Identity & Belonging

Explorations of self, belonging, and what it means to find your place.

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Ulysses

Ulysses follows a single day in the lives of Leopold Bloom, an advertising canvasser, and Stephen Dedalus, a young writer, as they move through Dublin on 16 June 1904. Their ordinary activities—walking through the city, eating, working, attending a funeral, and visiting a maternity hospital—become the basis for an extraordinary exploration of consciousness and urban life. Bloom’s wanderings are interwoven with Stephen’s intellectual struggles and the experiences of Molly Bloom, whose final extended monologue offers an intimate portrait of memory, desire, and marriage. Joyce draws parallels between the characters’ experiences and episodes from Homer’s Odyssey, transforming an ancient epic into a modern story about everyday existence. Through experimental language, shifting narrative styles, and detailed observations, the novel explores identity, belonging, sexuality, and the complexity of human thought.

Passage of Tears

Passage of Tears

Abdourahman A. Waberi

Set in Djibouti in the years following the September 11 attacks, Passage of Tears follows Djibril, a Djiboutian man who has spent years in voluntary exile in Montreal. When he returns to his homeland on assignment for an American economic intelligence company, he finds a country transformed into a strategic battleground where foreign powers, economic interests, and competing political and religious ideologies collide. As Djibril investigates the country’s security and political situation, his return awakens painful memories of childhood, family, and his estranged twin brother, Djamal, a religious extremist imprisoned on an island near the coast. Meanwhile, mysterious letters from a prisoner introduce another narrative, one that unexpectedly turns towards the life and ideas of German philosopher Walter Benjamin. Blending political thriller, philosophical reflection, family drama, and social satire, Waberi examines the consequences of globalisation, religious extremism, and foreign intervention in the Horn of Africa. The strategically important Bab-el-Mandeb Strait—the maritime passage connecting the Red Sea with the Gulf of Aden—becomes a powerful symbol of the tensions between local histories and global ambitions. Ultimately, the novel explores exile, fractured identities, and the difficult relationship between a person and the homeland they have left behind.

Three Strong Women

Three Strong Women

The story of three women who say no: Norah, a French-born lawyer who finds herself in Senegal, summoned by her estranged father to save another victim of his paternity; Fanta, who leaves a contented life as a teacher in Dakar to follow her boyfriend back to France, where his depression and dislocation poison everything; and Khady, a penniless widow put out by her husband's family with nothing but the name of a distant cousin in France. As these three lives intertwine, each woman manages an astonishing feat of self-preservation against those who have made themselves the fastest-growing and most-reviled people in Europe. In Marie NDiaye's stunning narration we see the progress by which ordinary women discover unimagined reserves of strength.

The Thing Around Your Neck

The Thing Around Your Neck

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The Thing Around Your Neck is a collection of twelve short stories exploring the experiences of Nigerians living both at home and abroad, particularly in the United States. Adichie portrays characters negotiating cultural expectations, family obligations, gender inequality, political instability, and the complicated realities of immigration. In the title story, a young Nigerian woman moves to America, where her hopes for a better life are challenged by loneliness, financial insecurity, and the feeling of being misunderstood. Other stories examine strained marriages, religious divisions, family secrets, and the gap between how people perceive Nigeria and how Nigerians experience their own country. With emotional precision and understated humour, Adichie explores the tension between tradition and modernity, revealing how migration and cultural encounters can transform people’s understanding of themselves and their relationships.

A Rift in Time: Travels with My Ottoman Uncle

A Rift in Time: Travels with My Ottoman Uncle

In A Rift in Time: Travels with My Ottoman Uncle, Palestinian writer and human rights lawyer Raja Shehadeh explores the connections between family history, national identity, and the changing political landscape of the Middle East. Inspired by the life of his great-uncle Najib Nassar, a Palestinian journalist who lived during the final decades of the Ottoman Empire, Shehadeh traces the journey of a man who witnessed the collapse of an empire and the emergence of a new political order. Moving between historical research, personal reflection, and travel writing, the author examines how the experiences of earlier generations continue to shape contemporary Palestinian life. Through his uncle’s story, Shehadeh reflects on the meaning of belonging, the fragility of historical memory, and the ways political borders transform people’s relationships with their homeland. The book offers an intimate exploration of the past, revealing how an individual’s life can illuminate the wider forces that shape a nation’s history and collective identity.

The Naive and the Sentimental Novelist

The Naive and the Sentimental Novelist

The Naive and the Sentimental Novelist explores how novels work and why reading fiction can transform our understanding of ourselves and the world. Drawing on his experience as a novelist and his lifelong engagement with literature, Orhan Pamuk examines the relationship between writers, readers, and the fictional worlds they create. Inspired by Friedrich Schiller’s distinction between naive and sentimental poetry, Pamuk considers two approaches to storytelling: one that emerges naturally from experience and another that consciously reflects on its own methods and meanings. Through examples from writers such as Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Thomas Mann, Pamuk discusses character, plot, setting, symbolism, and the delicate balance between imagination and observation. He also explores the pleasure readers find in entering a novel’s world, visualising its landscapes, and identifying with its characters. Blending literary criticism with personal reflection, the book offers an intimate account of the novelist’s craft and the reader’s experience. Ultimately, Pamuk suggests that the power of fiction lies in its ability to make imagined worlds feel as vivid and meaningful as reality itself.

