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Reading list
Our editorial team has put together this collection of book recommendations, this list of books is by Sudanese Women Authors who have published in recent years
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A Mouth Full of Salt by Reem Gaafar
(Saqi Books, 2024)
Thisnovel, set in the 1980s, tells the story of three women in Northern Sudan whose stories relate to a series of unfortunate events that mysteriously unfold starting with the drowning of a child. The story gives a glimpse to the lifestyle of villages along the banks of the Nile at the time, and how women navigate their social and cultural environment. The story also tackles issues of racism and gender roles.
Home is Not a Country by Safia Elhilo
(Make Me a World, 2021)
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In this free-verse novel, Elhilo explores notions of home and belonging through the lens of Nima, a fourteen-year-old girl of Sudanese origin living inAmerica. Intended for young adults, the book’s central question is whether we feel part of a place we have never lived in, a place we are connected to through only by our parents’ memories and a few items of memorabilia?
Nile Blues by Maha Ayoub
(Independent Publisher, 2012)
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This is the story of a group of Sudanese women, from very different socio-economic and religious backgrounds, navigating life at the time Sudan split into two countries. Ayoub’s excellent observation of small details in everyday Sudane selife and her ability to weave them into an engaging story plot, creates an exciting and often humorous narrative at a grave time of national reckoning.
Al-Tagiyyah: the art of needlework in Omdurman 1885-1940
by Bagia Badawi Muhammad Abd-al-Rahman
(Khartoum University Press, 2008)
This book is a study of needlework crafting in general, and of the tagiyyah (traditional Sudanese men’s skull cap) in particular. From the end of the 19,thto the middle of the 20th centuries, the women of Omdurman were known to excel at this activity. In the book, the author, herself a visual artist, considers the making of the tagiyyah from a variety of angles; historic, social, economic and aesthetic, relying on her lived experience aspart of Omdurman society at a time when needlework was still a common activity in Sudan.
A Mouth Full of Salt by Reem Gaafar
(Saqi Books, 2024)
Thisnovel, set in the 1980s, tells the story of three women in Northern Sudan whose stories relate to a series of unfortunate events that mysteriously unfold starting with the drowning of a child. The story gives a glimpse to the lifestyle of villages along the banks of the Nile at the time, and how women navigate their social and cultural environment. The story also tackles issues of racism and gender roles.
Home is Not a Country by Safia Elhilo
(Make Me a World, 2021)
In this free-verse novel, Elhilo explores notions of home and belonging through the lens of Nima, a fourteen-year-old girl of Sudanese origin living inAmerica. Intended for young adults, the book’s central question is whether we feel part of a place we have never lived in, a place we are connected to through only by our parents’ memories and a few items of memorabilia?
Nile Blues by Maha Ayoub
(Independent Publisher, 2012)
This is the story of a group of Sudanese women, from very different socio-economic and religious backgrounds, navigating life at the time Sudan split into two countries. Ayoub’s excellent observation of small details in everyday Sudane selife and her ability to weave them into an engaging story plot, creates an exciting and often humorous narrative at a grave time of national reckoning.
Al-Tagiyyah: the art of needlework in Omdurman 1885-1940
by Bagia Badawi Muhammad Abd-al-Rahman
(Khartoum University Press, 2008)
This book is a study of needlework crafting in general, and of the tagiyyah (traditional Sudanese men’s skull cap) in particular. From the end of the 19,thto the middle of the 20th centuries, the women of Omdurman were known to excel at this activity. In the book, the author, herself a visual artist, considers the making of the tagiyyah from a variety of angles; historic, social, economic and aesthetic, relying on her lived experience aspart of Omdurman society at a time when needlework was still a common activity in Sudan.
