The Eleventh Hour: A Quintet of Stories

The Eleventh Hour showcases Salman Rushdie’s extraordinary imagination in a quintet of stories that span India, England, and America, featuring an unforgettable cast of characters. In “In the South,” two quarrelsome old men—Junior and Senior—face private tragedy amid national calamity. “The Musician of Kahani” follows a prodigious talent from the Mumbai neighborhood of Midnight’s Children who uses her magical gifts to devastate the wealthy family she marries into. In “Late,” the ghost of a Cambridge don enlists a lonely student to exact revenge on his lifelong tormentor. “Oklahoma” plunges a young writer into a web of deceit as he struggles to uncover whether his mentor committed suicide or staged his own death. Finally, “The Old Man in the Piazza” offers a powerful parable about freedom of speech. These stories probe profound questions: Do we accept death or resist it? Do we spend our final hour in serenity or rage? And how do we find fulfillment if we never know the end of our own story? With penetrating insight and boundless imagination, Rushdie ponders life, death, legacy, and identity in a work that is both urgent and timeless. One of the world’s most acclaimed authors, Rushdie has written sixteen works of fiction, including Midnight’s Children, winner of the Booker Prize and multiple “Best of Booker” honors. Knighted in 2007 and honored as a Companion of Honour in 2022, his latest book, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder, was a number-one Sunday Times bestseller.