City of Spies

Sorayya Khan

Aleph Book Company

248 pages, Rs.395

Set in late-1970s Islamabad and Lahore, this novel unfolds over 30 tumultuous months. Weeks after her eleventh birthday, Aliya Shah wakes up to the news that General Zia has taken over the country and Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto is in jail. Although the general’s shadow and his increasingly puritanical edicts threaten to disrupt their comfortable existence, life goes on for Aliya and her family. However, when the son of the family retainer dies tragically in a hit-and-run accident, Aliya’s world is turned upside down, especially as she uncovers the terrible secret of the killer’s identity.