The world in half

The world in half

Cristina Henríquez

The World in Half follows Miraflores, a young woman living in Chicago who discovers that the father she has never known may still be alive in Panama. Determined to uncover the truth about her family’s past, she travels to the country her mother left behind, hoping to understand her own identity and the circumstances surrounding her parents’ relationship. As she explores Panama, Miraflores encounters unfamiliar landscapes, complicated family histories, and unexpected connections that challenge her assumptions about where she belongs. Through her journey, Cristina Henríquez examines the immigrant experience, cultural belonging, and the ways family secrets shape personal identity. The novel explores the emotional distance between generations and the search for a place to call home.

The Last Gift

Abdulrazak Gurnah

The Last Gift explores migration, family secrets, and the complicated relationship between personal identity and cultural heritage. Abbas, a Tanzanian man living in England, suffers a stroke that leaves him unable to speak. As his health deteriorates, memories of his earlier life begin to emerge, revealing experiences he has kept hidden from his wife, Maryam, and their children, Jamal and Hanna. His silence forces the family to confront questions about their past, their origins, and the emotional distance that has developed between them. Through shifting perspectives and carefully uncovered memories, Gurnah examines the difficulties of belonging between cultures and generations, showing how unspoken histories can influence family relationships long after people have tried to leave their past behind.

The Museum of Abandoned Secrets

The Museum of Abandoned Secrets

Oksana Zabuzhko

Spanning more than six decades of Ukrainian history, from the Second World War to the early 2000s, The Museum of Abandoned Secrets is an ambitious, multigenerational novel about memory, resistance, and the hidden forces shaping national identity. In contemporary Kyiv, journalist Daryna Hoshchynska discovers an old photograph of Olena Dovhan, a young Ukrainian partisan who was killed by Soviet secret police in 1947 after being betrayed by her lover. Fascinated by Olena’s story, Daryna begins investigating her life, uncovering secrets that connect the wartime resistance to the political realities of modern Ukraine. As her research deepens, personal relationships, family histories, and forgotten traumas become entangled with the country’s turbulent past. Moving between generations and historical periods, Zabuzhko explores Soviet repression, political violence, cultural memory, and the enduring consequences of historical silence. Combining historical fiction, psychological drama, and elements of the supernatural, the novel asks how the past survives within the present—and how recovering buried stories can reshape a nation’s understanding of itself.

Tears of the Black Man

Tears of the Black Man

Alain Mabanckou

In Tears of the Black Man, Congolese writer Alain Mabanckou examines the complex relationship between Africa and the West, exploring how colonial history, migration, and racial stereotypes continue to shape perceptions of Black identity. Drawing on personal experiences, literature, and cultural observations, Mabanckou challenges simplified narratives that portray Africans solely as victims of colonialism or racism. The book reflects on the expectations placed on Black people in Europe, the contradictions within contemporary African societies, and the ways historical grievances can influence individual and collective identities. Mabanckou also questions the tendency to explain present-day difficulties exclusively through the legacy of slavery and colonial rule, encouraging readers to consider the role of personal agency and contemporary political realities. Blending memoir, cultural criticism, and social commentary, the work offers a provocative reflection on race, belonging, and the ongoing dialogue between Africa and the wider world.

Congo, Democratic Republic 2012

The Expats

Kate Moore appears to have built a comfortable new life in Luxembourg. After her husband accepts a lucrative job abroad, she leaves Washington, D.C., behind and settles into the routines of expatriate life: school drop-offs, coffee mornings, and weekend trips around Europe. But Kate is hiding a dangerous secret about her past, and the ordinary life she has constructed is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain. When Kate begins to suspect that another American couple in Luxembourg are not who they claim to be, her suspicions grow. Her husband is also behaving strangely, and his work for an undisclosed banking client raises questions she cannot ignore. As she investigates the people around her, Kate discovers that the lives of the expatriates in her seemingly peaceful community are far more complicated than they appear. Moving between the polished world of international professionals and the shadowy realm of espionage, Pavone builds a suspenseful story of deception, double-crossing, and hidden identities. The novel explores how people reinvent themselves when they move abroad, whether it is possible to escape one’s past, and how secrets can undermine even the closest relationships. The Expats won both the Edgar Award and the Anthony Award for Best First Novel in 2013.

Luxembourg United States 2013

The Goldfinch

After a devastating accident kills his mother, thirteen-year-old Theo Decker finds himself clinging to a small, captivating painting that connects him to her. As he grows older, the artwork draws him into a world of wealth, deception, and the criminal art trade. Winner of the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, this sweeping novel explores grief, obsession, and the mysterious ways beauty can shape a life.

United States 2013

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About this theme

Books: 196
Countries: 72

Countries with this theme

Bosnia and Herzegovina

Congo, Democratic Republic

Dominican Republic

North Macedonia