BOOKS WE RECOMMEND THIS WEEK

From a non-fiction describing the natural history of the Himalayas, to a crime thriller set in the idyllic beaches of England’s North Devon, our picks

FICTION

“Salt Houses” by Hala Alyan

Written by Hala Alyan, a Palestinian-American author, this book follows the story of three generations of a Palestinian middle-class family, the Yacoubs. The family faces two life-altering displacements— the first after 1967’s Six-Day war, and the second following Saddam Hussein’s 1990 invasion of Kuwait. With the members of the family navigating assimilation into new cultures in Paris, Beirut and Boston, this lyrical and heartbreaking debut novel examines themes of displacement and belonging.



NON-FICTION

“Panjab: Journeys Through Fault Lines” by Amandeep Sandhu

In this book, author Amandeep Sandhu explores the beating spirit of the land of Panjab. While the author’s family did hail from Panjab, he was neither born there, nor did he live there. Investigating the ‘hole in his heart’, and his ‘emptiness about matters Panjab’, he crisscrossed the state for three years and discovered a land that was nothing like the one he had imagined. The book delves into the Green Revolution and its ecological impacts, and Panjab’s economy and governance.



NON-FICTION / TRAVEL

“Wild Himalaya” by Stephen Alter

In this book, Stephen Alter brings alive the Himalayas in all its terrifying beauty, grandeur and complexity. Aptly subtitled ‘A Natural History of the Greatest Mountain Range on Earth’, the book delves into the study of the history, science, geology, environment, flora, fauna, myth, and climate of the Himalayas. Alter, who considers himself an endemic species of the Himalayas, has travelled to all the five countries that the Himalayan range traverses— India, Pakistan, Bhutan, Nepal and China— to provide a nuanced and rich portrait of these majestic mountains.



CRIME THRILLER

“The Long Call” by Ann Cleeves

This book by bestselling author Ann Cleeves is the first novel in the Two Rivers series. Cleeves is the creator of popular detectives Vera Stanhope and Jimmy Perez, of Vera and Shetland series. This book introduces Detective Matthew Venn, who takes charge of his first major case in the Two Rivers region of North Devon, where a body has been found on the beach. With Venn’s focus being finding the killer, his team’s investigation takes him to the deadly secrets that lurk in the evangelical community in which he grew up.