International Fiction
Read beyond our borders with these international fiction titles selected by a librarian at The Seattle Public Library. Annotations from review sources, as cited. (February 2025)
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The Book Censor's Library
(Kuwait) In a future where deviant literature is banned and the government can read thoughts, a man takes a job as a book censor, sifting through manuscripts for unpublishable material. To his shock, he becomes a reader, falling in with a subversive group trying to save books, even as his daughter is taken for “reeducation.” (Staff annotation)
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Ædnan
(Sweden) Sámi Swedish writer Axelsson makes her memorable American debut with a verse novel that spans generations of two Sámi families, addressing themes of migration and colonial suffering through short-lined, atmospheric poems. Spanning 100 years, this sensitive, beautiful, quietly rendered epic tells an impactful tale of community and survival. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Huddud's House
(Syria) An enigmatic novel of resistance by the prizewinning Syrian writer in exile. A landmark work of contemporary Arabic literature, at once allusive and defiant. (Kirkus)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Oromay
(Ethiopia) Part spy thriller, part melodrama, roman à clef through and through, Girma’s story centers on a moment of Ethiopian history that, in that demographically young country, is all but forgotten. An exemplary anti-war novel from a little-known theater of conflict. (Kirkus)
Format: Book
Availability: No Longer Available
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Mother River
(China) Thirteen offbeat stories from the provocative Can Xue blend the earthy and uncanny. The fiction of Can Xue (a pseudonym) owes debts to magic realism, surrealism, and the Modernists at their most abstruse, but she’s also consistently determined to make sure that familiar feelings of love and loss emerge through her work. (Kirkus)
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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You Glow in the Dark
(Bolivia). Bolivian writer Colanzi makes her English-language debut with a shimmering collection focused on the ruinous consequences of human folly. Taken together, the stories paint an arresting portrait of corruption, industrialization, the power of nature, and supernatural forces. Readers will be captivated. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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Clear
(Scotland) [In 1840s Scotland] A minister is sent to evict the last inhabitant of an isolated island in the North Sea. A deft and graceful yarn about language, love, and rebellion against the inhumane forces of history. (Kirkus)
Format: Book
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You Dreamed of Empires
(Mexico) Enrigue once again reimagines history in this dynamic and stimulating chronicle of Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés’s expedition into the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan in 1519. Flexing his narrative muscle, Enrigue brings the past to vivid, brain-melting life. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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Kairos
(Germany) Erpenbeck sets the dissolution of a May-December romance against the backdrop of German reunification in her solemn and subtle latest. (Publishers Weekly)
Format: Book
Availability: Available
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A Calamity of Noble Houses
(Tunisia) The aftermath of an affair echoes through the history of two Tunisian families, from 1935 to the present day, as told by eleven different narrators. (Staff annotation)
Format: Book
Availability: All copies in use
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