The Witch Doctor of Umm Suqeim

Craig Hawes is a journalist whose work has appeared in the London Evening Standard, the Sunday Times, and Time Out Dubai, among other publications. As a short story writer, he has been short-listed for the Bristol Short Story Prize, has been a runner-up for the Rhys Davies Prize, and placed third for the Yeovil Short Story Prize. His short fiction has appeared in several publications and prize-winning anthologies including Blue Tattoo and the Bristol Prize Anthology, and one of his stories was broadcast on BBC Radio 4. He lives in Dubai.

The lives of locals and expatriates intertwine and collide as they strive to negotiate the shifting mores of the ever-changing emirate of Dubai in this debut short story collection. In one story, a young male journalist puts himself at risk when he dares to defy local custom by giving an Emirati female colleague a ride back to the office, to the envy of a bitter office rival. Another tale portrays a lavish mansion party in full swing that is suddenly interrupted by a muezzin's call to prayer. Still another story follows a Pakistani taxi driver who fails to wake a female passenger from her drunken stupor and takes her to his favorite café across the city so as not to miss an important cricket match. These tales of hardship and the high life, paranoia and alienation, and cruelty and love feature an array of characters that span Dubai's wide social spectrum and will appeal to anyone with a curiosity about what it is like to be an expat in the Arab world's most futuristic, vibrant, and affluent city.