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If you’re in the mood for fantasy now that Game of Thrones is over (and especially if this season was a disappointment), look no further than these brilliant books. How can I not start with JRR Tolkien, who arguably kick-started this entire genre with the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy (1954) — the original epic fantasy with magic deeply rooted in a realistic world with centuries of imagined history and mythology. Even if you’ve seen the brilliantly adapted movies, you’ll love the books more. Ursula Le Guin’s THE EARTHSEA QUARTET (1969) starts with a young wizard who is sent to the Island of Roke to study wizardry (sound familiar?). Le Guin’s books are anything but clichéd — Ged, the wizard-to-be at the centre of the books has “red-brown skin”, a really refreshing break from the white-good-guys-of-fantasy trope (like in GOT). Her world-building is solid and her characters are less “heroic” than they are ordinary people with longings and fears, who make mistakes and try to fix them. Philip Pullman’s HIS DARK MATERIALS (1995-2000) is another work of genius, written beautifully. In his world, every human’s soul walks beside them in the shape of a deamon, a sort of spirit-animal. Lyra, a spunky orphan, is raised by the Masters at Oxford in a parallel world to ours, and gets caught in a battle between the highest forces in the world. A new HBO series is in the works, to be released at the end of the year. THE BEAR AND THE NIGHTINGALE (2017) takes inspiration from Russian folklore and mythology, and is the first volume of the Winternight trilogy. This story, written in lyrical prose that pulls you right in to the storyworld, is about a young girl who lives at the edge of the icy Russian wilderness, where she loves hearing the story of the blue-eyed winter demon… I’ve only just started THE FIFTH SEASON (2016), the first volume of NK Jemison’s Broken Earth Triology, but it’s got me very excited. Jemison is the first African American, female fantasy writer I’ve read, and each of the three books have won the Hugo Award. #bookstagram #books #fantasybooks #bookstagrammer #bibliophile #readersofinstagram #bookish #bookrecommendations #bookworm #reading #instabook #booklover

I did it again. I bought a lot of books! In my defence... I will read them all eventually. Can’t go to @thelastwordbks and leave without a pile like this. Have you read any of these? Which one should I read first? . . . #books #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #bibliophile #booksbooksbooks #lovebooks #readersofinstagram #instabook #bookpile #bookloot #igbooks #bookworm #readersofig #bookish

“Ah... the deliciousness of discovering a masterwork. The beauty of the first sentences, the ‘what is this?’, the ‘how can this be?’, the first crush all over again, the smile of the soul. My heart begins to lift. I can see myself sitting all day in my chair, immersed in lives, plots, and sentences, intoxicated by words and chimeras, paralysed by satisfaction and contentment, reading until the deepening twilight, until I can no longer make out the words, until my mind begins to wander, until my aching muscles are no longer able to keep the book aloft. Joy is the anticipation of joy. Reading a fine book for the first time is as sumptuous as the first sip of orange juice that breaks the fast in Ramadan.” . Or, for me, the first sip of tea at iftari! And this one, later at night, when the fog of fasting lifts, the caffeine settles in, and my mind wakes up. . (The lovely quote is from Rabih Alammedine’s lovely novel, An Unnecessary Woman. @beirutiguy) . . . #ramzan #ramadan #bookstagrammer #bibliophile #readersofinstagram #booksandtea #tea #eveningtea #bookish #bookquotes

