Fiction

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Second Chance Convenience Store

Second Chance Convenience Store

The Second Chance Convenience Store follows Dokgo, a homeless man living near Seoul Station who has lost his memory and struggles to make sense of his past. His life begins to change after he finds and returns a wallet belonging to Mrs Yeom, a retired teacher who owns a small convenience store. Grateful for his honesty, she offers him food and eventually gives him a job at her shop. As Dokgo becomes part of the neighbourhood, his quiet kindness begins to transform the lives of customers and colleagues dealing with loneliness, family conflict, and personal disappointment. Yet his mysterious past continues to cast a shadow over his new beginning. Through the everyday encounters taking place inside the store, Kim explores social isolation, economic insecurity, and the importance of community. The novel celebrates compassion and suggests that small acts of kindness can help people recover their dignity and rebuild their lives.

The Women's Courtyard

The Women's Courtyard

Khadija Mastoor

The Women’s Courtyard follows Aliya, a young Muslim girl growing up in an extended family in the years surrounding the Partition of British India. Much of the family’s life unfolds within the secluded courtyard of their home, where women manage domestic responsibilities, negotiate relationships, and respond to the political changes taking place beyond their walls. While the men become absorbed in the struggle for independence, the women face mounting financial difficulties and the consequences of decisions made largely without their participation. Aliya, meanwhile, longs for an education and a future that extends beyond the limits imposed on her. Through the everyday experiences of the household, Mastur presents a distinctive perspective on a period usually narrated through political leaders and public events. The novel explores gender inequality, family obligations, and women’s quiet determination to claim greater control over their lives.

Guardian and a Thief

Guardian and a Thief

Set in a near-future Kolkata devastated by extreme heat and environmental crisis, A Guardian and a Thief follows two families whose lives become entangled through desperation and difficult moral choices. Ma, a mother determined to secure a future for her young daughter and elderly father, is preparing to leave India for the United States. Her plans are threatened when a young thief steals the documents her family needs to emigrate. The thief, meanwhile, is struggling to feed his own child in a city where poverty and climate catastrophe have made survival increasingly difficult. As their stories unfold over a single week, Majumdar explores the boundaries between right and wrong when people are pushed to desperate extremes. The novel examines inequality, parenthood, migration, and the moral compromises people make when protecting their families becomes a matter of survival.

When the Fireflies Dance

When the Fireflies Dance

When the Fireflies Dance tells the story of Lalloo, a young boy growing up in poverty near Lahore, Pakistan, where his family is trapped in a system of bonded labour at a brick kiln. After witnessing the brutal murder of his brother, Lalloo struggles to overcome the trauma of that night while confronting the exploitation and violence that govern his family’s existence. His parents and sisters remain trapped in a cycle of debt, forced to work endlessly under oppressive conditions. Determined to change their circumstances, Lalloo must find the courage to confront his past and seek a different future. Inspired by the realities of bonded labour in South Asia, Hassan explores injustice, family loyalty, and the human cost of exploitation. The novel portrays the resilience required to challenge an oppressive system and the hope that can survive even in the darkest circumstances.

The Lion Women of Tehran

The Lion Women of Tehran

Set in Tehran across three transformative decades, The Lion Women of Tehran follows Ellie and Homa, two girls from different social backgrounds who form a close friendship in the 1950s. After her father’s death, Ellie moves with her mother to a poorer neighbourhood, where she meets Homa, an outspoken and ambitious girl who dreams of becoming a judge and fighting for women’s rights. The girls share their hopes for the future, but changing circumstances eventually separate them. When they reunite years later, their friendship is tested by political upheaval, personal ambition, and a devastating betrayal. Against the backdrop of Iran’s changing political landscape, Kamali explores female friendship, social inequality, and the consequences of choices made in moments of fear and uncertainty. The novel examines how childhood relationships shape adult identities and how forgiveness can become a path towards understanding and redemption.

Six days in Bombay

Six days in Bombay

Set in Bombay in 1937, Six Days in Bombay follows Sona, a young Indian woman whose encounter with an enigmatic French artist draws her into a world of art, ambition, and personal transformation. Against the vibrant backdrop of colonial-era India, Sona navigates the social expectations surrounding women while discovering new possibilities for her own future. Her experiences over six pivotal days challenge her understanding of herself, her relationships, and the boundaries that society has established for her. As the story unfolds, art becomes a means of exploring both individual expression and the tensions between tradition and change. Joshi combines historical atmosphere with an intimate portrait of a woman confronting the possibilities of a different life, examining how brief encounters and unexpected experiences can alter the course of a person’s identity and ambitions.

