veer, no limits on author's country of origin. The book needs to be set in a different place or culture (preferrably not English speaking)

These titles are great - many of them I've not heard of, so I get to go exploring! Oh what fun! (sarah, I am the same way. I'd love to go actually visit these places, but as funds are not readily available, I go through books, both fiction, as well as travel narratives)

A friend emailed me these ideas (some repetitive of the above

>A Passage to India

>Imaginings of Sand by Andre Brink, deals with a woman (Boer background) who goes back to rural South Africa after having lived in England for a long time.

>Red Earth and Pouring Rain, by Vikram Chandra, which is a fabulous book which contains a decent dose of Indian history

>Gabriel Garcia Marquez Love in the Time of Cholera

>Hummingbird's Daughter, by something something Urrea (can't ever remember his first name). Just a gorgeous story that quietly becomes an grand epic.

>Mating, by Norman Rush

>Graham Greene (my current fetish) - so many of his books take place in foreign cultures (Power & Glory in Mexico, Quiet American in French-occupied Vietnam, Heart of the Matter in Africa, etc.), but you certainly can't ever claim Greene loses sight of his plots.

sarah, I share your worry about taking one writer's perspective and projecting that onto an entire country/culture I still remember reading the original Ripleys Believe it or Not when I was in HS (written in the 20s). At the time I was sure it was all true. Didn't take me long to learn that he is not exactly an unbiased author. But even someone who is unbiased can't help but project some of his own beliefs to what he sees. Which is why I love reading non fiction accounts after reading a fiction work about a place.

I'm a huge V.S. Naipaul fan. I think his great genius is to introduce me to totally alien cultures without making the people feel "other."

Arturo Reverte-Perez is probably more cosmopolitan that "unamerican" but I do love his novels.

Michael Ondatje I loved The English Patient but loved his story of growing up in Sri Lanka more.

I really enjoyed:

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

Loving Che by Ana Menendez

I've had Beach Boy by Ardashir Vakil on my TBR pile for quite a while now. Just haven't got around to picking it up.

The War at the End of the World by Mario Vargas Llosa is an historical novel about an event in Brazil that I'd never heard about. I subsequently read two histories of the event, one of them being Rebellion in the Backlands by Euclides da Cunha. It should have been Janet Reno's reading before she bacame attorney general.

Cindy, I'm glad you (or your friend) mentioned Graham Greene. When I was making my list, The Power and the Glory flitted through my mind but I forgot to include it. Likewise, I agree with Chris about Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient. I also liked Anil's Ghost.

It was my friend; I embarrassingly have not read any of his. Probably need to.

>Arturo Reverte-Perez is probably more cosmopolitan that "unamerican" but I do love his novels.

Takes place in Spain, 16th century, so that counts. I got hooked by the Captain Alatriste series and so have read several of his earlier books. Very readable and interesting.

The War at the End of the World reminds me of Time of the Butterflies.

Far Pavilions (already mentioned here)

Pearl Diver: A Novel (Japanese leper colony--excellent book)

No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series--be sure to listen to at least one on CD/tape, you will enjoy reading the others more after listening. Some are read by Lisette Lecat, and I thought she was just wonderful.

Cindy, the book about the young boy in your first posting is Armstrong Sperry's Call It Courage, a Newbery Medal book. My brothers and I used to fight over whose favorite book it was, as if we couldn't all share it. The things siblings will argue about!

Reading through this thread has put my head in a whirl; so if I repeat titles, just accept them as second motions. I especially like the following books and their settings:

The Siege of Krishnapur by J.G. Farrell (India)
Nectar in a Sieve by Karmala Markandaya (India)

The Last King of Scotland by Giles Foden (Uganda)
Kahawa by Donald E. Westlake (Uganda), a historical novel instead of one of the mysteries Westlake usually writes
Ladysmith by Giles Foden (South Africa)
The Story of an African Farm by Olive Schreiner (South Africa)

Eight Months on Ghazzah Street by Hilary Mantel (Saudi Arabia)
A Change of Climate by Hilary Mantel (South Africa, Bechuanaland)

The Year of Living Dangerously by Christopher J. Koch (Indonesia)

Spring Moon by Betty Bao Lord (China)
The World of Suzie Wong by Richard Mason (Hong Kong of the 1950s)

Chris, I'm glad you mentioned Naipaul. The two of his I've read are A House for Mr. Biswas and A Bend in the River. Which others do you recommend?

