SWANA Authors
Listen to audiobooks by authors of South West Asian and/or North African descent.
The Familiar
By: Leigh Bardugo
Narrated by: Lauren Fortgang
Length: 12 hours 57 minutes
Abridged: No
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER * #1 INDIE BESTSELLER * NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
“An immersive, sensual experience.” —The New York Times
"Essential." —The Washington Post
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Leigh Bardugo comes a spellbinding novel set in the Spanish Golden Age.
“A must-read for those who are seeking a little magic in their lives.”... Read more
This Is How You Lose The Time War
By: Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone
Narrated by: Cynthia Farrell & Emily Woo Zeller
Length: 4 hours 15 minutes
Abridged: No
* HUGO AWARD WINNER: BEST NOVELLA * NEBULA AND LOCUS AWARDS WINNER: BEST NOVELLA *
“[An] exquisitely crafted tale...Part epistolary romance, part mind-blowing science fiction adventure, this dazzling story unfolds bit by bit, revealing layers of meaning as it plays with cause and effect, wildly imaginative technologies, and increasingly... Read more
Hijab Butch Blues
By: Lamya H
Narrated by: Ashraf Shirazi
Length: 7 hours 32 minutes
Abridged: No
A queer hijabi Muslim immigrant survives her coming-of-age by drawing strength and hope from stories in the Quran in this “raw and relatable memoir that challenges societal norms and expectations” (Linah Mohammad, NPR).
“A masterful, must-read contribution to conversations on power, justice, healing, and devotion from a singular voice I now trust... Read more
Rouge
By: Mona Awad
Narrated by: Sophie Amoss
Length: 14 hours 42 minutes
Abridged: No
A National Bestseller
A USA TODAY Bestseller
A New York Times Editors’ Choice
A Goodreads Choice Award Finalist
Named a Best Book of the Year by The Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, Electric Literature, Tor, and Literary Hub
From the critically acclaimed author of Bunny comes a “Grimm Brothers fairy tale for the modern age” (Good... Read more
Martyr!
By: Kaveh Akbar
Narrated by: Arian Moayed
Length: 10 hours 39 minutes
Abridged: No
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK • A newly sober, orphaned son of Iranian immigrants, guided by the voices of artists, poets, and kings, embarks on a remarkable search for a family secret that leads him to a terminally ill painter living out her final days in the Brooklyn Museum. Electrifying, funny, and wholly original,... Read more
View audiobookThe Idiot
By: Elif Batuman
Narrated by: Elif Batuman
Length: 13 hours 39 minutes
Abridged: No
A New York Times Book Review Notable Book • Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction • Longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction
“Easily the funniest book I’ve read this year.” —GQ
“Masterly funny debut novel . . . Erudite but never pretentious, The Idiot will make you crave more books by Batuman.” —Sloane Crosley, Vanity Fair
A portrait of... Read more
As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow
By: Zoulfa Katouh
Narrated by: Rasha Zamamiri
Length: 12 hours 16 minutes
Abridged: No
A love letter to Syria and its people, As Long as the Lemon Trees Grow is a speculative novel set amid the Syrian Revolution, burning with the fires of hope, love, and possibility. Perfect for fans of The Book Thief and Salt to the Sea.
