We’re thrilled to welcome Lyse Doucet, the BBC's Chief International Correspondent, to Lala Books for a very special evening to discuss her new book The Finest Hotel in Kabul. Lyse will be joined by Mahfouz Zubaide, an award-winning producer for the BBC, and Sune Engel Rasmussen, author and foreign correspondent for the Wall Street Journal.
During her remarkable career, Lyse Doucet has been reporting on Afghanistan for more than four decades, and has been checking into the Inter-Continental Hotel in Kabul since 1988. In The Finest Hotel in Kabul, she uses the story of the hotel to tell a richly immersive history of modern Afghanistan.
When the Inter-Continental Kabul opened in 1969, Afghanistan’s first luxury hotel symbolised the dream of a modernising country connected to the world. More than fifty years on, it is still standing. It has endured Soviet occupation, multiple coups, a devastating civil war, a US invasion and the rise, fall and rise of the Taliban. History lives within its scarred windows and walls, and Lyse’s book offers a vivid portrait of how Afghans have survived a half-century of destruction and disruption.
Lyse Doucet serves as the BBC’s Chief International Correspondent and senior presenter. Her reporting has covered wars, humanitarian crises and under-reported stories across the Middle East, South Asia and Africa. She has won numerous awards, including a Peabody, an Emmy and the Columbia Journalism Award for lifetime achievement. She was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2014 and a Member of the Order of Canada in 2018.
Mahfouz Zubaide is a BBC News producer and longtime colleague of Lyse, formerly based in Kabul and now in London. His reporting has highlighted the realities of life under the Taliban and the humanitarian challenges facing Afghanistan, work that earned him the BBC Unsung Hero Award.
Sune Engel Rasmussen is a senior correspondent for the Wall Street Journal who spent over a decade reporting from Afghanistan. His book Twenty Years: Hope, War, and the Betrayal of an Afghan Generation won the Overseas Press Club Award for best non-fiction book on international affairs, and was named by both The Economist and The Washington Post as one of 2024’s best books of the year.
Tickets include a complimentary drink on arrival, with doors opening at 6.30pm for a 7pm start.
If you want to attend but are unable to afford this event right now, please use the free ticket option for this event, or if sold out, email us at hello@lalabooks.london. We have a limited number of free tickets and books available under our community pay it forward scheme.