Cindy, thanks for creating this thread. There's a lot of good recommendations here. I'm familiar with some of the titles at least, but there are many I've never heard of, so I'm making notes and will look them up.

Oh good, glad you found your way here! As I said, the world is open to you. Enjoy! (and I'd be very curious about what you picked to read, and your comments about it)

>Sister of My Heart - Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

I love all of all of her books, but thats probably the best. Her newest one, Mistress of Spice I think its called, is quite good but it takes place in California.

>The Last King of Scotland by Giles Foden (Uganda)

An excellent book, and a very intense movie. Oh, another book on Africa that I loved was Flame Trees of Thika.

And I'd forgotten about Spring Moon. Ive read several of her books (including the non fiction accounts of her time in China while her husband was ambassador. Legacies covers up to and including Tianamen Square

Any recommendations on Middle East fiction?

>Any recommendations on Middle East fiction?

I just bought The Reluctant Fundamentalist, which takes place in the U.S. and in Pakistan. Is that considered Middle East?

Anyway, I haven't read it yet, but it looks intriguing. I'll let you know what I think once I've finished it.

Maybe I shouldnÂt step in this thread because, as a mater of fact, I am and reppresent a
foreigner culture for you. But I allow myself to do it all the same
A couple of years ago I read a book which I deem to be a little gem.
Stones for Ibarra by Harriet Doerr
The novel tells the story of a young American couple, whom inherit a quarry in a little Mexican town,
so they leave everything they had in the U.S.A. and move to Mexico to run the quarry.
Once they settle down in the new house and town, they have to cope with little and less little
problems concerning, both the quarry output and the culture differences between them and the
resident population; because they are the only foreigners living there, and especially the rhythm of life
and the point of view about it are widely different

grelobe

"Any recommendations on Middle East fiction?"

Cindy, have you read Edeet Ravel? She has written a trilogy set in present day Tel Aviv. The first book is called Ten Thousand Lovers.

I don't think Pakistan is considered the Middle East - it is a Muslim country, but then so is Indonesia. However, the definition of 'Middle East' has been going on for a while. In my mind it includes the part of the Ottoman Empire which Britain controlled, and later carved up to form the boundaries of countries we now know in the region (Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, Iran, Saudia Arabia, Yemen, Oman, Israel, etc)

I haven't read Ravel, I'll give that a try.

Re Pakistan. I don't think being Muslim has anything to do with its being where it is geographically. Of course you may use a different definition of the Middle East in the US; maybe New Jersey? ;-)
Cindy you have the area spot-on. Over here we still sometimes refer to the Balkans as the 'Near' East.

A few I enjoyed set 'elsewhere' were Children of the Sun by Morris West about the slum children of Naples.
A Many Splendoured Thing by the doctor Han Suyin set partly in Hong Kong and made into a slushy movie with Jennifer Jones; remember the very well-known title song? Recommended to me years ago by a woman who had been a doctor out there and had worked with Suyin.
If you saw the film Inn of the Sixth Happiness you may be familiar with the book The Small Woman by Alan Burgess about the English missionary Gladys Aylward who went out to northern China in the '30's and lived through the Japanese invasion of that part of the country. I understand the film took far too many liberties with the story which greatly bothered Aylward; but that's Holly wood for you.

I Googled "define Middle East" and came up with a variety of definitions of what comprises the area. I found the following explanation by a U.S. college professor most interesting:

Defining the Middle East

The definition of the term Middle East is not set in granite, as the region is not an exactly defined area of the world. It is sometimes referred to as the Near East or Southwest Asia; in India the region is known as Western Asia. What the area is called sometimes depends on oneÂs position on the globe. Even then, not everyone agrees on which countries should be included within a geographic domain.

The different terms applied to the region emphasize that the area being described owes its regional character to other than indigenous factors. As diverse as the countries of Europe, these lands are included in a single term only because they are "near to" or "in the middle of" other regions. Whatever unity does exist within the region today is largely functional: it is a unity in relation to the outside world rather than an inherent unity arising from similar geographical and social conditions or from a recent common history.

The issue is confused not only due to the regionÂs location but also due to culture and ethnicity. If the Middle East is defined solely as the Arab states and Israel, Iran would be excluded. If it is thought to include Israel and the predominantly Muslim states in the area, then the North African states of Algeria, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia, plus Afghanistan, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, the Sudan, and Turkey, would also have to be included.

