Dave Eggers: The monk of Mokha (AudiobookFormat, 2018)
[sound recording] /
English language
Published June 11, 2018
The 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 by civil war.
So, I don't drink coffee. Much too bitter for me. But I saw this book at the library and was drawn in by the author's description of Mokhtar. I appreciated that the book took time out to discuss Yemeni culture and politics, and even the history of coffee despite not liking the drink. This is a great rags-to-riches story, with some lessons learned along the way.
Clearly I was on an Eggers-binge in 2018 :) This might be Eggers's best one in the series 'I steal an amazing life story and make it into a novel' It (again) raises the question why people need Eggers to write them auto-biographies, especially in the case of Mokhtar Alkhanshali who seems smart enough to speak for himself.
The Monk of Mokha tells Mokhtar story: a twenty-something sho dod not manage to finish college and now works as a doorman and comes up with the wicked idea of exporting coffee from Yemen (where his family is from) and ends up being caught in the war there.
Again I learned a lot about Yemen (and coffee) from the book and the way Eggers tells everything keeps you interested in the story. The part where he (Eggers) is present in the story himself is a bit uncanny I found and stresses the …
Clearly I was on an Eggers-binge in 2018 :) This might be Eggers's best one in the series 'I steal an amazing life story and make it into a novel' It (again) raises the question why people need Eggers to write them auto-biographies, especially in the case of Mokhtar Alkhanshali who seems smart enough to speak for himself.
The Monk of Mokha tells Mokhtar story: a twenty-something sho dod not manage to finish college and now works as a doorman and comes up with the wicked idea of exporting coffee from Yemen (where his family is from) and ends up being caught in the war there.
Again I learned a lot about Yemen (and coffee) from the book and the way Eggers tells everything keeps you interested in the story. The part where he (Eggers) is present in the story himself is a bit uncanny I found and stresses the strangeness of him writing this for/about someone else.
Immigrants make America great. The real person at the center of this story, Mokhtar Alkhanshali, the Bay Area-born son of Yemeni immigrants, exemplifies this perfectly. Dave Eggers-haters will be pleased to find that his authorial voice is completely subsumed by Mokhtar’s, and he tells a fascinating and thrilling story about one young man’s unbelievable journey to bring his homeland’s coffee heritage to the rest of the world. Plus, I learned a lot about coffee production and history!
An incredible story of one young man's determination against all odds and dangerous conditions, this is well worth the read. This rather short read includes some fascinating history, as well. It certainly makes one take another look at so many products that are, for us, so easily obtained.
I'd recommend this to anyone.
