In Adeni Incense, a French drifter finds refuge in cosmopolitan Aden—a city of exiles, artists, and revolutionaries. As looming forces threaten its pluralism, this richly layered novel explores identity, belonging, and the fragility of coexistence in a world closing its doors.

Teeming with Arabs, Indians, Somalis, Europeans, and others, Aden is like no other city in the world. A transcendent city. A city for all, no matter Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, or animist. And when “Michel,” a young Frenchman, washes ashore, fleeing his past in search of a new future, he’s immediately drawn into this intoxicating cocktail of dreamers, revolutionaries, artists, and politicians who have all found a place within the city’s vibrant atmosphere.

Yet not all is as it seems. Monumental changes and forces are bearing down on Aden, threatening to erupt and refashion its identity, and redefine who can lay claim to the city that has always welcomed misfits.

Adeni Incense interrogates concepts of belonging, identity, and who is entitled to speak for the whole. While set within a unique time period in Yemen’s history, the novel is timely today as the centrifugal forces of national chauvinism and parochialism seek to further entrench psychological borders between people.

With its richly developed scenes and moving depiction of a society teetering on a precipice, Adeni Incense is a masterwork of storytelling, leaving the reader with indelible memories of beloved characters and uncertainty over the viability of pluralism and diversity.