In the academic community, the term Middle East refers to the Arab countries of North Africa; the Arab countries of Asia; Israel; and the non-Arab countries of Afghanistan, Iran, Pakistan, and Turkey. According to some broader definitions, it may also include the five countries of Central Asia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. Some might also include Azerbaijan.

That said, a commonly used definition focuses on those countries that Americans most often associate with the Middle East and that have had a continuing and central role in two issues of importance to US foreign policy: the Arab-Israeli conflict and the security of the Persian Gulf and its oil resources. These nations are Bahrain, Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen. Given the importance of the war on terrorism to current US foreign policy, it might be appropriate to include Afghanistan and other neighboring Central Asian states in the definition. The average American sees Afghanistan as a country in the Middle East.

Carol J. Riphenburg, Ph.D.
Professor/Political Science
riphenbu@cdnet.cod.edu

And I've linked to a map from another site. It seems to me that the term "Middle East" is pretty relative.

Here is a link...

Barbara Wood has written several books set in various countries. Many of them deal with medical practices of early or ancient times. Unfortunately, although I like her books, I can't remember which titles deal with which societies.

sarah, excellent link. I obviously forgot about North Africa and the Asian countries. But as he says, it all depends on where you are geographically. When I was asking however about books, I was considering the countries that I listed above. So perhaps Middle East isn't the best word. How about Mesopotamia and thereabouts? :)

Veer, Near East to me is analogous with Middle East. I've never heard Balkans called that but considering how close you are to the Balkans (relativily) I can see how that would be used. Far East was always the Orient to me, and I never knew where to put India.

Oh, duh - another book, one that I just read and loved, that would fit this 'elsewhere' category: Painted Veil by Somerset Maugham. Its the first I've read of this author and was very impressed by his work. Story takes place in Hong Kong and rural China in the early 1900s.

Frieda, apologies. I responded to your Naipaul question over on the Unamerican Thread. In line with the Middle East discussion, I can recommend his Among the Believers.

As per another thread, the book "The
Betrothed" by Alessandro Manzoni is a wonderful book about two young people who are pledged in marriage and the trials they face. The story takes place in Italy during the time of Spanish rule and plague in the early 17th century. Excellent book! Considered a masterpiece of Italian writing.
Thanks, grelobe, for bringing this book up.

I just thought of another one: "Stones from the River" by Ursula Hegi. (set in a small village in Germany in the Thirties and Forties).

In some genres, I actively avoid American-based novels - teenage fiction particularly. It just doesn't relate to our experiences at all.

I'm not going to start naming novels set in Britain, as that is my home ground and preferred literary backdrop. Almost everything by Ian McEwan paints a truthful and enjoyable picture.

Germany: Uwe Timm, The Invention of the Curried Sausage - set in Hamburg during WWII. The correct translation of the title would be Discovery of the Curried Sausage, which is a much better slant, but I'll let it pass...

Botswana: the No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series has a wonderful atmosphere and great characters. Narrated by a beautiful rotund wise African woman, but written by a small rotund Scottish man, Alexander McCall Smith.

Certainly they aren't "unamerican" but Hillerman's novels of the Navaho are definately about another culture. I love how much I've learned about a couple of the native American cultures through the adventures of Jim Chee and Joe Leaphorn.

I love books about other cultures. I didn't see Haiti mentioned in the discussion so here's a few to consider:

Madison Smartt Bell's trilogy on the Haitian Revolution, including All Souls Rising, Master of the Crossroads, and The Stone the Builder Refused.

For a non-fiction follow-up try Avengers of the New World by Laurent Dubois.

Add to that work by Edwidge Danticat. Short story collection Krik? Krak!, and novels Breath, Eyes, Memory and The Farming of Bones.

One of my favorites: A Suitable Boy," by Vikram Seth

A Suitable Boy is one of my favorites, too. Same with Small Island and The Piano Tuner. Anyone read anything else by Seth?

Reading Kristin Lavransdatter is certainly whetting my appetite for more of the same--any recommendations? Africa has become more interesting to me, too, after reading two contemporary memoirs, Casting with a Fragile Thread and The White Masai.

Anyanka, you've piqued my curiosity... why do you avoid American-based teen fiction and say it is not reflective of your experiences? (being a mother of a pre-teen who is to the young adult section of the library as a moth is to a flame, I have my suspicions.)

Most of the ones I can think of have been mentioned but Isabelle Allende's books should be here, especially, The House of the Spirits and Of Love and Shadows.