I didn’t know anything about Homegoing – Ghanian-American writer Yaa Gyasi’s debut – when I started it. Judging by the family tree on the first page, I thought it would be a family saga. It is, but I could never have imagined the full picture of what this novel has accomplished. The story begins in the late 18th century in a village in the Gold Coast (now Ghana). Young Effia is sold by her family to a British slave trader to be his wife. She goes to live with him in Cape Coast Castle, a fort overlooking the sea. Beneath them are dungeons where the slaves are kept, hundreds to a room, sometimes stacked on top of each other, awaiting the ships that will take them to America. They include prisoners from tribal wars, servants, unlucky captives, sold to the British for money and goods. Esi (Effia’s half sister) is one of these slaves. The rest of the book is about the generations that follow, each chapter told from the point of view of the next person down the line. The book is actually a series of linked short stories. We learn of Effia’s son Quey’s revulsion to the “family business”. Of Esi’s daughter Ness, born into slavery in the American South. Ness’s son, Kojo, a “free black” in 1850s Baltimore. His son, H, who is unfairly incarcerated and sent to work in the brutal coal mines. We learn of segregation, of the heroine epidemic in 1960s Harlem, of Ghana’s role in the slave trade, its colonisation by the British. The book ends with Marjorie (from Effia’s line) and Marcus (from Esi’s) studying some of this history at Stanford. It is astonishing how much material Gyasi covers, while still managing to go deep enough into her characters that I felt for and connected with them. The stories are tied together by collective suffering and injustice; but also, against all odds, by love. The characters are not stereotypes – each is complex, weighed down by history but driven by individual insecurities and desires. Many parts of this novel were hard to read, but it is essential reading for anyone even remotely interested in the history of slavery, the history of America. #bookstagram #books #homegoing #readersofinstagram #bibliophile #yaagyasi #bookish #bookblogger

I’m in Karachi, revisiting some novels set in this sprawling city by the sea. Which one is your favourite? . Bilal Tanweer, The Scatter Here is Too Great: “The sky from the bridge looked like a white metal sheet. The bridge was one of the few places I visited often. On this bridge, the world made sense, even if momentarily. I had spent many hot afternoons standing here feeling the breeze of this city, and staring at the railway tracks forking below — abandoned and alone for miles, and watching the kites scout the skies overhead, and pigeons, crows and sparrows beneath them, all pursuing their always scramble. On the bridge you can stand aside, and simply observe the enormous angry mad busy world rushing past you.” @bilalt . Fatima Bhutto, The Runaways: “On Netty Jetty, overlooking the mangroves that crawl thin just before the Arabian Sea, kites swarm the sky like a thick cover of clouds, waiting for lovers to throw chunks of meat to them — or if the lovers cannot afford the blood parcels sold on the bridge, then small doughy balls of bread. In the chaos of Karachi’s congested traffic, surrounded by barefoot boys promising in their high-pitched voices that your dreams will come true if you feed the hungry, Anita always felt protected by the soar of kites.” @fbhutto . Kamila Shamsie, Kartography: “Karachi. That spider-plant city where, if you know what to look for and some higher power is feeling indulgent, you might find a fossilised footprint of Alexander. The Great. He led his army through Karachi, long, long before the spider-plant effect took hold, when Karachi was a harbour named Krokola. Perhaps Alexander’s was the first army that stirred up the sand along the eastern coast of the Arabian Sea.” @kshamsie . Shahbano Bilgrami, Those Children: “I imagined the grey fan above me an albatross... its expansive wings carrying with it a weight of air and sea, leaving my flesh damp and my nostrils full of the metallic scent of silver-tailed fish. This faintly acrid odour, like the residual smell of eggs on a poorly washed plate, overlay all the other scents (both good and bad) Karachi had to offer.” . #bookstagram #readingpakistan #karachi #books #bookish

Today I’m reading at the lovely new cafe at @comomuseum in Lahore. It’s Pakistan’s first private museum for contemporary and modern art and it’s extra special for me because my sister is the founder! Head to my instastories to see some of the art. I’m getting back to my book (review coming soon). (There’s also a @thelastwordbks store at the museum selling amazing art and design books.) 🖼 📚☕️ . . . #bookstagrammer #bibliophile #bookish #placestoread #readersofinstagram #summerreads #summer #summerreading #reading #amreading #bookstagrammer #pakistanibookstagram #lahore #summerinlahore #museums #comomuseum #books

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