Salama Kassab was a pharmacy student when the cries for freedom broke out in Syria. She still had her parents... Read more
Bunny
By: Mona Awad
Narrated by: Sophie Amoss
Length: 11 hours 44 minutes
Abridged: No
NATIONAL BESTSELLER
Soon to be a major motion picture
"Jon Swift + Witches of Eastwick + Kelly 'Get In Trouble' Link + Mean Girls + Creative Writing Degree Hell! No punches pulled, no hilarities dodged, no meme unmangled! O Bunny you are sooo genius!" —Margaret Atwood, via Twitter
"A wild, audacious and ultimately unforgettable novel." —Michael... Read more
Enter Ghost
By: Isabella Hammad
Narrated by: Nadia Albina
Length: 11 hours 41 minutes
Abridged: No
After years away from her family’s homeland, and reeling from a disastrous love affair, actress Sonia Nasir returns to Haifa to visit her older sister Haneen. This is her first trip back since the second intifada and the deaths of their grandparents: while Haneen made a life here commuting to Tel Aviv to teach at the university, Sonia remained... Read more
View audiobookBehind You Is the Sea
By: Susan Muaddi Darraj
Narrated by: Rasha Zamamiri & Ali Nasser
Length: 6 hours 30 minutes
Abridged: No
“Behind You Is the Sea fearlessly confronts stereotypes about Palestinian culture, weaving a remarkable portrait of life's intricate moments, from joyous weddings to heart-wrenching funerals, from shattered hearts to hidden truths—I wept and grew alongside this family. This is a story that challenges perceptions, offering a heartfelt glimpse... Read more
View audiobookAgainst the Loveless World
By: Susan Abulhawa
Narrated by: Susan Abulhawa
Length: 13 hours 9 minutes
Abridged: No
2020 Palestine Book Awards Winner
2021 Aspen Words Literary Prize Finalist
“Susan Abulhawa possesses the heart of a warrior; she looks into the darkest crevices of lives, conflicts, horrendous injustices, and dares to shine light that can illuminate hidden worlds for us.” —Alice Walker, Pulitzer Prize–winning author
In this... Read more
White Tears/Brown Scars
By: Ruby Hamad
Narrated by: Mozhan Marnò
Length: 7 hours 2 minutes
Abridged: No
Called "powerful and provocative" by Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, author of the New York Times bestselling How to be an Antiracist, this explosive book of history and cultural criticism reveals how white feminism has been used as a weapon of white supremacy and patriarchy deployed against Black and Indigenous women, and women of color.
Taking us from the... Read more
You Exist Too Much
By: Zaina Arafat
Narrated by: Zehra Jane Naqvi
Length: 7 hours 53 minutes
Abridged: No
On a hot day in Bethlehem, a twelve-year-old Palestinian-American girl is yelled at by a group of men outside the Church of the Nativity. She has exposed her legs in a biblical city, an act they deem forbidden, and their judgement will echo on through her adolescence. When our narrator finally admits to her mother that she is queer, her mother’s... Read more
View audiobookWe Could Have Been Friends, My Father and I
By: Raja Shehadeh
Narrated by: Peter Ganim
Length: 5 hours 8 minutes
Abridged: No
2023 National Book Award Finalist for NonfictionA subtle psychological portrait of the author’s relationship with his father during the twentieth-century battle for Palestinian human rightsAziz Shehadeh was many things: lawyer, activist, and political detainee. He was also the father of bestselling author and activist Raja. In this searingly... Read more
View audiobookArabs
By: Tim Mackintosh-Smith
Narrated by: Ralph Lister
Length: 25 hours 33 minutes
Abridged: No
A riveting, comprehensive history of the Arab peoples and tribes that explores the role of language as a cultural touchstone This kaleidoscopic book covers almost three thousand years of Arab history and shines a light on the footloose Arab peoples and tribes who conquered lands and disseminated their language and culture over vast distances.... Read more
View audiobookA Woman Is No Man
By: Etaf Rum
Narrated by: Ariana Delawari, Dahlia Salem & Susan Nezami
Length: 10 hours 15 minutes
Abridged: No
