This book tells the story of the Prophet Muhammad as an inspirational role model for anyone who wants to be extraordinary.

You will learn how Muhammad shaped his personality as a child, dealt with the universal challenges of adolescence while a teenager, and then emerged as a leader in his community as a young adult. The book deliberately avoids the language of historical narration used in typical biographies of the Prophet in favor of a more informal, down-to-earth approach.

In this book, the reader will get a completely different view of Muhammad and hopefully will see how Muhammad addressed our own daily challenges, inspiring us to excel in confronting these challenges.

Following the 25th January revolution, the Muslim Brotherhood emerged as the most organised and successful political force in Egypt as they cashed in on decades of grassroots mobilisation and growth. Through dominance in syndicates and unions, the provision of social services and participation in elections, this the Brotherhood steadily expanded under Mubarak. Hesham Al-Awadi's lucid and original argument frames this period as one of struggle over legitimacy between the regime and this then banned organisation, charting a cycle of accommodation and coercion. The Brotherhood failed to secure the recognition of the state, but gained an informal legitimacy as it occupied the spaces opened up by Mubarak in an early attempt to shore up the credibility of his regime. This social legitimacy became a threat to the regime, haunted by the regional rise of Islamists and a failure to legitimate its leadership, and ushered in an era of coercion. Through these complex dynamics of the conflict and control, and drawing on interviews with key figures such as Abdul Mun'em Abu Al-Futuh, Esam Al-Aryan and Mustafa Al-Fiqi, Al-Awadi sheds light on the Mubarak era and the Muslim Brotherhood that have risen out of it.

Hesham Al-Awadi argues that the growing impact of the Muslim Brotherhood on Egyptian politics and society is part of the movement's struggle to gain official legitimacy since its ban in 1954. The movement's remarkable presence in syndicates, student unions, investment companies and parliament was the outcome of its highly organised structure, consolidated during the earlier years of Mubarak. Although the Brotherhood failed to secure the recognition of the state, they did secure a degree of informal legitimacy, based on their services to middle class beneficiaries. This 'social' legitimacy was soon employed politically against the regime as Mubarak, haunted by the sudden rise of Islamists in Algeria and his failure to legitimate his leadership, was impelled to revoke his policies in the nineties. 'In Pursuit of Legitimacy' is a lucid and original book which shows the paradox of a movement that wishes to compete within the political system on an equal basis to other parties, yet which is prevented from doing so by an autocratic regime which attempts to make a virtue of its close links with Western democratic governments.