During the Spring Semester, “The Great Decisions” series exposed ICL members to a great variety of countries and cultures. Below is a list of books, fiction and non-fiction, set in some of these countries, with descriptions taken from the New Yorker, NPR, the Oregonian, and The New York Times. Anita has read all these books, with just two exceptions (marked**), which remain on her own summer reading list.
AFGHANISTAN and PAKISTAN
THE PLACES IN BETWEEN: A WALK ACROSS AFGHANISTAN by STEWART, Rory
Stewart returns to Afghanistan in the middle of winter in 2002, crossing entirely on foot through some territory still shakily held by the Taliban. The New York Times describes this as “a striding, glorious book”.
THE RELUCTANT FUNDAMENTALIST by HAMID, Mohsin
The novel begins a few years after 9/11. Changez, the narrator, happens upon an American in Lahore, invites him to tea, and tells the story of his life in the months just before and after the attacks. The resulting monologue by the narrator is the substance of Hamid’s elegant and chilling novel.
THREE CUPS OF TEA : ONE MAN’S MISSION TO PROMOTE PEACE, ....One School at a Time by MORTENSON, Greg
Greg Mortenson keeps a reminder on his bathroom mirror at home which states, “When your heart speaks take good notes.”
THE WASTED VIGIL by ASLAM, Nadeem (NPR Top Fiction Picks for 2008)
Fascinating characters gather in a villa in the countryside, near a town currently fought over by two warlords. Aslam’s vision of contemporary Afghanistan is enlightening, if given to pessimism.
AFRICA
CUTTING FOR STONE by VERGHESE, Abraham
Marion and Shiva Stone, born in 1954 in Addis Ababa, conjoined at the skull, but separated sucessfully after birth, are raised by two doctors from Madras, after their mother, a nun, dies and their father disappears. The boys grow up amid the chronic, political turmoil of Ethiopia’
INFIDEL by ALI, Ayaan Hirsi
Ali tells her life story, beginning with her traditional Muslim childhood in Somalia, Saudi Arabia, and Kenya, to her intellectual awakening and activism in the Netherlands, and her current life under armed guard in the West.
LITTLE BEE by CLEAVE, Chris
The story begins in England where a Nigerian refugee is looking for a British couple that she had met during a horrific episode in Nigeria.
LONG WAY GONE by BEAH, Ismael
A child warrior during the Sierra Leone Civil War.
TWENTY CHICKENS FOR A SADDLE by SCOTT, Robyn
A memoir of growing up in Botswana with loving, eccentric, and adventure loving parents; her father was a flying doctor to remote cliniics. Robyn spends her teenage years in a boarding school in Zimbabwe.
WHEN THE CROCODILE EATS THE SUN by GODWIN, Peter
Peter Godwin’s new book about Zimbabwe is part family memoir and part bulletin from the barricades. He writes, “A white in Africa is like a Jew everywhere - no sufferance, watching warily, waiting for the next tidal wave of hostility.”
CUBA
TELEX FROM CUBA by KUSHNER Rachel
Set in the last days of Cuba’s golden age (at least, for American businessmen), this saga, at once familial and national, chronicles the impact of Castro’s coming coup upon a family stuck in the center of an unstoppable storm.
WAITING FOR SNOW IN HAVANA: CONFESSIONS OF A CUBAN BOY by EIRE, Carlos (National Book Award Winner 2003)
At the start of the 1960s, Operation Pedro Pan flew more than 14,000 children from Cuba to Miami, without their parents. Eire’s deeply moving memoir describes life among the aristocracy of old Cuba, before Castro’s revolution, and later when he turned from a child of privilege into a Lost Boy of Cuba.
INDIA
THE AGE OF SHIVA by SUIR, Manil
The Age of Shiva is a rich read, full of the sights and sounds of tumultous political years in India during the country’s struggle for independence. This is the story of one woman’s struggle to find balance between tradition and modern life, as she faces the unpredictable consequences of love.
SEA OF POPPIES by GHOSH, Amitav
The story begins in 1838, a pivotal year in the annals of the poppy trade. Poppy farming was then considered a perfectly legitimate line of agricultural work; after processing, drugs were transported by ship around the world.
THE SPACE BETWEEN US by UMRIGAR, Thrity
Two characters from opposite sides of the track become inextricably intertwined: Sera, a wealthy upper-middle-class Parsi housewife, and Bhima, her servant living in a Mumbai slum. There are convincing descriptions of Indian life, where class colors everything.
UNACCUSTOMED EARTH by LAHIRI, Jhumpa
First-generation Bengali-Americans of Lahiri’s new collection of short stories struggle with their life in the USA and their differences with their immigrant parents. One of the best fiction books of 2008 (New York Times).
WEIGHT OF HEAVEN by UMRIGAR, Thrity
While grieving for the loss of their 7-year-old son, American couple Frank and Ellie move to India to start again. As Ellie assimilates smoothly into a new community, Frank becomes increasingly alienated, until he befriends Ramesh, the young son of their servants. "Umrigar shows us the intersection where East and West meet, on a painfully personal level. Larger issues are brought to the fore as well: conflicts between tradition and modernity; between globalization and local values; between haves and have nots."
THE WHITE TIGER by ADIGA, Aravind (Winner of the Man Booker Prize 2008)
Mr. Adiga said his book was an “attempt to catch the voice of the men you meet as you travel through India - the voice of the colossal underclass.”
MIDDLE EAST
THE BIN LADENS: AN ARABIAN FAMILY IN THE AMERICAN CENTURY by COLL, Steve**
This riveting book not only provides a pschologically detailed portrait of Osama bin Laden, but in recounting the story of his extended family, it also underscores the crucial role that his relatives and their relationship with the royal House of Saud played in shaping his thinking, his ambitions, and his technical expertise.
A GRAVE IN GAZA by REES, Matt Beynon
This international mystery depicts the sights, smells, and sounds of both the historical and modern day Gaza Strip. The conflicts between the UN, Israelis, and Palestinians are well described.
HONEYMOON IN TEHRAN: TWO YEARS OF LOVE AND DANGER IN IRAN by MOAVENI, Azadeh
Moaveni, a journalist for Time magazine, returns to Iran in 2005 to report on the country’s presidential election. Iran is stunned when the religious fundamentalist Ahmadinejad is elected.
IRAN AWAKENING: A MEMOIR OF REVOLUTION AND HOPE by Ebadi, Shirin
In her memoir, Ebadi, the first Iranian and the first Muslim Woman to win a Nobel Prize and also Iran’s first female judge (soon demoted to the position of clerk after the Islamic Revolution) describes her betrayed hopes for the revolution that she had once supported.
THE LOOMING TOWER by WRIGHT, Lawrence (Pulitzer Prize for Non-Fiction 2007)**
A thoughtful examination of the world that produced the men who brought us 9/11.
READING LOLITA IN TEHRAN: A MEMOIR IN BOOKS by NAFISI, Azar
Seven female students meet once a week at the Tehran house of the author, their teacher, to discuss ”forbidden” works of Western fiction.
BOSNIA, etc.
CELLIST OF SARAJEVO by GALLOWAY, Steven
Fact and fiction intersect in this haunting novel about four people striving to survive, both physically and spiritually, while their city is under siege during the Bosnian War.
PEOPLE OF THE BOOK by BROOKS, Geraldine
An Australian conservator traces the journey of a priceless prayer book from 15th century Spain to modern day Sarajevo.
THE PIANO TEACHER by LEE, Janice
Set in Hong Kong from 1941 to 1951, the book opens a window into life during and after the Japanese invasion of 1941, when values were laid bare and individual choices had ramfications beyond anyone’s imagination.
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