19 Best canada books like What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad

Cover of What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad

What Strange Paradise

By: Omar El Akkad

4.05

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

More bodies have washed up on the shores of a small island. Another overfilled, ill-equipped, dilap…

"Today you are the only boy in the world and tomorrow it will be as though you never existed."

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

"And what do you think the prerequisite for kindness is? Have you ever tried to be kind to someone better off than you?"

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

"Farther out, the water sheds its sandy complexion and turns a turquoise of such clarity that the tourists’ sailboats seem to float atop their own shadows."

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

"Because that's how we take the future from them," Walid said, animated now. "Look at Stockholm, look at Munich, look at New York-- who's picking up the garbage, cleaning the toilets? Who's doing the work? Us. Who's doing the living? Them. But in ten, twenty years, we'll be the ones running the computers, the machines, the *infrastructure*, and they'll have nothing left but poems and stories." "So they'll still do all the living," Maher replied, "and we'll still do all the work."

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

If you liked the canada plot in What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad , here is a list of 19 books like this:

1. Scarborough

By: Catherine Hernandez

4.19

Format: 208 pages,

Scarborough is a low-income, culturally diverse neighborhood east of Toronto, the fourth largest ci… read more

Similar categories in Catherine Hernandez's Scarborough book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

2. The Break

By: Katherena Vermette

4.36

Format: 39 pages, Paperback

2016 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize finalist When Stella, a young Metis mother, looks out her … read more

Similar categories in Katherena Vermette's The Break book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

Cover of Moon of the Turning Leaves (Moon, #2) by Waubgeshig Rice

3. Moon of the Turning Leaves (Moon, #2)

By: Waubgeshig Rice

4.28

Format: 320 pages, Hardcover

In this gripping sequel to the award-winning post-apocalyptic novel Moon of the Crusted Snow , a br… read more

Similar categories in Waubgeshig Rice's Moon of the Turning Leaves (Moon, #2) book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • fiction
  • canada
  • audiobook
Cover of Washington Black by Esi Edugyan

4. Washington Black

By: Esi Edugyan

3.95

Format: 334 pages, Hardcover

Washington Black is an eleven-year-old field slave who knows no other life than the Barbados sugar … read more

Similar categories in Esi Edugyan's Washington Black book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • novels
  • audiobook
"You cannot know the true nature of another's suffering." "No. But you can try your damnedest not to worsen it."

-Esi Edugyan, Washington Black

"I do not much care for childhood. It is a astate of terrible vulnerability, and is therefore unnatural and incomaptivle with human life."

-Esi Edugyan, Washington Black

"...a good parent is as rare as snow in summer, I am afraid. Well." He smiled sadly. "It is possible I have some prejudices in this respect."

-Esi Edugyan, Washington Black

"But then, gradually, miraculously, things began to clear between us. We were able to speak as we'd once done, with great love and little calculation."

-Esi Edugyan, Washington Black

Cover of Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory by Sarah Polley

5. Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory

By: Sarah Polley

4.32

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

Oscar-nominated screenwriter, director, and actor Sarah Polley's Run Towards the Danger explores me… read more

Similar categories in Sarah Polley's Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • canada
  • audiobook
"His love was all around the edges, but sometimes it was hard for both of us to see, I think."

-Sarah Polley, Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory

"The past was affecting how I moved through the world, while present life was affecting how the past moved through me."

-Sarah Polley, Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory

"The past and present, I have come to realize, are in constant dialogue, acting upon one another in a kind of reciprocal pressure dance."

-Sarah Polley, Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory

"It can seem perplexing from the outside, this pull that many women experience to make things better for those who have hurt us. The impulse to smooth things over the keep ourselves safe..."

