When a young man is given the chance to rewrite his future, he doesn't realize the price he will pay for giving up his past... Casablanca's stinking alleys are the only home that nineteen-year-old Youssef El-Mekki has ever known. Raised by his mother in a one-room home, he dreams of escape - until, one day, the father he thought dead turns out to be very much alive, and whisks him from the slums into the luxurious life of Casablanca's elite. But as he leaves the poverty of his childhood behind him, he comes up against a starkly un-glittering reality...

Moroccan born Laila Lalami is known internationally for her blog, www.moorishgirl.com, and is author of the acclaimed short story collection Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits. Shortlisted for the Caine Prize for African Writing and recipient of an Oregon Literary Arts grant and Fulbright Fellowship, her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post and The Boston Globe.