The Haunting of Hajji Hotak

<p><b>A finalist for the National Book Award - a luminous new collection of stories from a young writer with ''a singular, resonant voice, an American teenager raised by Old World Afghan storytellers'' (<i>New York Times</i>) </b><br><b><br>**FINALIST FOR THE 2022 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR FICTION**<br>**NAMED A BOOK OF THE YEAR 2022 BY THE <i>NEW YORKER </i>AND THE <i>ATLANTIC**</i><br></b><br>PEN/Hemingway finalist Jamil Jan Kochai breathes life into his contemporary Afghan characters, moving between modern-day Afghanistan and the Afghan diaspora in America. In these arresting stories verging on both comedy and tragedy, often starring young characters whose bravado is matched by their tenderness. <br><br><i>The Haunting of Hajji Hotak and Other Stories</i> is a moving exploration of characters grappling with the ghosts of war and displacement - and one that speaks to the immediate political landscape we reckon with today.<br><b><br>''An endlessly inventive and moving collection from a thrilling and capacious young talent'' Jess Walter, author of <i>Beautiful Ruins.</i><br></b><br><b>''Kochai’s short fiction defies expectations – readers’ expectations of what a story should look like, and the story of a nation often told reductively and exclusively through media headlines'' <i>Guardian</i></b></p>