A Palace in the Old Village - Paperback

by Tahar Ben Jelloun (Author), Linda Coverdale (Translator)

From "Morocco's greatest living author" (The Guardian), an internationally bestselling novel of universal appeal--about the powerful pull of home and the lengths to which a parent will go to bring his family together

Mohammed has spent the past forty years working in France. As he approaches retirement, he takes stock of his life--his devotion to Islam and to his assimilated children--and decides to return to Morocco, where he spends his life's savings building the biggest house in the village and waiting for his children and grandchildren to come be with him.

A heartbreaking novel about parents and children, A Palace in the Old Village captures the sometimes stark contrasts between old- and new-world values, and immigrant's abiding pursuit of home.

Author Biography

Tahar Ben Jelloun was born in 1944 in Fez, Morocco, and emigrated to France in 1961. A novelist, essayist, critic, and poet, he is a regular contributor to Le Monde, La Republica, El País, and Panorama. His novels include The Sacred Night (winner of the 1987 Prix Goncourt), Corruption, and The Last Friend. Ben Jelloun won the 1994 Prix Maghreb, and in 2004 he won the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award for This Blinding Absence of Light.