Daniyal Mueenuddin at Harvard Book Store
1256 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA
Harvard Book Store welcomes Daniyal Mueenuddin—author of the story collection In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award—for a discussion of his debut novel, This is Where the Serpent Lives. He will be joined in conversation by James Wood—book critic at The New Yorker and Professor of the Practice of Literary Criticism at Harvard University. A stunning new work from universally acclaimed Daniyal Mueenuddin, whose debut short story collection won the Story Prize and was a finalist for the Los Angeles Book Prize, the National Book Award, and the Pulitzer Prize. Moving from Pakistan’s dazzling chaotic cities to its lawless feudal countryside, This Is Where the Serpent Lives powerfully evokes contemporary feudal Pakistan, following the destinies of a dozen unforgettable characters whose lives are linked through violence and tragedy, triumph, and love. Orphaned as a little boy and fending for himself in the city streets, Yazid rises to a place of responsibility and respect in the Lahore household of Colonel Atar, a powerful industrialist and politician, only to find that position threatened by conflicting loyalties and misplaced trust. Born on Colonel Atar’s country estate to a poor gardener, Saqib is entrusted with the management of a pioneering business, but he overreaches and finds himself an outlaw, confronting the violence of the corrupt Punjab Police. The colonel’s son competes with his cherished brother for the love of a woman and discovers that her choice colors his life with unexpected darkness as well as light.