The Monk of Mokha
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - "A gripping, triumphant adventure" (Los Angeles Times) from the bestselling author of The Circle--the incredible true story of a young Yemeni American man, raised in San Francisco, who dreams of resurrecting the ancient art of Yemeni coffee but finds himself trapped in Sana'a by civil war.
Mokhtar Alkhanshali is twenty-four and working as a doorman when he discovers the astonishing history of coffee and Yemen's central place in it. He leaves San Francisco and travels deep into his ancestral homeland to tour terraced farms high in the country's rugged mountains and meet beleaguered but determined farmers. But when war engulfs the country and Saudi bombs rain down, Mokhtar has to find a way out of Yemen without sacrificing his dreams or abandoning his people.
Mokhtar Alkhanshali is twenty-four and working as a doorman when he discovers the astonishing history of coffee and Yemen's central place in it. He leaves San Francisco and travels deep into his ancestral homeland to tour terraced farms high in the country's rugged mountains and meet beleaguered but determined farmers. But when war engulfs the country and Saudi bombs rain down, Mokhtar has to find a way out of Yemen without sacrificing his dreams or abandoning his people.
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Community Reviews
I didn't expect to be so captivated by this story. Eggers is a talented writer and his skill propels this fantastic, nearly unbelievable story along. Mokhtar Alkhanshali, the person about whom the book revolves is real, even if his exploits seem too bizarre to be real. A Yemeni-American who grew up in the tenderloin district of San Francisco, and seems to be able to continuously reinvent himself, eventually founds a business and a movement to bring Yemeni coffee to America and the world. No hurdle is too high for Mokhtar to hurdle, it seems. This was exciting and heartrending, and informative.
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