Talks | Literary

Dave Eggers (The Circle, What Is the What) and Mokhtar Alkhanshali come together for an evening of conversation about entrepreneurship, community development, civil war, and coffee. Alkhanshali is the subject of Eggers’ heart-pounding new book, The Monk of Mokha, which weaves together the history of coffee, the ongoing Yemeni civil war, and the courageous journey of a young man following the most American of dreams.

The Bay Area-raised, Yemeni-American Alkhanshali finds himself working as a doorman and unable to pay for college when he becomes fascinated with his family’s roots in coffee farming. He travels to Yemen and visits countless farms, eager to bring improved cultivation methods to the countryside. Just as he is on the verge of success, civil war engulfs the country; the US Embassy closes, Saudi bombs rain down, and he is trapped in Sana'a, desperate to escape. Eggers traces Mokhtar’s journey as a social entrepreneur and his harrowing escape from war-torn Yemen with his first coffee samples.

A book signing with Eggers and Alkhanshali will follow the event.