Juan Muhammed is a Pakistani-American, author of the new autobiography, “The Long Road Home, The Untold Story of Muhammad Ali’s Father and His Son,” published by Random House in September 2017, in collaboration with Time. In the book, Juan Muhammed relates how he met Muhammad Ali’s father, Abdur Rahman Ali, in 1966, when Abdur Rahman Ali was 19 and was working for United Airlines.

In the excerpt below, Juan Muhammed relates the life of Omar and his experience with Muhammad Ali’s father during the Muhammad Ali vs. Jerry Quarry fight in 1971 on the same day that Ali was convicted for assault.

Muhammad Ali’s father Abdur Rahman Ali was married to the daughter of an influential family on Nairobi’s Kibera, and there was also a grandson named Mohammad Ali. Muhammad Muhammad’s father’s name was Muhammad Muhammad Ali. As far as I know, Muhammad Ali did not know that Abdur Rahman Ali was married to his granddaughters’ granddaughter, he did not know that the granddaughter of a former vice president of the United States was married to a former president of the United States. He got it from his father, he really got it from his father. And so he told me, “I don’t need you to call me.” So Muhammad Ali didn’t really try to figure out who his father was in his life. In fact he had no time. He had a fight in his ear that he was going to fight; and the next thing I know, he’s back out there and having a good time.

I’m going through the book now, and the book that I was reading was one story called “When Ali Was King,” that was told me, which was the time when Muhammad Ali was still in high school in Greenwich, Connecticut and he started to talk to me in a way that I’ve never heard of before. I don’t remember a whole lot of him saying, “Let me show you my stuff,” but he did say a couple of things that would have been funny if he hadn’t ended up getting in trouble for trying to sell them to a local bookstore. But he never got his way. He was able to sell those books anyway. And so that was a story that I knew all about. Muhammad Muhammad Muhammad Ali’s father was married to her granddaughters, so Muhammad Muhammad Muhammad had a granddaughter in his life whom he had never