From tales of the time of the concubines, through death on the Scorpions Hill, the adventures of Abdullah Effendi Palmer, the Patriarch in Exile, and the executioner of Denshaway, until Abd al-Hakam raised the flag, this enjoyable book contains thirteen exciting tales, the events of which may surprise many readers. There is not a single line inspired by the imagination, nor a single phrase that is not based on a reference or source, be it a document, newspaper, memoirs, studies and research. The goal of the great journalist and historian Salah Issa was for this book to be as close as possible to a portrait of the homeland, enticing lovers to read about its history and to fall in love with it, just as it enticed him. He narrated about the homeland in its largest and most far-reaching concept, and spoke about Egypt and other countries of the Arab nation, which were - and still are - related in blood and kinship, and brothers in history and sorrows. Through these stories, he was able to transport the reader to the time in which the events took place, with all its features, characters, buildings, incidents, newspapers, and arts, and he falls in love with it, like our great writer, because it is the past of the nation that we can only love, present, past, and future.