What Have You Left Behind? Voices From A Forgotten War by Bushra Al-Maqtari | Book Review

“From that morning, what’s engraved on my mind (…) it is the shock of how war was conjured, how life collapsed in one fell swoop: civil infighting, the humiliation of hunger, the indignity of it all, our generation’s lost dreams. They split the citizens into two warring camps, leaving the majority of us transformed into […]

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Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love by Huma Qureshi | Book Review

Things We Do Not Tell The People We Love by Huma Qureshi is a collection of ten profoundly moving short stories, written in lyrical and luscious prose underpinned by a variety of subtle emotions. Each story explores themes of loneliness, relationships, connections, misunderstandings, silences, unspoken emotions and feelings, internal turmoil, cultural and social norms within […]

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20 Books about Immigration, Belonging and Identity

I have prepared a list of 20 books exploring themes of immigration, belonging and identity related to social class, ethnicity, and nationality. Often the theme of immigration intersects with the theme of belonging and identity. Therefore, I have decided to include all these themes in one list. As usual I have tried to give the […]

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Michel The Giant. An African in Greenland by Tete-Michel Kpomassie | Book Review

Michel the Giant by the Togolese writer and adventurer, Tete-Michel Kpomassie is an extraordinary book about a long journey that Michel took from his home in Togo via Europe to reach Greenland, the land of eternal ice he had become fascinated with as a child and dreamt of visiting. In 1950s when he was a teenager, Michel found […]

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Stories of the Sahara by Sanmao | Book Review

Sanmao belongs to the 20th century most iconic women. She was a writer, traveler, and university teacher born in China in 1943 and then raised in Taiwan. As an adult she travelled extensively across Spain, Germany, Central America and spent a few years living in the Western Sahara where she closely observed the native Sahrawi […]

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12 Books with the Inspirational Female Protagonists

I hope you all are doing well. I would like to share with you a few book recommendations with the Inspirational Female Protagonists. These are characters dealing with loneliness in its various forms, trauma, ageing, poverty, life within strict religious and social norms, no opportunities for ‘better’ life. I have tried to include titles from […]

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The Desert and The Drum by Mbarek Ould Beyrouk | Book Review

“I refused to be intimidated by the chapters of the past or the indecipherable pages of the future. (…) It was time to detach myself from the old ways: I was no longer from here. I was from nowhere, and I was going faraway”. “I am nothing. I am the emptiness that wanders the streets […]

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Under the Tripoli Sky by Kamal Ben Hameda | Book Review

“The soul of life is the little things, the minor events no one notices…. That’s where life is, the pleasure of being alive, otherwise there’s just this vast blueness casting its shadow over us.  (…) Take care of your soul as the wind does, have fun your own as a butterfly does and live within […]

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10 Books about Loneliness

I have prepared a list of my favourite books which explore a theme of loneliness, solitude, and aloneness in various forms and aspects of daily life. The stories mentioned below portray loneliness related to the contemporary urban existence, traumatic experiences caused by war or displacement, being an outsider within a society, being an introvert in […]

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A Single Rose by Muriel Barbery | Book Review

A Single Rose by a French writer, Muriel Barbery is a beautifully crafted book which can fill one’s heart with gentle warmth, peace, and hope for a better tomorrow. If you are in need of reading something delicate, comforting written in ethereal prose, this slender volume won’t disappoint you. This is a little novel full […]

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The Halfway House by Guillermo Rosales | Book Review

Guillermo Rosales (Havana 1946 – Miami 1993) was a Cuban writer of excellence with a very unique style and profound level of sensitivity shining through his words. Prior to his death, he destroyed all his work except for two books ‘El Juego de la Viola’ and this one, The Halfway House, published in Spanish under […]

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8 Best Books by Elif Shafak

I always devour all the books written by a Turkish writer, Elif Shafak. I deeply connect with the way she tells the stories of people from the peripheries of the society and how she gives the voice to the voiceless. In her books Elif Shafak always shows a rather nuanced perspective and avoids stereotyping. I […]

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This Mournable Body by Tsitsi Dangarembga| Book Review

This Mournable Body by the Zimbabwean writer, Tsitsi Dangarembga, tells a story of a middle-age woman, called Tambu living in Harare (Zimbabwe) who is trying to find her way in this world. Tambu leaves her stagnant job as a copywriter with hope that she will find a better job where she is treated with respect […]

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Diary of an Invasion by Andrey Kurkov | Book Review

“I […] will continue to write for you so that you know how Ukraine lives during the war with Putin’s Russia.” “This war (…) will continue as a war for historical truth and historical memory. “ “Ukraine will either be free, independent, and European, or it will not exist at all. (…) Ukrainians did not […]

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Elizabeth Finch by Julian Barnes | Book Review

“We must certainly consider, not just in this class, but outside it, in our own turbulent and fretful lives, the element of chance. The number of people we deeply meet is strangely few. Passion may mislead us furiously. Reason may mislead us just as much. Our genetic inheritance might hamstring us. So might previous events […]

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