The Scarecrow

Ibrahim al-Koni (Author)

9781477302521

Paperback / softback, published 1 August 2015

128 pages
21.6 x 14 x 1.3 cm, 0.454 kg

The Scarecrow is the final volume of Ibrahim al-Koni’s Oasis trilogy, which chronicles the founding, flourishing, and decline of a Saharan oasis. Fittingly, this continuation of a tale of greed and corruption opens with a meeting of the conspirators who assassinated the community’s leader at the end of the previous novel, The Puppet. They punished him for opposing the use of gold in business transactions-a symptom of a critical break with their nomadic past-and now they must search for a leader who shares their fetishistic love of gold. A desert retreat inspires the group to select a leader at random, but their “choice,” it appears, is not entirely human. This interloper from the spirit world proves a self-righteous despot, whose intolerance of humanity presages disaster for an oasis besieged by an international alliance. Though al-Koni has repeatedly stressed that he is not a political author, readers may see parallels not only to a former Libyan ruler but to other tyrants-past and present-who appear as hollow as a scarecrow.

• Introduction: Al-Koni’
  s Demons
• The Omen
• The Prophecy
• The Scarecrow
• The Gifts
• The Edicts
• Blindness
• Wantahet
• The Epidemic
• The Raids
• The Beauty
• The Idol
• The Sacrificial Offering
• About the Author