A PEN/Hemingway Award finalist and a Kirkus Best Book of the Year, this brilliant, lively novel follows an impulsive American attorney and a fledgling Iraqi-American resettlement officer trying to aid a refugee who finds herself trapped in Cairo during the turbulent aftermath of the 2011 revolution. Incisive, exciting, and deeply compassionate, it’s a compelling tale for our times.
Find a copy at the library or on Overdrive/Libby as an ebook.
Ian Bassingthwaighte, author of this year’s Wayland Reads selection Live from Cairo, is also a noted photographer. He has graciously allowed us to reproduce his Instagram project of words and pictures about the writing of his novel here. You can see more of his work at igbass.com.
Sunday, February 17, 2:15-4:15 pm – The Square, A Documentary Film
Thursday, March 7, 7-9 pm – FRONTLINE: Egypt in Crisis with Reporter Charles M. Sennott
Wednesday, March 13, 7-8 pm – Immigration Stories
Monday, March 18, 7:30-8:45 pm – Immigrants, Asylum Seekers, and Refugees: Legal Challenges. View a video of this program.
Tuesday, March 26, 7:30-8:45 pm – “Look for the Helpers:” Services for Refugees in the Boston Area. View a video of this program.
Wednesday, March 27, 7-9pm – The Trials of Spring with Hend Nafea. View a video of this program.
Sunday, April 7, 3-4:30 pm – AUTHOR APPEARANCE in the Library Rotunda. View a video of this program.
Monday, March 11, 2-4 pm – with librarian Andy Moore *at The Local Restaurant*
Tuesday, March 19, 7-8:30 pm – with librarian Courtney Michael
Wednesday, March 27, 10-12:00 pm – with Wayland resident and retired librarian Daryl Mark
Wednesday, March 13, 3:30-4:30 pm – What’s Your Story? Stories of Home
Wednesday, March 20, 3:30-5 pm – Children’s Drop-In Craft: Making Welcome Cards
We collected 7 boxes of toiletries for clients of the Boston Center for Refugee Health and Human Rights. Thank you!
Fiction
Refuge, Dina Nayeri
The City Always Wins, Omar Robert Hamilton
Exit West: A Novel, Mohsin Hamid
The Cairo Trilogy, Naguib Mahfouz
The Refugees, Viet Thanh Nguyen
A Hope More Powerful Than the Sea, Melissa Fleming
Sea Prayer, Khaled Hosseini
Poetry
The Essential Rumi
The Angels Knocking on the Tavern Door: Thirty Poems of Hafez
Unaccompanied, Javier Zamora
Non-Fiction
On the State of Egypt: What Made the Revolution Inevitable, Alaa al Aswaany
The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Editor
A Nation of Immigrants, John F. Kennedy
The New Odyssey: The Story of the Twenty-First Century Refugee Crisis, Patrick Kingsley
Violent Borders: Refugees and the Right to Move, Reece Jones
A Nation of Nations: A Great American Immigration Story, Tom Gjelten
Tell Me How it Ends, An Essay in 40 Questions, Valeria Luiselli
Memoir
Pianist from Syria, Aeham Ahmad and Emanuel Bergmann
Enrique’s Journey, Sonia Nazario
Call Me American, Abdi Nor Iftin
Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen, Jose Antonio Vargas
The Newcomers: Finding Refuge, Friendship, and Hope in America, Helen Thorpe
The Girl Who Smiled Beads, Clemantine Wamariya
Films
The Square (also on Kanopy)
FRONTLINE: Egypt in Crisis (also on pbs.org)
In Syria (also on Kanopy)The Good Postman (also on Hoopla)Terraferma
Turtles Can Fly
On the Bride’s Side