Arab Authors for April

The Book Censor's Library

A Novel

By: Bothayna Al-Essa
Narrated by: Cindy Kay
Length: 5 hours 25 minutes

FINALIST, National Book Award for Translated Literature, 2024



A perilous and fantastical satire of banned books, secret archives, and the looming eye of an all-powerful government.



The new book censor hasn't slept soundly in weeks. By day he combs through manuscripts at a government office, looking for anything that would make a book unfit to... Read more

We Crossed a Bridge and It Trembled

Voices from Syria

By: Wendy Pearlman
Narrated by: Erin Bennett, Assaf Cohen & Susan Nezami
Length: 6 hours

Reminiscent of the work of Nobel Prize winner Svetlana Alexievich, an astonishing collection of intimate wartime testimonies and poetic fragments from a cross-section of Syrians whose lives have been transformed by revolution, war, and flight.Against the backdrop of the wave of demonstrations known as the Arab Spring, in 2011 hundreds of... Read more

Frankenstein in Baghdad

A Novel

By: Ahmed Saadawi
Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini & Kaleo Griffith
Length: 8 hours 1 minute

International Booker Prize finalist

Winner of the International Prize for Arabic Fiction

“Brave and ingenious.” —The New York Times

“Gripping, darkly humorous . . . profound.” —Phil Klay, bestselling author and National Book Award winner for Redeployment

“Extraordinary . . . A devastating but essential read.” —Kevin Powers, bestselling author and... Read more

Iraq + 100

The First Anthology of Science Fiction to Have Emerged from Iraq

By: Hassan Blasim
Narrated by: Peter Ganim
Length: 6 hours 52 minutes

"Peter Ganim was just the right choice to narrate this audiobook" — AudioFile Magazine

A groundbreaking audiobook anthology of science fiction from Iraq that will challenge your perception of what it means to be “The Other.”

This collection of short stories is masterfully edited by Hassan Blasim and features the following authors:

Hassan Blasim... Read more

Dearborn

By: Ghassan Zeineddine
Narrated by: Sarab Kamoo & Qarie Marshall
Length: 7 hours 34 minutes

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

American War

A novel

By: Omar El Akkad
Narrated by: Dion Graham
Length: 12 hours 21 minutes

“Omar El Akkad has delivered a stunning debut. He imagines a world in a not-too-distant future where Americans are at war with each other once again. The characters in this story are fully developed and individual, yet their histories - their stories - extend into the histories of all those displaced and affected by the forces of war. The title,... Read more

The River Has Roots

By: Amal El-Mohtar
Narrated by: Gem Carmella
Length: 3 hours 53 minutes

“The River Has Roots is an ethereal, hypnotizing novella that highlights El-Mohtar's ardent devotion to the English language while paying homage to the faerie tales of old. I highly recommend listening to the immersive audiobook. It's an indulgent read that left me with goosebumps. Read more

The Dream Hotel: A Read with Jenna Pick

A Novel

By: Laila Lalami
Narrated by: Frankie Corzo & Barton Caplan
Length: 11 hours 41 minutes

“I was blown away by this book! It's a cross between EE Cummings' The Enormous Room, Solzhenitsyn's Cancer Ward, and Margaret Atwood's Handmaid's Tale. It's a strange combo, but it works! In the near future, the Risk Assessment Administration assigns all citizens a risk assessment score. If your score exceeds 500, you are subject to... Read more

If an Egyptian Cannot Speak English

By: Noor Naga
Narrated by: Amin El Gamal & Noor Naga
Length: 5 hours 7 minutes

“Unlike anything I've read in fiction before. A brilliantly told story on entitlement, class, culture, obsession, and the love/hate relationship you have for the place you come from. (General Fiction Book Club Book!) Read more

The Hundred Years' War on Palestine

A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017

By: Rashid Khalidi
Narrated by: Fajer Al-Kaisi & Rashid Khalidi
Length: 10 hours 30 minutes

This program includes an introduction read by the author.

A landmark history of one hundred years of war waged against the Palestinians from the foremost US historian of the Middle East, told through pivotal events and family history.

In 1899, Yusuf Diya al-Khalidi, mayor of Jerusalem, alarmed by the Zionist call to create a Jewish national home... Read more

The Thirty Names of Night

A Novel

By: Zeyn Joukhadar
Narrated by: Samy Figaredo & Lameece Issaq
Length: 9 hours 29 minutes

“Since the death of his ornithologist mother in a fire five years ago, Nadir, a young, closeted trans man, has lived with and cared for his grandmother. Struggling with his mother’s death and his identity, he begins a quest to validate her sighting of a rare bird, so rare that only two others have claimed to have seen it and most ornithologists... Read more

Evil Eye

A Novel

By: Etaf Rum
Narrated by: Vaneh Assadourian & Gail Shalan
Length: 11 hours 13 minutes

“A moving meditation on motherhood, inter-generational trauma and how surface appearances often obscure a deeper truth. . . . A stunning second novel from a writer who set the bar very high with her first!”—Tara Conklin, New York Times bestselling author of The Last Romantics and Community BoardThe acclaimed New York Times bestselling author of... Read more