Arab American Heritage Month - Books for Adults

National Arab American Heritage Month is a month-long celebration of Arab culture and the contributions of Arab Americans in the United States.

Arab Americans are people who came from or whose ancestors came from one of twenty-two Arab nations in northern Africa or the Middle East. An Arab nation is one where people speak the Arabic language. There are twenty-two Arab nations, and the largest by population include Egypt, Algeria, Sudan, Iraq, Morocco, and Saudi Arabia. Other Arab nations include Bahrain, the Comoro Islands, Djibouti, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Somalia, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.

In 2021, the world’s Arab population was estimated to be about 436 million. Oregon’s Arab American community is one of the fastest growing in the U.S. with more than 31,000 Arab Americans living in Oregon.

To celebrate Arab American Heritage Month, check out one of these recommended books or movies below!

Updated December 14, 2025
LINCC (Libraries in Clackamas County) Milwaukie Ledding Library
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Almond blossoms and beyond
Darwīsh, Maḥmūd
Paper Book
The first English translation of recent poetry by the late Mahmoud Darwish, the most important Palestinian contemporary poet. Almond Blossoms and Beyond is one of the last collections of poetry that Mahmoud Darwish left to the world. Composed of brief lyric poems and the magnificent sustained Exile...
Behind you is the sea : a novel
Darraj, Susan Muaddi
Paper Book
2025 PEN/FAULKNER AWARD FINALIST * ANISFIELD-WOLF BOOK AWARD FINALIST Washington Post Notable Works of Fiction from 2024 * Booklist Top 10 Debut Novels of 2024 * Ms. Magazine Favorite Books of the Year 2024 * Elle.com The Best Literary Fiction Books of 2024 * The New Yorker Best Books of...
Bikur ha-Tizmoret The band's visit
Bleiberg, Ehud.
Paper Book
An Egyptian orchestra arrives in Israel to play an important cultural event only to find themselves in the wrong town, where they learn about themselves and each other as they spend the night interacting with the locals.
Bitter orange tree : a novel
Alharthi, Jokha
Paper Book
Longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award A TIME Best Book of the Year A New Yorker Best Book of the Year An extraordinary novel from a Man Booker International Prize-winning author that follows one young Omani woman as she builds a life for herself in...
The Cairo trilogy
Maḥfūẓ, Najīb
Paper Book
Nobel Prize-winner Naguib Mahfouz's magnificent epic trilogy of colonial Egypt--Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, and Sugar Street--together for the first time in one beautiful hardcover volume. The masterwork of the Nobel Prize-winning author, the three novels...
Cities of salt : a novel
Munīf, ʻAbd al-Raḥmān
Paper Book
Banned in Saudia Arabia, this is a blistering look at Arab and American hypocrisy following the discovery of oil in a poor oasis community.
Courting Samira : a novel
Awad, Amal
Paper Book
Set in Sydney, Australia, Courting Samira is a charming, big-hearted rom-com about a twenty-seven-year-old Palestinian woman who finds herself in an unexpected love triangle--a sparkling ode to meddling best friends, traditional courtship, The Princess Bride, and, of course, the possibility of...
Crescent
Abu-Jaber, Diana
Paper Book
Praised by critics for her first novel, "Arabian Jazz, " Diana Abu-Jaber now weaves with spellbinding magic a multidimensional love story set in the Arab-American community of Los Angeles.
The ethnic cleansing of Palestine
Pappé, Ilan
Paper Book
Since the Holocaust, it has been almost impossible to hide large-scale crimes against humanity. In our communicative world, few modern catastrophes are concealed from the public eye. And yet, Ilan Pappe unveils, one such crime has been erased from the global public memory: the ethnic cleansing...
The food of Morocco
Wolfert, Paula.
Paper Book
Winner of the James Beard Foundation's Lifetime Achievement Award "A cookbook by Paula Wolfert is cause for celebration. Ms. Wolfert may be America's most knowledgeable food person and her books are full of insight, passion and brilliance." --Anthony Dias Blue, CBS Radio, NY<...
Gate of the Sun
Khoury, Elias
Paper Book
ANew York Times Book Review Notable Book of the Year One ofKansas City Star's 100 Noteworthy Books of the Year ABoldtypeNotable Book of the Year AChristian Science Monitor Best Book of the Year ASan...
The Hollow Half: A Memoir of Bodies and Borders
Aziza, Sarah
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE PALESTINE BOOK AWARD A brush with death. An ancestral haunting. A century of family secrets. Sarah Aziza's searing, genre-bending memoir traces three generations of diasporic Palestinians from Gaza to the Midwest to New York City--and back "You were...
Huda F are you?
Fahmy, Huda
Paper Book
From the creator of Yes, I'm Hot In This, this cheeky, hilarious, and honest graphic novel asks the question everyone has to figure out for themselves- Who are you? A Kirkus Reviews Best Young Adult Book of the Century Huda and her family just moved to...
The insult
Sehnaoui, Antoun
The language of Baklava
Abu-Jaber, Diana.
Paper Book
"From the acclaimed author of Crescent, here is a vibrant, humorous memoir of growing up with a gregarious Jordanian father who loved to cook. Diana Abu-Jaber weaves the story of her life in upstate New York and in Jordan around vividly remembered meals: everything from Lake Ontario shish kabob...
The map of love
Soueif, Ahdaf.
Paper Book
Booker Prize Finalist Here is an extraordinary cross-cultural love story that unfurls across Egypt, England, and the United States over the course of a century. Isabel Parkman, a divorced American journalist, has fallen in love with a gifted and difficult Egyptian-American...
The map of salt and stars
Joukhadar, Jennifer Zeynab
Paper Book
"This imaginative but very real look into war-torn Syria is a must." -Booklist (starred review) This rich, moving, and lyrical debut novel is to Syria what The Kite Runner was to Afghanistan; the story of two girls living eight hundred years apart--a modern-day...
Namesake: Reflections on a Warrior Woman
Nuseibeh, N. S.
Paper Book
A Palestinian Woman's dazzling exploration of heritage, gender and the idea of home. I may not be brave enough, but somewhere deep inside of me there is, perhaps, the kernel of someone who is. That brave someone was the legendary Nusayba bint Ka'ab al...
Palestine
Sacco, Joe.
Paper Book
A single volume collection of the landmark novel by Joe Sacco, author of Safe In Goradze. Palestine was his first major comic work of political and historical non-fiction, and was based on several months research and an extended visit to the West Bank and Gaza Strip in the early 1990s, where he...
Paradise now [DVD]
Abu-Assad, Hany
DVD
The story of what may be the last 48 hours in the lives of two Palestinian men who have been recruited as suicide bombers. When they are intercepted at the Israeli border, a young woman who discovers their plan causes them to reconsider their actions.
The return : fathers, sons, and the land in between
Matar, Hisham
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE * The acclaimed memoir about fathers and sons, a legacy of loss, and, ultimately, healing--one of The New York Times Book Review's ten best books of the year, winner of the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, and a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle...
The Slightest Green
Mustafah, Sahar
Paper Book
American-born nurse Intisar has strived to create a life for herself in Chicago. She was raised by her mother after her father returned to Palestine when she was 9, completely disappearing from her life. Now, 20 years later, she receives an urgent request from him. He is dying and asks her to come...
The wrong end of the telescope
Alameddine, Rabih
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE 2022 PEN/FAULKNER AWARD FOR FICTION By National Book Award winner for The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) and National Book Award finalist for An Unnecessary Woman comes a transporting new novel about an Arab American trans woman's...

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