He gains access to the building and finds a Danish woman named Hanne and begs her for help in gaining an audience with the king. He races to hire a private driver, but when he finally arrives at the location he learns that the king is not there, and neither is his liaison, Karim Al-Ahmad, and his sales team have been placed in a tent outside the building and lack an Internet connection.Īlan is frustrated with his lack of access and begins to fear he’s going to fail. Alan oversleeps, and when he wakes up discovers he has missed the shuttle bus heading to the location of the presentation. Alan reveals he has only been invited to pitch the idea because of a chance meeting with the king’s nephew. He is also coming off of a professional disaster at his last job, which leaves Alan feeling little confidence as he arrives in Saudi Arabia on behalf of his new employer, Reliant Systems, to pitch a holographic projection system to the Saudi King. Alan has recently been through a terrible divorce and as a result is deeply in debt and financially ruined, and he worries he will not be able to continue paying his daughter’s college tuition. His meeting with a woman in Nairobi is described Alan is very attracted to her and wishes he could get to know her better, but when his flight is called he simply gets up and walks away from her.

The story opens with the simple declaration that a man named Alan Clay is in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. With hints of parable, Eggers explores a modern-day quandary in both national and personal identity explored through mid-life crisis and cultural clashes. A Hologram for the King is a novel by Dave Eggers, published in 2012.

A hologram for the king novel