Books like In the city by the sea by Kamila Shamsie

The Kite Runner follows an unlikely friendship between a privileged boy and the son of his father’s servant amid Afghanistan’s turbulent history, exploring betrayal, redemption, and the father‑son bond.

In the orderly suburb of Shaker Heights, a new family’s arrival and a custody dispute ignite tension, revealing secrets, art, and the complex pull of motherhood in a tightly knit community.

Sisters Vianne and Isabelle are pulled into the turmoil of World War II, each forging a path of courage and resistance against the Nazi occupation of France.

Six friends navigate love, career, and cultural clashes while working nights at an Indian call center for a U.S. appliance company, culminating in a transformative Thanksgiving call that turns their lives upside down.

A sweeping coming‑of‑age story set on Nebraska’s prairie, following Jim Burden’s journey with his grandparents amid immigrant families, especially the Czech Shimerdas, and his complex love and friendship with Antonia.

The Orphan Master's Son follows a man's journey through propaganda, identity, and state power in North Korea.

Sage Singer, a baker, befriends retired teacher Josef Weber, who asks her to end his life. When his chilling secret surfaces, Sage must decide whether justice or forgiveness is the right path.

Mukundan, a middle‑aged bachelor, returns to his Indian village, grappling with guilt and a longing for redemption. With the help of an eccentric painter, he attempts to rebuild his home and himself, only to face a daunting choice between friendship, love, and ambition.

Set in early 20th‑century Ottoman lands, a young Englishwoman’s love and archaeological discovery become entangled with the war‑torn politics of a British Indian soldier, weaving a tale of mystery, loyalty, and hope.

In senior Karachi, Raheen and Karim share a symbiotic friendship, dream, and secret fate—until adulthood, distance, and migration split them, unveiling hidden truths about family, maps, and love.

Arranged Marriage by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni is a collection of short stories that explore the lives of young girls and women adapting to a new country in the United States, with a focus on their struggle for change and acceptance.

A captivating novel of sisterhood and forbidden love, Sister of My Heart explores the intricate bond between two sisters from vastly different backgrounds in San Francisco and India.

High school students find themselves caught up in a murder mystery at a party, leading to a thrilling adventure and coming-of-age tale for young readers who want to solve crimes and make friends in the process.

A group of friends navigate relationships and cultural differences in America, facing challenges in their new surroundings.

A powerful, sweeping epic crossing generations, cultures and continentsIn a prison cell in the US, a man stands trembling, naked, fearfully waiting to be shipped to Guantanamo Bay. How did it come to this? he wonders...August 9th, 1945, Nagasaki. Hiroko Tanaka steps out onto her veranda, taking in the view of the terraced slopes leading up to the sky. Wrapped in a kimono with three black cranes swooping across the back, she is twenty-one, in love with the man she is to marry, Konrad Weiss.In a split second, the world turns white. In the next, it explodes with the sound of fire and the horror of realisation. In the numbing aftermath of a bomb that obliterates everything she has known, all that remains are the bird-shaped burns on her back, an indelible reminder of the world she has lost.In search of new beginnings, she travels to Delhi two years later. There she walks into the lives of Konrad’s half-sister, Elizabeth, her husband James Burton, and their employee Sajjad Ashraf, from whom she starts to learn Urdu. As the years unravel, new homes replace those left behind and old wars are seamlessly usurped by new conflicts. But the shadows of history – personal, political – are cast over the entwined worlds of the Burtons, Ashrafs and the Tanakas as they are transported from Pakistan to New York, and in the novel’s astonishing climax, to Afghanistan in the immediate wake of 9/11. The ties that have bound them together over decades and generations are tested to the extreme, with unforeseeable consequences.Sweeping in its scope and mesmerising in its evocation of time and place, Burnt Shadows is an epic narrative of disasters evaded and confronted, loyalties offered and repaid, and loves rewarded and betrayed.

A twin narrative intertwining Pakistani family life, Muslim cultural identity, and psychological complexity, as characters navigate marriage, faith, and the shadow of crime in England and Pakistan.