The following selection of books have been recommended and reviewed by the LEILA project’s jury members who are Arabic literature specialists, many of them translators and writers themselves. These recommendations have been chosen with European publishers in mind, who are interested in finding out more about books from the Arab world. When available, contact information for foreign rights (author, agent, or publisher) is provided.
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A postmodernist retelling of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis set in present-day Morocco -
A 30-year-old privileged Egyptian man consumed by his fears and desires, set to the backdrop of the 2011 Egyptian revolution -
The true story of an illegal immigrant’s harrowing journey -
An investigation into the life of an Egyptian female writer who committed suicide in 1963 -
Memoir and meta-narrative combine in a unique work of anti-prison literature. -
Palestinian stories on fictional attempts to escape the reality of life under occupation -
A rich exploration of the ambiguous place of one queer man within the close-knit fabric of working-class Tripolitanian life -
A personal and political journey of a Tunisian militant -
Exploring Cairo through love stories that failed by a hair -
Muslim and Jewish Algerians fighting against French occupation -
A Tunisian girl in Baghdad of the 1980s -
An intergenerational magical-realist story about war and conflict in Sudan -
An exquisite scream of clever rage at the contemporary moment -
The impact of conflict on everyday life in Libya -
A timely portrayal of human life under late capitalism, in a world simmering with lust and fear -
In this novel, the Saudi writer Omaima El Khamis tells a fascinating story that takes place during the 11th century -
The reminiscences of a Lebanese intellectual haunted by the loss of his two lovers -
An ironic cookbook and serious socio-political commentary