I don't think that English speaking novels really count. They may be "not American" but our language shapes a great deal of our cultural outlook. And I'm not sure that sometimes the distance of history can be as great as the distance of culture and language. Reading Hawthorne or Melville feels more distant as reading the latest British fiction, American or not!

Bookmom, I have two teenage daughters with very different reading habits, and therefore frequently scour the Young Adult section for presents. I'm also writing my second YA novel (the first one is making the rounds of agents & publishers). Both are reasons that make me particularly aware of English teenage culture.

There are of course some universal themes, and the best novels are above and beyond cultural limitations - Catcher in the Rye, or more recently A Gathering Light (aka A Northern Light). Also Meg Rosoff's two excellent novels. Rosoff is an American who lives in England, and whose novels are set in the UK.

The typical American teen novel that I see in English bookshops, though, is the Meg Cabot type. Fluffy, zippy, deeply embedded in the Valley-girl culture. My older daughter reads occasional American novels with a Gothic, horror or vampire theme, but the younger one who is into more 'girly' books finds English and Australian books closer to her own world. Your school system is very different, much more competitive and merit-driven than ours; also the teen humour here is quite specific and very pronounced, in spite of exposure to American tv series.

Sorry - as I'm trying to explain, it's all slipping away!

>I don't think that English speaking novels really count. They may be "not American" but our language shapes a great deal of our cultural outlook.

I think this is a very interesting point. You of course are right about the connection between language and culture, and it must affect writers in their books (as well as the readers). But aside from knowing another language (which most of us don't) or reading translations, I am not sure what the solution is - unless its reading authors who are from the cultures in question.

My short list:

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures by Anne Fadiman

Reading Lolita in Tehran by Azar Nafisi

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah

The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

The Bone People by Keri Hulme

Disgrace by J. M. Coetzee

A House for Mr. Biswas by V.S. Naipaul

Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The Poetry of Pablo Neruda

The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela

Anyanka, I had a long post for you, bemoaning the trashy YA "literature" so popular right now in the US and unfortunately so attractive to my nearly-teen daughter. Instead, suffice it to say that much of that fluffy valley girl materialistic and often nasty fiction isn't reflective of most US teens either. What disturbs me about it is that young teens and tweens are quite impressionable and these books often send a message I'd prefer my daughter not hear. Unfortunately, this same message is being broadcasted on TV and film. I don't like being put in the position of "book-banner" but will do it when truly necessary because of the proliferation of this type of book, which makes much of Meg Cabot look tame, which resides in the YA fiction section of the library.
Sometimes I remind myself of Dana Carvey's churchlady from SNL... but I try to leave what I consider higher quality literature just "lying around" in the car or the family room waiting for my daughter to take the bait and consider it a victory when she bites.

Good luck with your own books; if you have any YA recommendations, I'd love to hear them.

I love this topic! Here are a few books I've read and enjoyed:

The Shadow of the Pomegranate Tree - Tariq Ali
The Weight of All Things - Sandra Benitez
The Hero's Walk - Anita Rau Baudami
The Map of Love - (I can't remember name of author - it's about Egypt)
Staircase of a Thousand Steps - Masha Hamilton (written by an American author though)
Your Mouth is Lovely - Nancy Richler (Canadian author)
The Rabbit Proof Fence - Doris Pilkington
The Shadow Lines - Amitav Ghosh
The Hungry Tide - Amitav Ghosh
A Blade of Grass - Lewis DeSoto
Kartography - Kamia Shamsie
The Red Passport - Katherine Shronk (short stories)
Smell - Radhike Jha
Mandalay's Child - Prem Sharma
Ali and Nino - Kurban Said (I think the author here is a pen name and may be 2 people)
The Girl From the Golden Horn - Kurban Said
This is Not Civilization - Robert Rosenberg
The Harmony Silk Factory - Tash Aw
Ladies Coupe - Anita Nair
Sky Buriel - Xinran
Desertion - Abdularazak Gurnab
The Inheritance of Loss - Kiran Desai
History: A Novel - Elsa Morante
Palace Walk - Naguib Mahfouz
The Attack - Yasmina Khadra
Let it Be Morning - Sayed Kashua
Fire on the Mountain - Anita Desai
Kiffe Kiffe Tomorrow - Faiza Guene - YA
Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits - Laila Lalami
Bliss - O.Z. Livaneli
In the Country of Men - HIsham Matar
Lost City Radio - Daniel Alarcon

Oooooo, new posters and new books! Welcome nwreader and linaclare. You have listed books I have never heard of and now must discover. I may be some time.... :)

A few I loved:

The Shadow of the Pomegranate Tree - Tariq Ali
The Map of Love - Ahdaf Soueif
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

A few that I have been wanting to read:

The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down

A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah (the author was interviewed on the Daily Show a week back. This normally is not a book I'd go after, but I was so impressed by this young man that the book is on my must read list.)

