in case you're searching...

for a new addition to your nightstand, here is a list of some books I recommend. Aside from being in completely random order, and far from exhaustive, not every book listed is necessarily one I adore or have no qualms with. However, if I’ve learned something meaningful from it, it’s here. If you have any recommendations you think I may enjoy, please do share!

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Nonfiction:

• The Palestine Sermons, Dr. Khaled Abou el Fadl

• The Glass Castle, Jeanette Walls

• Perfect Victims, Mohammed El-Kurd

• A People’s History of the United States, Howard Zinn

• The Hundred Years War on Palestine, Rashid Khalidi

• Philosophy in the Islamic World, Peter Adamson

• Your Silence Will Not Protect You, Audre Lorde

• Failed States, Noam Chomsky

• Everything I Know About Love, Dolly Alderton

• Metahuman, Deepak Chopra

• all about love, bell hooks

• Girl, Interrupted, Susanna Kaysen

• The Diary of Anais Nin

Fiction:

• The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini

• Woman at Point Zero, Nawai El Saadawi

• Little Women, Louisa May Alcott

• One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez

• The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoevsky

• The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien

• 40 Rules of Love, Elif Shafak

• The Essential Kafka, Franz Kafka

• A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens

• A Thousand Splendid Suns, Khaled Hosseini

• Atonement, Ian McEwan

• The Awakening, Kate Chopin

• A Wrinkle in Time, Madeleine L’Engle (yes, even for adults)

• Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison

• Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen

• Before the Coffee Gets Cold, Toshikazu Kawaguchi

• 1984, George Orwell

Religion:

• The Study Qur’an, Translation by Dr. Seyyed Hossein Nasr

  • (Anything written by Seyyed Hossein Nasr)

• Nahj al-Balagha, Imam Ali ibn Abi Talib

• Divine Love: Islamic Literature and the Path to God, William Chittick

• The Reconstruction of Religious Thought in Islam, Allama Muhammad Iqbal

• In Search of the Lost Heart, William Chittick

• The Prophet’s Heir, Hassan Abbas

• Husayn: The Saga of Hope, Jalal Moughania

• After the Prophet, Lesley Hazleton

• Believing Women in Islam, Asma Barlas

• Muhammad, The World-Changer, Mohamad Jebara

• Christianity and Islam, Samuel Zinner

• With the Heart in Mind, Mikaeel Ahmed Smith

• The Practice of the Presence of God, Brother Lawrence

• No God but God, Reza Aslan

• Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard