with the circumstances surrounding the life of the character of Alan Sheriff (not his real name) flip-flopping from one end of the spectrum to the next. His ultimate fate comes from a journey that has played cruel joke upon cruel joke that pushes his sanity to the brink, which, for someone as imaginative as an author, can result in all kinds of disaster.
The turning point, that of being recruited by his sanction-crippled Middle Eastern nation’s benevolent dictator to write a masterpiece that shall become their country’s Kite Runner, is truly inspired—the one-month deadline the cherry on the cake. Watching Sheriff become corrupted as he finds himself trapped in an obligation he cannot refuse, particularly by undoing the one truly noble act he had ever performed.
Sheriff’s character depth aside, it is the parallels the author (the real one) draws between the fictional oil-rich, sanction-ridden country to its real-life counterpart that proves to be the most ghastly. Having been a veteran of a long war himself, Sheriff’s first-hand account of the conflict and the story’s on-the-nose descriptions leave several questions worth asking. The timing of this book’s release to the run-up to the invasion of Iraq should have made this a book worth reading, but perhaps the mood at the time leaned in another direction. In retrospect, I think this novel greatly humanizes a populace that lives fraught lives no one else sees and could make a greater impact in this decade than it could have in 2003.
A must-read for fans of literary and political fiction.
The turning point, that of being recruited by his sanction-crippled Middle Eastern nation’s benevolent dictator to write a masterpiece that shall become their country’s Kite Runner, is truly inspired—the one-month deadline the cherry on the cake. Watching Sheriff become corrupted as he finds himself trapped in an obligation he cannot refuse, particularly by undoing the one truly noble act he had ever performed.
Sheriff’s character depth aside, it is the parallels the author (the real one) draws between the fictional oil-rich, sanction-ridden country to its real-life counterpart that proves to be the most ghastly. Having been a veteran of a long war himself, Sheriff’s first-hand account of the conflict and the story’s on-the-nose descriptions leave several questions worth asking. The timing of this book’s release to the run-up to the invasion of Iraq should have made this a book worth reading, but perhaps the mood at the time leaned in another direction. In retrospect, I think this novel greatly humanizes a populace that lives fraught lives no one else sees and could make a greater impact in this decade than it could have in 2003.
A must-read for fans of literary and political fiction.
September 12, 2018
3.5 stars
Funny to have read this straight after ‘And the Mountains Echoed’! Would have been better if true, or based on a true story.
For a book to be great, it needs to have a great story, fantastic setting or great characters. This one didn’t have any of the three.
And the English names drove me mad.
Themes:
The craziness of dictators and life under them
More a telling than a tale?
Writing:
Easy to ready, accomplished writing
Liked:
Interesting insight into (real or imagined) events in Iraq
Disliked:
It was a bit boring... I didn’t care whether I finished it or not.
Unbelievable in parts - seemed unlikely that Great Uncle would know all the details of Alan’s life
Things ended a bit suddenly - more descriptive of events than feelings and scenes. Also his journey to Australia - there was a gap there.
Characters:
I liked Alan. I thought the characters seemed realistic.
Funny to have read this straight after ‘And the Mountains Echoed’! Would have been better if true, or based on a true story.
For a book to be great, it needs to have a great story, fantastic setting or great characters. This one didn’t have any of the three.
And the English names drove me mad.
Themes:
The craziness of dictators and life under them
More a telling than a tale?
Writing:
Easy to ready, accomplished writing
Liked:
Interesting insight into (real or imagined) events in Iraq
Disliked:
It was a bit boring... I didn’t care whether I finished it or not.
Unbelievable in parts - seemed unlikely that Great Uncle would know all the details of Alan’s life
Things ended a bit suddenly - more descriptive of events than feelings and scenes. Also his journey to Australia - there was a gap there.
Characters:
I liked Alan. I thought the characters seemed realistic.
August 12, 2017
كتاب #رمان_ديكتاتور
نوشته : #تامس_كنيلي
ترجمه : #حسن_افشار
ناشر : #اختران
رمان کنیلی، چند ویژگی دارد؛ او رفتار دیکتاتورها به ویژه دیکتاتورهای خاورمیانه را به خوبی می شناسد، آن قدر خوب که «عموی کبیر ملت» هم می تواند صدام باشد، هم قذافی، هم اسد و هم کس دیگری. نویسنده به خوبی نشان داده که چقدر رفتارهای دیکتاتورها مشابه است: مشکوک بودن به همه، مشکلات را به گردن دشمن انداختن، تبلیغات بی شمار برای کارایی خود، ریختن بی مهابای خون مخالفان، فساد مالی شدید در طبقه حاکم و فساد اخلاقی در فرزندانشان و... او همچنین به وضوح تحریم های غرب را به نفع حاکمان فاسد و به زیان مردم بیچاره و تهی دست معرفی می کند و در خلال داستان، چند بار این نکت�� را بیان می کند.
نوشته : #تامس_كنيلي
ترجمه : #حسن_افشار
ناشر : #اختران
رمان کنیلی، چند ویژگی دارد؛ او رفتار دیکتاتورها به ویژه دیکتاتورهای خاورمیانه را به خوبی می شناسد، آن قدر خوب که «عموی کبیر ملت» هم می تواند صدام باشد، هم قذافی، هم اسد و هم کس دیگری. نویسنده به خوبی نشان داده که چقدر رفتارهای دیکتاتورها مشابه است: مشکوک بودن به همه، مشکلات را به گردن دشمن انداختن، تبلیغات بی شمار برای کارایی خود، ریختن بی مهابای خون مخالفان، فساد مالی شدید در طبقه حاکم و فساد اخلاقی در فرزندانشان و... او همچنین به وضوح تحریم های غرب را به نفع حاکمان فاسد و به زیان مردم بیچاره و تهی دست معرفی می کند و در خلال داستان، چند بار این نکت�� را بیان می کند.