Thanks for the great lists!

Bookmom, I'm glad to hear that American teens aren't actually like that. My main impression comes from tv and the occasional novel I pick up in the library and put down again rather sharpish...

Recommendations - teen literature that both my daughters and I enjoyed include Finding Cassie Crazy and Feeling Sorry for Celia by Jaclyn Moriarty, an Australian writer. Good characters, good plots, entertaining but also thought-provoking.

On the fluffy side, concerned with boyfriends and false eyelashes, there's the 'Georgia Nicolson' series by Louise Rennison, such as Angus, Thongs and Full Frontal Snogging. Not deep and meaningful, but vair vair funny (as per Georgia's Franglais). Many Georgia-isms have entered our family vocab.

Climbing the Monkey Puzzle Tree by Karen Wallace is the story of a Canadian girl at an English boarding school in the 1960s. Good story, great period detail, entertaining but also meaningful.

And my very very favourites, Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now and Just In Case. I've mentioned them before... frequently.

>My main impression comes from tv

Yikwa, thats scary! I suspect you are not the only one who does that, which is probably why our country gets such a bad rap. What you see on tv and movies have little resemblance to real life.

I'm not usually all that gullible, Cindy, and I have also lived in the States, but there are certain themes that are so recurrent in US tv (and absent from European products) that I assumed they must have some basis in reality. E.g. the cruelty and competitiveness of high school, the importance of the prom and the prom date. Perhaps another thread is needed to discuss this, if you want to enlighten me.

I will go out on a limb and say that yes, among US teens, what you mention specifically does have basis in reality. Of course, in the U.S. there are various differing sub-cultures....

>the cruelty and competitiveness of high school, the importance of the prom and the prom date.

Yes, yes, and yes. I had first hand knowlege of the first when I was in school (talk about the Dark Ages) but couldn't have cared less about the prom or date. Different world on that front now.

One refreshing change since I was a teen and attended my prom 30 plus years ago, is that the kids don't need a date to attend ... at least in our area. If a girl, or boy, wants to go but doesn't have a date, they just get some friends together and go anyway. I think that's great, and that way no one who wants to attend misses out. No one seems to look down on the kids who go as a group, either.

"I'm not usually all that gullible, Cindy, and I have also lived in the States, but there are certain themes that are so recurrent in US tv (and absent from European products) that I assumed they must have some basis in reality. E.g. the cruelty and competitiveness of high school, the importance of the prom and the prom date. Perhaps another thread is needed to discuss this, if you want to enlighten me."

I think the US is so vast--and teens (as well as adults) so different all over it's hard to really give a general description of what the teens are like. For instance, I was raised in rural Iowa, and I expect as a teen my life was very different from a teen raised in, say, California or urban New York. I'm not sure what TV shows they show portraying teens in the UK, but here in the US it seems nearly all of them take place either in California or in affluent,urban areas and thus don't reflect what much of the US is like. I'm still waiting for the show about farm kids in Iowa;-)(and I suspect I'll be waiting a long time--shows about everyday people just aren't as exciting, I guess).

As for my list of books about other countries (other than the ones already listed here):

Wild Swans by Jung Chang--non-fiction about three generations of women in China from 1909-1978.

The Space Between Us by Thity Umrigar. Two women--a servant and her "mistress"--in modern day India.

Snow Flower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See. Two young girls in China become friends for life.

Suite Francaise--Irene Neriovsky (I think this one's maybe been already listed?). France during the begining of WW II.

The Voyage of the Narwhal by Andrea Barrett. Fictional account of artic expedition. Some of it takes place in US.

Moloka'i by Alan Brennert. Leper colony in early 1900s Hawaii (technically US but mostly involves native Hawaiians).

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimanda Ngozi Adichie. Novel about a family during the Biafran War in Nigeria. This one is excellent.

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. "Death" narrates a book about a young girl in Munich, Germany during WW II.

Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. About a dysfunctional family in 1980's Nigeria.

Infidel by Ayaan Hirsi Ali--this is non-fiction; the memoir of a woman born Muslim and raised in Somalia, Kenya, Ethiopia, and Saudi Arabia.

I've really enjoyed reading this thread, and have added several books to my TBR list!

Kelly

Flame Trees of Thika by Elsbeth Huxley - Africa
The Terror by Dan Simmons - Arctic, Lost Franklin Expedition
Oil for the Lamps of China - China, of course
Inn of the Sixth Happiness - China, again
All Creatures Great and Small - England (a foreign country to me!) and one of my all time favorites.
The Greenlanders - Jane Smiley - Lost settlement of Greenland set about the same time frame as Kirsten Lavransdatter
Kirsten Lavrandsdatter - shear heaven - one to be read over and over!
Confessions of a Pagan Nun - early Christian Ireland and fantastic!

Wild Swan is probably my favorite book on China - fiction or non. The stories of her grandmother, mother and herself read like good fiction, and I came away with a much better understanding of modern Chinese history and culture then I had before.

I agree - I don't think you can really make any generalization about any country, but esp not one so big. Yes we export some of our most glaring stereotypes for all to see. But its so very different between regions, states, rural/urban/suburban, and so dependent on class, race or nationalities. Rather an interesting mix, actually. Im in a website that has a language forum, and people from all over the country pop in with their favorite regionalisms, and comments on others. Makes me remember how really diverse this huge nation is, and makes me wonder how in the world we managed to all stick together for so long!

Kren, you put your finger on it - here too, the absolute majority of US tv series with teens are Californian. The fact that the movie and television industry is mostly based in and around L.A. means that the American image abroad is largely determined by the Valley Girl. You lucky people.

Bringing up this interesting thread again, to add to it K. Hosseini's latest novel: "A Thousand Splendid Suns." This master storyteller has also given us a poignant picture of Afghanistan before, during, and after the Russian invasion of that country, with vibrant descriptions of its landscapes and cities.

Interesting thread. I'm working to add to a list of titles HS students can read for a World Cultures class. Suggestions welcome.
Here are titles that have been popular (I'll omit titles mentioned often in previous posts):
American Shaolin - Polly
Bliss - Livoneli
Broken Moon - Antieau
Chanda's Secret - Stratton
First They Killed My Father - Ung
Homeless Bird - Whelan
Kaffir Boy - Mathabane
Keeping Corner - Sheth
Real Time - Kaas
Samurai Shortstop - Gratz (LOVE IT!)
Shabanu - Staples
Sold - McCormick
Tasting the Sky - Barakat
When Broken Glass Floats - Him
And I just finished People of the Book - Brooks, not sure of the teen appeal, but I'd definitely recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading about other cultures.

I'm waffling about recommending Snow Flower and the Secret Fan for a high school list-I guess it depends on the mores of your particular area. While I know that teens see, hear and discuss just about anything, a teacher must be careful when officially recommending a book. Since most of the focus, though, is on the footbinding and only slight emphasis is placed on "bed business" it would probably work. It is certainly a startling look into another time and culture, and would, I am sure, lead to good discussion. And it is a thin book, a quick read-sometimes a consideration for high schoolers-even though it is deceptively dense in themes and plotline.

cece, FWIW, having read "Snowflower & the Secret Fan", I do think it would be a good read for today's teens, who are, in general, way more sophistocated than we were, at the same age, so long ago. I think the foot-binding issue would be thought-provoking for them and a real "eye opener." I loved this book.

Oh, I definitely agree that the teens are ready for the book-not sure some parents would be. I live in an area that has long been considered conservative, (I live not 25 miles from the district that became nationally famous for their stand on the relative merits of Intelligent Design and Evolution) and I know that in some nearby school districts they still fight to ban Harry Potter, Huckleberry Finn, Julie of the Wolves, The Golden Compass, Atlas Shrugged, Maniac Magee....so teachers must know their district and recommend carefully for their own protection. People have lost their jobs over less.

Brazzaville Beach by William Boyd. A riveting story about a young-ish English woman in Africa researching wild animal behavior and experiencing much of it from the human arena!

I second many of the titles mentioned, and have added many others to my TBR list. Great thread!

Two that I very much enjoyed that may not have been mentioned: Hullaballoo in the Guava Orchard by Kirin Desai, and The Death of Vishnu by Manil Suri.