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Men in the Sun (Rijāl fī l-shams)
By Ghassan Kanafani
Translated by Hilary Kilpatrick
A powerful and prescient novella about migration and the extremes that people will go to in order to find a better life.
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Cities of Salt (Munif’s Mudun al-Milḥ)
By Abdel Rahman
Translated by Peter Theroux
In 1992, reviewing the English translation of this novel, I described Cities of Salt as “a work of immense significance.” This is a pioneering account of the earliest contacts between American oilmen and the indigenous peoples of the Arabian Peninsula.
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Memoirs from the Women's Prison (Mudhakkirātī fī Sijn al-Nisāʾ)
By Nawal El Saadawi
Translated by Marilyn Booth
A prison memoir that is filled with contemporary resonances.
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The Open Door (Al-Bāb al-Maftūḥ)
By Latifa al-Zayyat
Translated by Marilyn Booth
An extraordinary semi-autobiographical novel about a woman’s coming-of-age at a time of turmoil in Egypt.
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Season of Migration to the North (Mawsim al-Ḥijra ilā l-Shimāl)
By Tayed Salih
Translated by Denys Johnson-Davies
An elegant, poetic, moving novel about connections that transcend race and nation.
About this series
Author Picks
In this series, widely acclaimed authors recommend a list of books based on a theme.
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Out There
A much-anticipated memoir from Salman Rushdie leads the selection this week. Two others are story collections that bust their genres -
From One Extreme to Another
This week we have novels brimming with hilarity and heartbreak, farce and catastrophe. Each extreme is hard to pull off, but... -
Fountain of Youth
Several selections this week feature young protagonists as we explore past and present: in a Polish Gothic novel; with a closeted... -
The Heart’s Desire
This week we cover stories about family, love, and characters who are haunted by their pasts and potential futures -
Arts & Letters
In this week’s selection we recommend a stunning debut from a veritable polymath; two books about ’80s artists in Soho—a... -
Crimes and Passion
Though we get an extra day this month (thanks to the leap year), folklore suggests February 29th is bad luck -
Life Stories
This week we dig deep into lives real and imagined, past and present: three memoirs, one in verse; a posthumous essay collection... -
Hearts and Flowers?
This Valentine’s issue of our newsletter presents two books about love in its various iterations, both happy and sad, always complicated -
Out of the Shadows
If the groundhog’s prediction is to be believed, we can look forward to an early spring, but in the meantime, there are... -
Thrilling
These five novels are all suspenseful in their own ways—not just because there are three gripping crime stories (including... -
Mind Over Matter
Books that are informed by the cultures of Iran, Vietnam, Denmark, and Ukraine will take you to faraway places this week, and... -
Varieties of Exile
Several disparate yet extraordinary voices this week are linked by themes of heritage and displacement—from North Africa to... -
Women's Intuition
A selection of five new novels with page-turning plots by women start off our reading in the new year. Here we have a novelist... -
The Literarians: 2023 Selections
Featuring titles by Abdulrazak Gurnah, Tess Gunty, Percival Everett, Salman Rushdie, Rebecca Makkai, Eleanor Catton, Alba de... -
Joy to the World
This roundup of our 25 bestselling books from 2023 can act as a last-minute holiday gift guide for your family and friends—or... -
Oh, the Places You’ll Go!
This week bookseller extraordinaire Leah Bronstein guest-edits the newsletter to share some of her favorite books for young readers from 2023 -
May We Recommend...
My esteemed colleagues at The Center for Fiction are avid and passionate readers. In the Bookstore we get to recommend titles... -
Cultural Concoctions
Here is a selection of work from writers around the world that reminds us, as Virginia Woolf wrote, “Literature is open to everybody -
Cooking Up a Storm
The holiday season is often a time for gathering in the kitchen or entertaining friends and family. This week we have a roundup... -
Late Editions
As we approach the holiday season, there are some stellar books still to come. This week, two novels tackle a group effort to save the world