Claiming to come from Afghanistan, Ikbal and Idries Shah convinced spies, poets, orientalists, diplomats, occultists, hippies and even a prime minister that they held the keys to understanding the Muslim world. Gambling with the currency of cultural authenticity, father and son became master players of the great game of empire and its aftermath as their careers extended from colonial India and wartime Oxford to swinging London and literary New York. Empire’s Son, Empire’s Orphan unravels a quagmire of aliases and pseudonyms, fantastical pasts and self-aggrandising anecdotes, high stakes and bold schemes that painted the defining portrait of Afghanistan for almost a century. From George Orwell directing Muslim propaganda to Robert Graves translating a fake manuscript of Omar Khayyam and Doris Lessing supporting jihad, Nile Green tells the fascinating tale of how the world was beguiled by the dream of an Afghan Shangri-La that never existed.

"[A] superb book... it highlights the pervasive influence of esoteric religion—often of a Sufi tinge—in the increasingly post Christian West." -- Fitzroy Morrissey - Literary Review
"Have literary deceit and spiritual self-invention ever been this entertaining? The question arises on almost every page of this galloping exposé" -- Justin Marozzi - The Spectator
"Nile Green has done an excellent job tracing the various careers, achievements and ambitions of Ikbal Shah and his son Idries… It makes a fantastic detective story for Professor Green to unravel, in part because the truth was as strange as any of their fictions." -- Barnaby Rogerson - The Times Literary Supplement

Nile Green holds the Ibn Khaldun Endowed Chair in World History at UCLA. A former Guggenheim Fellow, he is recognized as one of the world’s leading historians of Islam. He has written nine previous books, most recently, How Asia Found Herself: A Story of Intercultural Understanding and Empire's Son, Empire's Orphan.