House of Day, House of Night

House of Day, House of Night

House of Day, House of Night is a fragmentary, dreamlike novel set in a small village near the Polish-Czech border, where everyday life intertwines with folklore, history, dreams, and the supernatural. Through a series of interconnected stories, memories, recipes, local legends, and reflections, Olga Tokarczuk explores the lives of the village’s inhabitants and the mysterious forces that shape their existence. The narrative moves between past and present, blending the ordinary with the uncanny and revealing how individual lives become woven into a larger tapestry of collective memory. Among its recurring subjects are the boundaries between life and death, the fluidity of identity, the relationship between humans and nature, and the spiritual dimensions of seemingly mundane experiences. Rather than following a conventional plot, Tokarczuk creates a mosaic of voices and perspectives that invites readers to discover connections between seemingly unrelated events. The novel transforms a remote borderland into a place where personal stories, forgotten histories, and myth coexist, questioning the limits of rational understanding and the nature of belonging.

Exit Zero

Marie-Helene Bertino

Exit Zero is a collection of twelve surreal and imaginative short stories that explore the strange, often unsettling experiences of ordinary people. Blending magical realism, dark humour, and reflections on mortality, Marie-Helene Bertino creates worlds where the boundaries between everyday life and the extraordinary begin to dissolve. In the title story, Jo returns to her estranged father’s home after his death and discovers that she has inherited an unexpected companion: a unicorn living in the backyard. Elsewhere, former lovers fall mysteriously from the sky, gardens become sites of communication between the living and the dead, and familiar objects take on uncanny significance. Beneath the collection’s fantastical premises lies a thoughtful exploration of loneliness, family relationships, grief, and the difficulty of navigating an unpredictable world. Bertino’s stories invite readers to look beyond the apparent absurdity of everyday existence and consider the connections, losses, and moments of wonder that give life meaning.

United States 2025

Nights Are Quiet in Tehran

Nights Are Quiet in Tehran

The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran follows an Iranian family across four decades, exploring revolution, exile, identity, and the lasting effects of political upheaval. The story begins in 1979, when Behzad, a young communist revolutionary, fights for a new political order following the fall of the Shah. He falls in love with Nahid, an equally passionate young woman, but the rise of the Islamic Republic eventually forces them to flee to West Germany. Told through four family members’ perspectives in 1979, 1989, 1999, and 2009, the novel traces their struggles to build a new life while maintaining connections to their homeland. As the children grow up between cultures, questions of belonging, memory, and inherited political convictions become increasingly complex. Their experiences culminate against the backdrop of Iran’s 2009 Green Movement, which brings the family’s past and present into renewed tension. Through its shifting voices and generations, Bazyar explores how political events shape private lives and how the meaning of home changes across generations of migration and exile.

Too Soon

Too Soon follows three generations of Palestinian American women—grandmother Zoya, mother Naya, and granddaughter Arabella—as they navigate love, ambition, exile, and cultural identity across decades. Their family history stretches from their displacement from Jaffa in 1948 to their pursuit of the American Dream and their lives in the New York theatre world. Arabella, a thirty-five-year-old theatre director, faces complicated romantic choices and an opportunity to stage a provocative production in the West Bank, while her mother and grandmother attempt to guide her future and confront secrets from their past. Blending sharp humor with emotional depth, Betty Shamieh explores the lasting effects of displacement, the tensions between tradition and independence, and the struggle to define oneself across generations. The novel celebrates the resilience of women determined to pursue love and freedom on their own terms.

The Remembered Soldier

The Remembered Soldier

In The Remembered Soldier, a young woman named Noon Merckem encounters a man suffering from amnesia who may be her husband, a soldier who disappeared during the First World War. Although he remembers nothing of his former life, Noon attempts to help him recover his identity and rebuild their relationship. As the story unfolds, conflicting memories and unanswered questions emerge, revealing the uncertainty surrounding his past and the devastating consequences of war. Anjet Daanje explores the fragile relationship between memory, identity, and truth, examining how love can endure when the past becomes inaccessible. Set against the aftermath of the First World War, this haunting novel reflects on trauma, loss, and the stories people construct to make sense of their lives.

Netherlands 2025

We are Green and Trembling

We are Green and Trembling

Gabriela Cabezón Cámara

We Are Green and Trembling reimagines the story of Antonio de Erauso, a seventeenth-century Spanish figure who escaped a convent, adopted a male identity, and travelled through colonial South America. Narrated by Antonio’s companion, the Indigenous woman Micuén, the novel follows their adventures across a world shaped by colonial violence, religious authority, and rigid gender expectations. Blending historical fiction, satire, and exuberant storytelling, Gabriela Cabezón Cámara challenges conventional ideas about gender, identity, and power while exposing the brutality of colonialism. Through its unconventional characters and vivid prose, the novel celebrates resistance, transformation, and the possibility of creating a life beyond the identities imposed by society.

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