Nature & Landscape

In There Are Rivers in the Sky, Elif Shafak weaves together the lives of three characters connected by water, memory, and the ancient city of Nineveh. In Victorian London, Arthur, a gifted boy born into poverty, develops a fascination with the Epic of Gilgamesh. In nineteenth-century Ottoman Mesopotamia, Narin, a young Yazidi girl, faces the threat of displacement as her community’s traditions and homeland come under pressure. In contemporary London, Zaleekhah, a hydrologist struggling with personal loss, becomes drawn into the histories of the Tigris and its surrounding landscapes. Moving across centuries and continents, the novel explores the enduring connections between human lives, ancient civilizations, and the natural world. Through its interwoven narratives, Shafak examines environmental destruction, cultural heritage, religious persecution, and the transformative power of water as a source of life, memory, and renewal.

Set in the mountainous countryside of Oman, Honey Hunger follows Azzan, a solitary beekeeper whose devotion to bees and the search for wild honey offers him a refuge from disappointment and personal turmoil. When he encounters Thamna, a shepherd woman with honey-coloured eyes, he becomes captivated by her, opening the possibility of connection in a life marked by loneliness and troubled relationships. As Azzan navigates family expectations, alcohol addiction, and the fragile bonds between people, his work with bees becomes a source of purpose and healing. Yet an unexpected accident threatens to destroy everything he has built, forcing him to confront loss and the uncertainty of starting over. Through vivid descriptions of Oman’s mountains, villages, and delicate ecosystems, Alqasmi creates an intimate portrait of a community whose lives are deeply intertwined with the natural world. The novel explores longing, resilience, and the complicated relationship between humans and their environment, revealing how the pursuit of something as precious as honey can reflect a deeper hunger for meaning and belonging.

Twenty-three-year-old Yosoye arrives in Lagos eager to begin a new chapter of her life. Working for a prestigious architectural firm, she finds herself immersed in a world of glamorous social gatherings, ambitious colleagues, and exciting possibilities. Her company is developing Omi City, an extravagant new housing project built on reclaimed land and presented as a symbol of Lagos’s bright future. For Yosoye, the development represents progress and the promise of a city reinventing itself. But beneath the glittering surface, something is deeply wrong. Stories of pregnant women walking into the city’s waters and drowning begin to spread, while the construction of Omi City continues to reshape the landscape and displace the past. When Yosoye discovers that she is pregnant herself, the strange events around her become increasingly difficult to ignore. As she investigates the mysteries surrounding the development, she is forced to confront unsettling connections between motherhood, urban expansion, and the forces that haunt the city. Blending literary fiction, horror, and Nigerian folklore, Aguda’s atmospheric novel examines the human and environmental costs of progress. It explores the complicated relationship between women and their bodies, the weight of ancestral histories, and the question of what a society sacrifices when it builds its future on buried ground.

In Ghost-Eye, Amitav Ghosh weaves together reincarnation, family secrets, and environmental concerns across two generations. In 1969 Calcutta, three-year-old Varsha Gupta begins describing memories of a previous life, including a different mother and a home beside a river. Her unusual claims lead her family to Dr. Shoma Bose, a psychiatrist investigating cases of apparent reincarnation. Decades later, Varsha’s case file attracts the attention of environmental activists, drawing Shoma’s nephew Dinu into a search that brings buried memories and unexpected connections to light. Moving between India and contemporary Brooklyn, the novel blends magical realism, mystery, and ecological fiction to explore the relationship between human identity, memory, and the natural world. It raises questions about how lives are interconnected and how humanity’s relationship with the environment shapes both personal histories and collective futures.

New York, 2040. In a half-flooded city devastated by environmental and social collapse, a young pigeon named Blaze survives with her tightly bonded flock in an abandoned tower. Life is dangerous, but her community has rules that keep them alive—until Blaze rescues a solitary stranger whose memories of the world before the catastrophe challenge everything she believes. As she navigates the complexities of loyalty, love, and motherhood, Blaze must decide whether to follow the traditions of her flock or dare to imagine a different future. An inventive, moving tale of survival, belonging, and the courage to change.