I have always tried to branch out beyond my world. I had an idea for an international booklist that could help myself and others find writers whose experiences and worlds are completely different from my own. This is my international booklist…if anyone has suggestions for add-ons, I’d love to hear from you!
An International Booklist
Afghanistan: The Kite Runner, Khaled Housseini
Argentina: Jorge Luis Borges, Ficciones
Austria: Frederic Morton, Thunder at Twilight; Norman Stone, Europe Transformed; Stefan Zweig, Chess Story
Australia: Markus Zusak, The Book Thief; John Marsden, Tomorrow, When the War Began;Tim Winton, Cloudstreet
Belgium: Hugo Claus, The Sorrow of Belgium; Amélie Nothomb, Hygiene and the Assassin; Georges Simenon, Pietr the Latvian
Brazil: The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho; Brandão and Ellen Watson, Zero
Canada: The Blind Assassin Margaret Atwood
Chile: The House of Spirits, Isabel Allende
China: Three Hundred Tang Poems (tr Geoffrey Waters, et. al)
Columbia: One Hundred Years of Solitude, Garbiel Garcia Marquez
Cuba: John Sturrock, Explosians in a Cathedral; Cirilo Villaverde, Cecilia Valdés or
Dominican Republic: Junot Diaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Egypt: Yusuf Idris, The Cheapest Nights; Marjane Satrapi, The Complete Persepolis
England: Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice; Marguerite Duras, The Lover
France: Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo; Victor Hugo, Les Misérables
Germany: Herman Hesse, The Glass Bead Game; Cornelia Funke, Inkheart; Jacob Grimm, The Complete Grimm’s Fairy Tales
Greece: Sappho; Barry Unsworth, Pascali’s Island; Louis de Berniéres, Corelli’s Mandolin
Iceland: Halldór Laxness, Independent People; Svava Jakobsdóttir, Gunnlöth’s Tale
India: the God of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
Iran: Sadegh Hedayat, The Blind Owl; Shahriar Mandanipour, Shadows of the Cave, Censoring an Iranian Love Story
Ireland: C. S. Lewis, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe
Italy: Italo Calvino: Invisible Cities, If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler
Jamaica: Sylvia Wynter, The Hills of Hebron; Margaret Cezair-Thompson, The True History of Paradise, the Pirate’s Daughter; Jean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea
Japan: Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore
Lebanon: Amin Maalouf, Gardens of Light; Alexandre Najjar, the School of War
Mexico: The Four Agreements, Don Miguel Ruiz
Nigeria: Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe
Norway: Knut Hamsun, Hunger; Tarjei Vesaas, The Ice Palace
Pakistan: I am Malala, Malala Yousafzai
Peru: Mario Vargas Llosa, Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter
Poland: Stanislaw Lem, Solaris
Portugal: José Saramago, Blindness; Lidia Jorge, The Day of the Prodigies
Russia: Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment; Vladimir Sorokin, Ice Trilogy
South Africa: Long Walk to Freedom, Nelson Mandela; Bryce Courtenay, The Power of One; J. M. Coetzee, Disgrace, Waiting for the Barbarians
Spain: Don Quixote, Cervantes; Carlos Ruiz Zafón, The Shadow of the Wind
Sweden: Kerstin Ekman, Blackwater; Tomas Tranströmer, New Collected Poems; Bodil Malmsten, The Price of Water in Finistère
Switzerland: Johanna Spyri, Heidi
Turkey: Ohran Pamuk, My Name is Red; Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar, The Time Regulation Institute
United States: Louisa May Alcott, Little Women; John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
