Short-listed for The National Book Award and long-listed for The Man Booker Prize last year, My Friends is the story of Khaled and his two friends, Hosam and Mustafa. All three are Libyans who cannot return to their homeland while Qaddafi is in power. Because each of them are frightened of being discovered by Qaddafi’s spies who are all over Europe, the three friends are overly cautious, secretive and fearful. My Friends is a novel about the love of family, friends and one’s native land, but above all it is about how it feels to be exiled from them.

Hisham Matar is a gifted writer, but My Friends is not for everyone. Although I appreciated it and sometimes found Khaled’s plight awful, My Friends is slow moving and highly descriptive.