Middle Eastern Studies - All Titles

"Kiser is the first American to have told the full story . . . What makes this book so unusual and yet useful for students is the way the author has combined solid research and profound analysis with compelling writing and personal engagement in the story. It is part mystery, part love story and part historical journalism of a very high order. There are precious few such books on the market. The Monks of Tibhirine brings together history, politics and stories of faith that is lived amid fear and violence in a style that is dramatic, inspiring and extremely educational. In this sense it is an excellent tool for teaching students about the Muslim world in which religion infuses life . . . This is an extraordinary story of the meeting of two peoples within the Abrahamic tradition who believed that, the violence notwithstanding, the destiny of all of them was to live together joined in charity and friendship. Kiser's book, as history and witness to faith, would be a valuable companion for many courses on religious studies, history and cultural studies of the Arab and Muslim worlds, but most of all for courses that seek to advance Christian Muslim understanding. I am going to be using it for my religion and conflict resolution course and am also recommending it as well to the Middle Eastern studies department."—Andrea Bartoli, Director, Center for International Conflict Resolution, Columbia University

"Feels like a revelation . . . a raw nerve ending for the West—shocking, raw, but mercifully, joyously, still alive."—Andrew Sullivan, New York Times Book Review

A Finalist for the Northern California Book Award

"Ali explores cultural conditions with sensitivity, and mercifully does not over-exoticise. Her story is intriguing . . . She is one of a rare breed of writers who take us into the closed world behind a Muslim woman's veil . . . Carefully crafted [and] eminently readable."—Mitali Saran, Far Eastern Economic Review

"This book goes to a place where few, if any, of its predecessors have gone before. . . [This is] a deeply feminist novel with richly drawn and complicated characters."—Ms.

"Beautiful and arresting . . . Like the best fables, Someone to Run With hoists the reader into a world larger and more luminous than any found outside the book. Grossman has created a place of great dangers and improbable strokes of fortune, of compelling suspense and love's labor gained."—Los Angeles Times