Appearing for the first time in English translation, this is the only career-spanning collection of short prose by the fiery, radical Moroccan writer Mohammed Khaïr-Eddine, beginning with the first story he ever published (which won the Prix de la nouvelle maghrébine) and ending with a posthumously published monologue written in the voice of an African head of state worrying about the fragility of the nation his death is about to bereave. Throughout his celebrated career, Khaïr-Eddine's work mused on exile, on his use of the French language rather than his native Chleuh, on the colonial pacification of the Moroccan hinterlands, and on his ancestors. Like the young boy he remembers corralling fish in the seasonal streams of southern Morocco, or the unfortunate travelers waylaid by djinns and hyenas, Khaïr-Eddine finds there is life even in the desert and there is wisdom abounding in the asylum--one need only be patient enough to see it.