Update from Kia
Hello,
First, an announcement: Book Five officially has a title! What Happens in the Dark is coming in June 2025. Safa Saleem is probably my favourite character I’ve ever written and I hope that readers feel the same.
I spent the best part of November on the copy-edits for the book and now I’m in that lovely period between finishing one novel and starting the next. I’m going to take some downtime in December (I even Googled ‘mulled wine recipe’ the other day) and hope you manage to do the same.
December is quiet in terms of new books by British-Asian authors, so I’m doing something a little different today. Instead of the usual new releases, I have hand-picked 10 great books to give at Christmas. I’ve focused on non-fiction (food, travel, memoir, beauty and history) as these tend to be chunkier and better suited as gifts, but do feel free to browse the website if you’re after fiction.
I’ll be back in touch on 1st Jan.
Until then.
Kia x
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10 great books to give at Christmas
Made in Bangladesh: Recipes and Stories from a Home Kitchen
By Dina Begum
Taking you through the six Bangladeshi seasons – summer, monsoon, autumn, late autumn, winter and spring – with warming flavours and memories, Dina Begum’s Made in Bangladesh teaches modern classics and age-old recipes to home cooks across the world. Dina also offers advice on pantry essentials, a range of vegetarian, vegan and gluten-free recipes, and sample menus for feeding a crowd, celebrating how food brings community and festivity.
Sanjana Feasts: Modern vegetarian and vegan Indian recipes to feed your soul
By Sanjana Modha
Sanjana Modha’s flavourful and vibrant recipes are rooted in her Indian heritage, East African family background, and Yorkshire childhood. This book showcases the varied ingredients and unique combinations that are authentic to Sanjana’s upbringing, and includes signature dishes such as Madras Mac and Cheese with Naan Crumbs, Desi-inspired French Bread Pizza and Sticky Toffee Gulab Jamun, as well as delicious Indian classics.
Around the World in 80 Trains
By Monisha Rajesh
Packing up her rucksack – and her fiancé, Jem – Monisha Rajesh embarks on an unforgettable adventure that takes her from London’s St Pancras station to the vast expanses of Russia and Mongolia, North Korea, Canada, Kazakhstan, and beyond. The journey is one of constant movement and mayhem, as the pair strike up friendships and swap stories with the hilarious, irksome and ultimately endearing travellers they meet on board, all while taking in some of the earth’s most breathtaking views.
A Flat Place
By Noreen Masud
Noreen Masud has always loved flatlands. Her earliest memory is of a wide, flat field glimpsed from the back seat of her father’s car in Lahore. As an adult in Britain she has discovered many more flat landscapes to love: Orford Ness, the Cambridgeshire Fens, Morecambe Bay, Orkney. These bare, haunted expanses remind her of the flat place inside herself: a place created by trauma.
A Dutiful Boy: a Memoir of a Gay Muslim’s Journey to Acceptance
By Mohsin Zaidi
Mohsin Zaidi grew up in a poor pocket of east London. His family were close-knit and religiously conservative. Outside of home Mohsin went to a failing inner city school where gang violence was a fact of life. Life didn't seem to offer him many choices: he was disenfranchised from opportunity and isolated from his family as a closet gay Muslim. But Mohsin had incredible drive and became the first person from his school to go to Oxford University. His memoir takes harrowing turns but it is full of life and humour, and, ultimately, it is an inspiring story about breaking through life's barriers.
How We Met: A Memoir About Grief, Love and Growing up
By Huma Qureshi
Growing up in Walsall in the 1990s, Huma straddled two worlds – school and teenage crushes in one, and the expectations and unwritten rules of her family’s South Asian social circle in the other. Reconciling the two was sometimes a tightrope act, but she managed it. Until it came to marriage.
Caught between her family’s concern to see her safely settled down with someone suitable and her own appetite for adventure, she seeks temporary refuge in Paris and imagines a future full of possibility. And then her father has a stroke and everything changes.
Skin Revolution: The Ultimate Guide to Beautiful and Healthy Skin of Colour
By Dr Vanita Rattan
In a world where Caucasian skin dominates clinical trials – but where skin of colour is the global majority – how can you decide what your skin really needs? Dr Vanita Rattan, whose unique expertise in skin of colour has earned her an online audience of millions worldwide, distils years of research in Skin Revolution to give you the tools and tips you need to keep your skin healthy and happy.
South Asian Beauty
By Sonia Haria
A masterclass in skincare, haircare, makeup and wellness, South Asian Beauty is an indispensable guide that will show you how to boost your confidence, elevate your self-care and feel great both inside and out. Hear from the most influential beauty experts across South Asia and the diaspora. Discover the must-have hero products that belong in your bathroom cabinet, and come away with simple, effective routines that don’t cost the earth or require a chemistry degree to understand.
From Sylhet to Spitalfields
By Shabna Begum
From Sylhet to Spitalfields is a fascinating book that explores the hidden history of the Bengali squatters’ movement. Faced with institutional discrimination in council housing and the existential threat of the National Front, hundreds of Bengali families in 1970s East London decided to squat, taking over entire streets and estates.
Using oral history interviews and archival research, this book looks at the Bengali community’s contribution to this little-known episode of East End history, and how it can inform present-day housing struggles.
Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain
By Sathnam Sanghera
The British Empire ran for centuries and covered vast swathes of the world. It is, as Sathnam Sanghera reveals in this book, fundamental to understanding Britain. However, even among those who celebrate the empire there seems to be a desire not to look at it too closely – not to include the subject in our school history books, not to emphasise it too much in our favourite museums.
At a time of great division, when we are arguing about what it means to be British, Sanghera urges us to step back to understand where we really come from, who we are, and what unites us.
Visit asianbooklist.com for more upcoming books by British-Asian authors or view all the books out last year.