Islamic world
| Book cover | Book title and author | Book introduction | Websites for more information |
|---|---|---|---|
 |
The Architect’s Apprentice by Elif Shafak | When Jahan travels to 16th-century Istanbul as a stowaway carrying the gift of a white elephant for the sultan, little does he know the journey on which he is about to embark. Whispers in the palace gardens and secret journeys through Istanbul lead Jahan to Mihrimah, the beautiful Princess. Still under her spell, he is promoted from simple Mahut to apprentice of the Grand Master Architect, Sinan - when his fortunes take a mysterious change. | |
 |
The Shadow of the Crescent Moon by Fatima Bhutto |
Fatima Bhutto's debut novel begins and ends one rain swept Friday morning in Mir Ali, a small town in Pakistan's Tribal Areas close to the Afghan border. Three brothers meet for breakfast. Soon after, the eldest, recently returned from America, hails a taxi to the local mosque. The second, a doctor, goes to check in at his hospital. His troubled wife does not join the family that morning. No one knows where Mina goes these days. And the youngest, the idealist, leaves for town on a motorbike. Seated behind him is a beautiful, fragile girl whose life and thoughts are overwhelmed by the war that has enveloped the place of her birth. Three hours later their day will end in devastating circumstances. |
|
 |
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini | 1970s Afghanistan: 12-year-old Amir is desperate to win the local kite-fighting tournament and his loyal friend Hassan promises to help him. But neither of the boys can foresee what will happen to Hassan that afternoon, an event that is to shatter their lives. | |
 |
The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid | At a café table in Lahore, a Pakistani man converses with a stranger. As dusk deepens to dark, he begins the tale that has brought him to this fateful meeting. | |
 |
Bird Summons by Leila Aboulela | Salma, happily married, tries every day to fit into life in Britain. When her first love contacts her, she is tempted to risk it all and return to Egypt. Moni gave up a career in banking to care for her disabled son, but now her husband wants to move to Saudi Arabia - where she fears her son's condition will worsen. Iman feels burdened by her beauty. In her twenties and already in her third marriage, she is treated like a pet and longs for freedom. On a road trip to the Scottish Highlands, the women are visited by the Hoopoe, a sacred bird whose fables from Muslim and Celtic literature compel them to question the balance between faith and femininity, love, loyalty and sacrifice. | |
 |
My Country by Kassem Eid | Kassem Eid grew up in the small town of Moadamiya on the outskirts of Damascus. He excelled at school, and had a natural gift for languages. But it didn't take long for Kassem to realise that he was treated differently at school because of his family's resistance to the brutal government regime. When the 2011 Arab Spring protests in Syria were met with extreme violence, it was yet another blow - and as Kassem reached young adulthood, life in Syria became intolerable. Then, on the 21st of August 2013, Kassem nearly died in a gas attack that killed hundreds of civilians. Later that day, he would pick up a gun and join the Free Syrian Army as they fought government forces. |
|
 |
The Geometry of God by Uzma Aslam Khan | The palaeontologist Zahoor tries to do his research while General Zia is launching a campaign to Islamize knowledge. In the Punjab salt Range, Zahoor's granddaughter Amal finds proof of the dog-whale, Pakicetus, the oldest known primitive whale. | |
 |
Daughter of the Tigris by Muhsin Al-Ramli | Follow-up to 'The President's Gardens'. On the sixth day of Ramadan, in a land without bananas, Qisma leaves for Baghdad with her husband-to-be to find the body of her father. But in the bloodiest year of a bloody war, how will she find one body among thousands? For Tariq, this is more than just a marriage of convenience: the beautiful, urbane Qisma must be his, body and soul. But can a sheikh steeped in genteel tradition share a tranquil bed with a modern Iraqi woman? The President has been deposed, and the garden of Iraq is full of presidents who will stop at nothing to take his place. Qisma is afraid - afraid for her son, afraid that it is only a matter of time before her father's murderers come for her. The only way to survive is to take a slice of Iraq for herself. But ambition is the most dangerous drug of all, and it could just seal Qisma's fate. | |
 |
My Name is Red by Orhan Pamuk | The Sultan secretly commissions a great book: a celebration of his life and the Ottoman Empire, to be illuminated by the best artists of the day - in the European manner. | |
 |
The Unquiet Dead by Ausma Zehanat Khan |
A complex and provocative story of loss, redemption, and the cost of justice that will linger with readers long after turning the final page. Despite their many differences, Detective Rachel Getty trusts her boss, Esa Khattak, implicitly. But she's still uneasy at Khattak's tight-lipped secrecy when he asks her to look into Christopher Drayton's death. Drayton's apparently accidental fall from a cliff doesn't seem to warrant a police investigation, particularly not from Rachel and Khattak's team, which handles minority-sensitive cases. But when she learns that Drayton may have been living under an assumed name, Rachel begins to understand why Khattak is tip-toeing around this case. It soon comes to light that Drayton may have been a war criminal with ties to the Srebrenica massacre of 1995. If that's true, any number of people might have had reason to help Drayton to his death, and a murder investigation could have far-reaching ripples throughout the community. But as Rachel and Khattak dig deeper into the life and death of Christopher Drayton, every question seems to lead only to more questions, with no easy answers. Had the specters of Srebrenica returned to haunt Drayton at the end, or had he been keeping secrets of an entirely different nature? Or, after all, did a man just fall to his death from the Bluffs? In her spellbinding debut, Ausma Zehanat Khan has written a complex and provocative story of loss, redemption, and the cost of justice that will linger with readers long after turning the final page. |
|
 |
Ayesha at Last by Uzma Jalaluddin |
A modern-day Muslim Pride and Prejudice for a new generation of love. Ayesha Shamsi has a lot going on. Her dreams of being a poet have been set aside for a teaching job so she can pay off her debts to her wealthy uncle. She lives with her boisterous Muslim family and is always being reminded that her flighty younger cousin, Hafsa, is close to rejecting her one hundredth marriage proposal. Though Ayesha is lonely, she doesn't want an arranged marriage. Then she meets Khalid, who is just as smart and handsome as he is conservative and judgmental. She is irritatingly attracted to someone who looks down on her choices and who dresses like he belongs in the seventh century. When a surprise engagement is announced between Khalid and Hafsa, Ayesha is torn between how she feels about the straightforward Khalid and the unsettling new gossip she hears about his family. Looking into the rumours, she finds she has to deal with not only what she discovers about Khalid, but also the truth she realizes about herself. |
|
 |
Daughters of Smoke and Fire by Ava Homa | Set in Iran, this extraordinary debut novel takes readers into the everyday lives of the Kurds. Leila dreams of making films to bring the suppressed stories of her people onto the global stage, but obstacles keep piling up. Leila's younger brother Chia, influenced by their father's past torture, imprisonment and his deep-seated desire for justice begins to engage with social and political affairs. But his activism grows increasingly risky and one day he disappears in Tehran. Seeking answers about her brother's whereabouts, Leila fears the worst and begins a campaign to save him. But when she publishes Chia's writings online, she finds herself in grave danger as well. | |
 |
The Family Tree by Sairish Hussain | Amjad never imagined he'd be a single father. But, when tragedy strikes, he must step up for his two children - while his world falls apart. Saahil dreams of providing for his dad and little sister. But his life is about to take an unexpected turn. The baby of the family, Zahra, is shielded from the worst the world has to offer. But, as she grows up, she wonders if she can rely on anyone but herself. There's no such thing as an easy journey. But when life sends the family in different directions, will they take their own paths - or find their way back to each other? |
|
 |
Planet Omar: Accidental Trouble Magnet by Zanib Mian |
My parents decided it would be a good idea to move house AND move me to a new school at the same time. As if I didn't have a hard enough time staying out of trouble at home, now I've also got to try and make new friends. What's worse, the class bully seems to think I'm the perfect target and has made it his mission to send me back to Pakistan. But I've never even been to Pakistan! And my cousin told me the pizza there is YUCK. The only good thing is that Eid's just around the corner which means a feast of all my favourite food (YAY) and presents (DOUBLE YAY). I'm really hoping I can stay in Mum and Dad's good books long enough to get loads. |
|
 |
My Grandma and Me by Mina Javaherbin | In this big universe full of many moons, I have travelled and seen many wonders, but I have never loved anything or anyone the way I love my grandma. While Mina is growing up in Iran, the centre of her world is her grandmother. Whether visiting friends next door, going to the mosque for midnight prayers during Ramadan, or taking an imaginary trip around the planets, Mina and her grandma are never far apart. At once deeply personal and utterly universal, this story is a love letter of the rarest sort: the kind that shares a bit of its warmth with every reader. |