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERA READ WITH JENNA TODAY SHOW BOOK CLUB PICK A New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice • A Washington Post 10 Books to Read in March • A Marie Claire Best Women’s Fiction of 2019 • A Washington Book Review Difficult-To-Put-Down Novel • A Refinery 29 Best Books of the Month • An Electric Lit 20 Best Debuts of the... Read more
View audiobookMy Year of Rest and Relaxation
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
Narrated by: Julia Whelan
Length: 7 hours 14 minutes
Abridged: No
Named a Best Book of the Year by The Washington Post, Time, NPR, Amazon,Vice, Bustle, The New York Times, The Guardian, Kirkus Reviews, Entertainment Weekly, The AV Club, & Audible
A New York Times Bestseller
“One of the most compelling protagonists modern fiction has offered in years: a loopy, quietly furious pillhead whose Ambien ramblings... Read more
Dearborn
By: Ghassan Zeineddine
Narrated by: Sarab Kamoo & Qarie Marshall
Length: 7 hours 34 minutes
Abridged: No
Spanning several decades, Ghassan Zeineddine’s debut collection examines the diverse range and complexities of the Arab-American community in Dearborn, Michigan. In ten tragicomic stories, Zeineddine explores themes of identity, generational conflicts, war trauma, migration, sexuality, queerness, home and belonging, and more. In Dearborn, a... Read more
View audiobookThe Stardust Thief
By: Chelsea Abdullah
Narrated by: Nikki Massoud, Sean Rohani & Rasha Zamamiri
Length: 15 hours 37 minutes
Abridged: No
Inspired by stories from One Thousand and One Nights, this book weaves together the gripping tale of a legendary smuggler, a cowardly prince, and a dangerous quest across the desert to find a legendary, magical lamp.Neither here nor there, but long ago . . . Loulie al-Nazari is the Midnight Merchant: a criminal who, with the help of her jinn... Read more
View audiobookThe Stationery Shop
By: Marjan Kamali
Narrated by: Mozhan Marnò
Length: 9 hours 13 minutes
Abridged: No
A poignant, heartfelt new novel by the award-nominated author of Together Tea—extolled by the Wall Street Journal as a “moving tale of lost love” and by Shelf Awareness as “a powerful, heartbreaking story”—explores loss, reconciliation, and the quirks of fate.
Roya, a dreamy, idealistic teenager living amid the political upheaval of 1953 Tehran,... Read more
The Map of Salt and Stars
By: Zeyn Joukhadar
Narrated by: Lara Sawalha
Length: 12 hours 17 minutes
Abridged: No
This powerful and lyrical debut novel is to Syria what The Kite Runner was to Afghanistan; the story of two girls living eight hundred years apart—a modern-day Syrian refugee seeking safety and an adventurous mapmaker’s apprentice—“perfectly aligns with the cultural moment” (The Providence Journal) and “shows how interconnected two supposedly... Read more
View audiobookAll's Well
By: Mona Awad
Narrated by: Sophie Amoss
Length: 13 hours 8 minutes
Abridged: No
From the author of Bunny, which Margaret Atwood hails as “genius,” comes a “wild, and exhilarating” (Lauren Groff) novel about a theater professor who is convinced staging Shakespeare’s most maligned play will remedy all that ails her—but at what cost?
Miranda Fitch’s life is a waking nightmare. The accident that ended her burgeoning acting... Read more
The Thirty Names of Night
By: Zeyn Joukhadar
Narrated by: Samy Figaredo & Lameece Issaq
Length: 9 hours 29 minutes
Abridged: No
Winner of the Lambda Literary Award for Transgender Fiction
Winner of the ALA Stonewall Book Award—Barbara Gittings Literature Award
Named Best Book of the Year by Bustle
Named Most Anticipated Book of the Year by The Millions, Electric Literature, and HuffPost
From the award-winning author of The Map of Salt and Stars, a new novel about three... Read more
This Woven Kingdom
By: Tahereh Mafi
Narrated by: Kate Reading
Length: 13 hours 21 minutes
Abridged: No
New York Times, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly bestseller! Clashing empires, forbidden romance, and a long-forgotten queen destined to save her people—Tahereh Mafi’s first in an epic, romantic trilogy inspired by Persian mythology.To all the world, Alizeh is a disposable servant, not the long-lost heir to an ancient Jinn kingdom forced to hide... Read more
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