November 16, 2020
3 and a half stars, really.
The story of how a refugee ends up in an Australian camp. I found the author's use of Westernised names for people and place somewhat patronising after a while. The main character is fairly sympathetic but only fairly. The jeopardy involved is quite subtle by design but it does drain things of tension to some degree and the end sequence feels a bit short. The sequence involving the war is well done.
The story of how a refugee ends up in an Australian camp. I found the author's use of Westernised names for people and place somewhat patronising after a while. The main character is fairly sympathetic but only fairly. The jeopardy involved is quite subtle by design but it does drain things of tension to some degree and the end sequence feels a bit short. The sequence involving the war is well done.
March 25, 2025
This book was a bit of a surprise. Well written and from the point of view of an asylum seeker who escaped a difficult situation with not much more than the clothes on his back. The interesting touch was that the characters were given Anglo Saxon names which seem to elicit more sympathy from the Anglo Saxon readers than would culturally appropriate names.
February 23, 2019
Meh. The end felt preordained; there was nothing about it that surprised me. And the narrator was just not that engaging.
February 3, 2015
This book left me sad and unsure what to say about it. It’s a bit like Kafka, but far too real for that comparison to really work. I think the main thing about it is that the narrator’s voice is so infused with grief—for his wife, for his people, for the horrible things people do to each other and for the lack of any clear solutions to the horrors. Initially, I had trouble getting the narrative situated in my mind. Keneally has taken a fictionalized Iraq under Saddam Hussein and populated it with people bearing distinctly British names. I understand why he did that, why he interrupted the Western reader’s ability to distance himself from people in a place we’ve set aside as so very “Other,” and it works wonderfully well, but it did take me a few pages to get my bearings. Ultimately, I liked that effect, how it makes us realize how much we live in our own fictional narratives of how the world is and how certain people must be because of where they live. Even though the narrator is of a privileged class, his own awareness of the suffering of common people caused by the political machinations of their government and others infuses the book and the reading of it with a kind of hopelessness. He writes that for the poor of this country, the hardships and horrors (“children worth a dollar” selling themselves on the street, women drawing tainted water to feed their families because it’s all the water they can get) seem to come from God, not from other men. No matter who is in charge, the suffering continues. It’s a really hopeless feeling to read this, knowing how true it is. And, of course, Keneally gives no quarter for his “hero” either. Fleeing a gilded prison, he ends up in a bland, bureaucratic one. He sought to avoid serving a tyrant, but forever bears the mark of having done so. However much he wants to deny that he is guilty, the scars on his wrist indict him—but, unspoken, is the fact that we are all guilty. We are all complicit. We are all scarred. The book is bleak and beautifully written.
February 1, 2015
Minus whatever political agenda it may have, for me, this book was a tale of a man who has suffered, been faced with extreme decisions, and suffered some more. It is an emotional journey, captivating and brought forth by a writer with great skill. Keneally has a way of showing deep emotion without making it overly dramatic. Instead, his characters suffer quietly, but realistically. I can imagine that people in other countries, not so lucky as ours to be free, face situations like this. I can't wait to read Schindler's Ark (List) next!
Read full critical review here.
Read full critical review here.
March 26, 2016
A promising premise let down by a story that simply wasn't that interesting. Life under the fictionalised dictator was obviously potentially dangerous but you could still get decent coffee and life seemed to go on as ever. At one point the protagonist has to dig up a grave in order to inject drama into the otherwise dull writing process. I loved the Anglicisation of the names though - it was a inspired way to universalise the story.
August 5, 2009
A strange political fable narrated by a writer who lives in a deliberately ambiguous geographical location (with elements of both the Middle East & Africa) under a brutal dictator, who commissions the writer to ghostwrite a novel drawing attention to the injustice of the sanctions imposed on the country by the U.S. Ingenious but not as compelling as Office of Innocence.
March 31, 2014
از این جهت که کاملا منطبق بر اوضاع سیاسی و اقتصادی ایران بود برام جالب بود. گرچه میتونه دربارهی هرکشور دیگهای در خاورمیانه یا آفریقا باشه.
این قسمت هم برام خیلی ملموس بود که باوجود نفرتی که آلن از عموی کبیر داشت، وقتی باهاش روبرو شد ناخودآگاه احساس احترام کرد. چیزی که گاهی خودم هم نسبت به بعضی دیکتاتورها در خودم احساس میکنم و برام خیلی عجیبه.
این قسمت هم برام خیلی ملموس بود که باوجود نفرتی که آلن از عموی کبیر داشت، وقتی باهاش روبرو شد ناخودآگاه احساس احترام کرد. چیزی که گاهی خودم هم نسبت به بعضی دیکتاتورها در خودم احساس میکنم و برام خیلی عجیبه.
August 31, 2010
A thinly veiled novel of Saddam Hussein; well written. "...manages to be both bold and humble."
May 23, 2011
great story-within-a-story that humanises the forgotten faces behind asylum-seeker statistics without resorting to sentimentality or two-dimensional characters, not an easy task.
January 10, 2012
Reading about Tyrant's sweetens my enjoyment of freedom. As always, Keneally writes an interesting, unusual story with strong emotional impact. Near perfect.
August 2, 2012
Couldn't finish.
March 27, 2013
Excellent novel about living in a Middle East tyranny.
June 8, 2014
Interesting premise
December 23, 2020
A mix of seriousness and tongue in cheek, an easy and entertaining read
August 28, 2015
Very disappointed, I didn't enjoy this at all.
Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews