Read around the world - new fiction from diverse cultures
Enjoy the newest works of fiction from around the world with these diverse and captivating reads.
We are all birds of Uganda by Hafsa Zayyan
Sameer is a young, ambitious lawyer in modern-day London who is navigating his career and a difficult breakup. In 1960s and 70s Uganda, Sameer's grandfather, Hassan, dealing with the shock death of his wife, documents his life in diary entries. Through these alternating viewpoints, Zayyan masterfully explores the expulsion of the Ugandan Asian community by Idi Amin's regime. It is a compelling tale of identity, belonging, and the enduring impact of generational trauma and what it means to call a place home, even when you've been forced to leave.
A sunny place for shady people by Mariana Enriquez
Enriquez, author of The dangers of smoking in bed, plunges readers into a world where the everyday and the supernatural collide with chilling results. The stories, primarily set in Argentina, explore a range of macabre and unsettling events, from a neighbourhood plagued by ghosts to a woman whose face begins to disappear due to generational trauma. Enriquez expertly blends gothic horror with social commentary, using the supernatural to illuminate real-world anxieties like poverty, urban decay, and violence against women. The collection is rich in atmospheric dread, where the horror isn't just about jump scares but the persistent, creeping terror that lurks just beneath the surface of contemporary life.
Told through letters, Tidal Waters follows Vel, who, after a long absence, returns to her native home in the Afro-Colombian community of Chocó, on Colombia's Pacific coast. Vel works to establish a literary centre and festival to promote reading and culture, and the letters capture her hopes, challenges, and the complexities of her life. The novel is a deeply personal and intimate exploration of homecoming, identity, and finding purpose, discussing what it means to be a Black woman in a often-forgotten region of Colombia and how to build a meaningful life and career that serves one's community. It is a powerful testament to the transformative power of returning to one roots and the importance of community and cultural preservation.
Speak to me of home by Jeanine Cummins
Spanning three decades, Speak to Me of Home follows three women across generations: Rafaela, who moves from Puerto Rico to the American Midwest for love; her daughter, Ruth, who strives to assimilate in white America and leave her Puerto Rican heritage behind; and Ruth's daughter, Daisy, who seeks to reconnect with her roots in San Juan. When Daisy, who has moved to San Juan, is critically injured in a car accident during a hurricane, Ruth, and Rafaela, back to the island, forcing them to confront their pasts and the unspoken tensions that have long existed between them. A stirring novel of family, identity and love.
When the cranes fly south by Lisa Ridzén
Bo is an elderly man in rural Sweden who is fighting to maintain his independence. His days are punctuated by visits from his care team and a son with whom he has a difficult relationship. When his son insists on rehoming Bo's beloved elkhound, Sixten, Bo is forced to confront his past and re-evaluate his relationships, particularly with his son, as he looks back on his life and the ways he has expressed love. Ridzén, who was inspired by her grandfather's care notes, uses a simple narrative to offer a profound meditation on mortality and the dignity of living out one's final years on one's own terms. It's a story that resonates with anyone who has dealt with an aging loved one, or who contemplates the realities of growing older.
In late summer by Magdalena Blažević
Ivana is a 14-year-old girl in Bosnia, during her final summer before the start of the 1993 war. The story, narrated by her after Ivana is killed in a massacre, contrasts her peaceful village life with the impending violence. It's a haunting tale of innocence lost, a family's struggle to survive, and the devastating impact of war, a tale of innocence lost and a testament to the enduring memory of those who are gone.
Satnam, a young man from London, returns to his ancestral village in Punjab for his grandmother's funeral and discovers water in a long-dry well. This discovery fuels a contentious Hindu nationalist movement to "unearth" the lost river, a project with significant political and environmental consequences. The story then expands to follow seven distant relatives of Satnam's, scattered across the globe, whose lives become intertwined by this event and their shared ancestry. An ambitious, multi-generational epic that uses the mythical Saraswati River as a central metaphor, exploring themes of nationalism, diaspora, climate change, and the power of myth and history to connect people across continents and time. For those who enjoyed The covenant of water and There are rivers in the sky.
Underground Barbie by Maša Kolanović
As air-raid sirens become a regular occurrence, an unnamed young girl and her friends retreat to the basement of their Croatian apartment building. There, they use their collection of Barbies—a mix of treasured imports and local knockoffs—to process the chaos and violence of the world outside. The idealised world of Barbie and Ken is twisted into a reflection of the splintering social structure, with dolls taking on roles of politicians, refugees, and soldiers. This is a compelling and unsettling novel that uses the innocence of childhood play to explore the horrors of the Croatian War of Independence in the early 1990s.
