Books like Dimashq yā basmat al-ḥuzn by Ulfat Idlibi

A historical novel that follows a young woman’s journey from a fishing village into the refined, yet perilous world of Japanese geishas, exploring the rituals, social pressures, and personal ambitions that shape her life.

Candide: A Tale of Conviviality and Optimism in a Wretched World

A Fine Balance is Rohinton Mistry's critically acclaimed second novel, set in India in the mid-1970s and focusing on four unlikely individuals who come together in a city apartment during a state of emergency.

A Chilean woman embarks on a quest to find her lover in 1840s California's goldfields, facing numerous challenges and adventures along the way.

A graphic memoir of Riad Sattouf’s nomadic childhood in rural France, Libya and Syria, as his family follows their father’s Pan‑Arabist ideals across the Middle East.

Natty Bumppo's first journey into frontier life and the challenges of defending his freedom against dangerous Indians and the corrupting influence of a ruthless new lawman, setting the stage for the larger story of The Last of the Mohicans.

James Salter's 'All that is' is a captivating and sometimes devastating labyrinth of love and ambition. A deeply intimate portrait of the emotional and physical experiences of being alive. Set during the golden decades following World War II, the book captures Salter's lifelong obsession with capturing the intimate, ephemeral spaces that all of us hold and leave behind on paper. After serving as a young officer in Okinawa during the war, Philip Bowman returns home to a small publishing house in New York. The frenetic social scene of New York in the post-war era is a backdrop for the story, where Bowman feels at home. However, his enduring love seems to elude him. When he meets a woman who captivates him, Bowman embarks on a journey that he never intended to take. The book is celebrated for its lyrical evocation of a post-war world imaginatively rendered and beautifully written.

Set on Easter Monday 1916 in Dublin, this historical fiction follows a divided family caught in the turmoil of the Irish Easter Rising, where two generations clash over contrasting hopes and loyalties.

Osama al‑Kharrat returns to Beirut to witness his father's death and be drawn into a tapestry of ancestral tales, where he meets legendary figures and contemporary Lebanese lives interwoven with war, identity, and survival.

Gogol, N. The overcoat. Melville, H. [Billy Budd, sailor](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL102746W) James, H. The Aspern papers. Chopin, K. [The awakening](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL65430W) Conrad, J. Heart of darkness. Joyce, J. [The dead](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL15073437W) Kafka, F. The metamorphosis. Lawrence, D.H. St. Mawr. Porter, K.A. Pale horse, pale rider. Pynchon, T. The crying of Lot 49.