The Selected Works of Abdullah the Cossack

"H.M. Naqvi is a superb stylist and writes like a poet. With careful attention to details and with enormous patience he presents a world that is at once fascinating and familiar. The Selected Works of Abdullah the Cossack is completely original in form and sensibility."—Ha Jin, winner of the National Book Award Winner of the inaugural DSC Prize for South Asian Literature, H.M. Naqvi follows his critically-lauded debut Home Boy with The Selected Works of Abdullah the Cossack, an enthralling novel about one unforgettable and gloriously unaccomplished man, his impending death, and the history and life of his bustling, shape-shifting city. Abdullah, bachelor and scion of a once prominent family, awakes on the morning of his seventieth birthday and considers launching himself over the balcony. Having spent years attempting to compile a "mythopoetic legacy" of his beloved Karachi, the cosmopolitan heart of Pakistan, Abdullah has lost his zeal. A...