Minaret

By Leila Aboulela,

Book cover of Minaret

Book description

In her Muslim hijab, with her down-turned gaze, Najwa is invisible to most eyes, especially to the rich families whose houses she cleans. Twenty years ago, Najwa, then at university in Khartoum, would never have imagined that one day she would be a maid. An upper class westernised Sudanese, her…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Minaret as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Humans are a dynamic species; they never stay in one place but migrate. This migration is not just for greener pastures but also to find knowledge and identity. It is sometimes to flee from a suffocating culture.

This novel captures these elements well from a woman’s perspective. A person who not only leaves their culture behind but also their identity when they migrate. The book also presents the differences between Western and Eastern cultural traditions. 

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