Jahan-Kushay, the Sahib-e-Divan and the Assassin

"A ruler and an Assassin are the protagonists of this novel.
Its events unfold during the fall of the Abbasid state and the beginning of Mongol rule.
In that era, rich with contradictions and conflicts, during the last days of the Abbasid state and the early days of the Ilkhanate founded by Hulagu Khan and his family in Iraq, Ala ad-Din Juwayni, the ruler of Iraq and author of "Tarikh-i Jahangushay" (History of the World Conqueror), in which he chronicled Genghis Khan, the founder of the Mongol Empire, and his dynasty, meets Gutyar, who belongs to the Hashashin (Assassins) group.

In this imagined biography, Juwayni represents both authority and rebellion against it, mirroring the calamity of the Juwayni family, who worked in the Mongol chancelleries, with the calamity of the Barmakids during the era of Harun al-Rashid.
As for Gutyar, he encapsulates the methods, ideas, and struggles of the Hashashin against the Mongols during that difficult historical period.
The novel delves into a dark era of Arab-Islamic history; when the lamp of the Abbasids was extinguished with the fall of Baghdad, and the world plunged into the monstrous darkness of the Mongols.

Ziyad Mubarak – a Sudanese writer and engineer (born in Khartoum, 1983) and founder of the cultural magazine "Masareb Adabiyah." He has published a collection of short stories titled "The Other," and his novel "Jahangushay: The Diwan Master and the Assassin" was shortlisted in the 18th list for the unpublished historical novels category of the Katara Prize 2024.

"The novel by the esteemed writer Ziyad Mubarak is a model of distinguished construction in the field of both historical and historiographical narrative" – Mohamed Badawi Mustafa – Sudanese writer, journalist, and academic"