-Sarah Polley, Run Towards the Danger: Confrontations with a Body of Memory

Cover of The Son of the House by Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia

6. The Son of the House

By: Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia

4.11

Format: 288 pages, Paperback

SHORTLISTED for the Scotiabank Giller Prize 2021 • FINALIST for the Nigeria Prize for Literature 20… read more

Similar categories in Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia's The Son of the House book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
Cover of Fight Night by Miriam Toews

7. Fight Night

By: Miriam Toews

4.04

Format: 255 pages, Hardcover

The beloved author of bestsellers Women Talking, A Complicated Kindness, and All My Puny Sorrows r… read more

Similar categories in Miriam Toews's Fight Night book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
"She (mom) yelled from upstairs, Those are books that help me to live! Those books are my life! Get down here! I yelled back. I'm your goddamn life!"

-Miriam Toews, Fight Night

Cover of Shut Up You're Pretty by Téa Mutonji

8. Shut Up You're Pretty

By: Téa Mutonji

3.57

Format: 135 pages, Paperback

In Téa Mutonji's disarming debut story collection, a woman contemplates her Congolese traditions du… read more

Similar categories in Téa Mutonji's Shut Up You're Pretty book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
"Her sadness was overwhelming. Her sadness was an illusion. She'd pretend to be fine but then wash the same dish for twenty minutes"

-Téa Mutonji, Shut Up You're Pretty

Cover of What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad

9. What Strange Paradise

By: Omar El Akkad

4.05

Format: 256 pages, Hardcover

More bodies have washed up on the shores of a small island. Another overfilled, ill-equipped, dilap… read more

Similar categories in Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • adult fiction
  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • literature
  • politics
  • social justice
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • novels
  • audiobook
"Today you are the only boy in the world and tomorrow it will be as though you never existed."

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

"And what do you think the prerequisite for kindness is? Have you ever tried to be kind to someone better off than you?"

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

"Farther out, the water sheds its sandy complexion and turns a turquoise of such clarity that the tourists’ sailboats seem to float atop their own shadows."

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

"Because that's how we take the future from them," Walid said, animated now. "Look at Stockholm, look at Munich, look at New York-- who's picking up the garbage, cleaning the toilets? Who's doing the …"

-Omar El Akkad, What Strange Paradise

Cover of Greenwood by Michael Christie

10. Greenwood

By: Michael Christie

4.33

Format: 528 pages, Hardcover

It's 2034 and Jake Greenwood is a storyteller and a liar, an overqualified tour guide babysitting u… read more

Similar categories in Michael Christie's Greenwood book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
"There is nothing more quieting than an ancient tree"

-Michael Christie, Greenwood

"Do you know what becomes of men like us without the armour of wealth...?"

-Michael Christie, Greenwood

"Maybe trees do have souls. Which makes wood a kind of flesh. And perhaps instruments of wooden construction sound so pleasing to our ears for this reason: the choral shimmer of a guitar; the heartbea…"

-Michael Christie, Greenwood

"Still, Temple has no illusions concerning her library's impact. Her books won't lift anyone from their low station. They won't right wrongs or save wandering souls from perdition or fill grumbling st…"

-Michael Christie, Greenwood

Cover of Five Little Indians by Michelle Good

11. Five Little Indians

By: Michelle Good

4.48

Format: 304 pages, ebook

Taken from their families when they are very small and sent to a remote, church-run residential sch… read more

Similar categories in Michelle Good's Five Little Indians book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
Cover of The Future by Catherine Leroux

12. The Future

By: Catherine Leroux

3.32

Format: 288 pages, Paperback

In an alternate history in which the French never surrendered Detroit, children protect their own k… read more

Similar categories in Catherine Leroux's The Future book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • literature
  • fiction
  • audiobook
"It'll come back," Ulysses says again. "This place isn't made for disappearing, it's a place for resurrection."

-Catherine Leroux, The Future

"The exact opposite of the huge car factories she imagines as the city's womb, a uterus that makes automobiles the way others make promises, or laws."

-Catherine Leroux, The Future

Cover of Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah

13. Hotline

By: Dimitri Nasrallah

4.15

Format: 280 pages, Paperback

A vivid love letter to the 1980s and one woman’s struggle to overcome the challenges of immigration… read more

Similar categories in Dimitri Nasrallah's Hotline book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
"Here i am on my own, because of him, maybe free from a life that was turning into a prison, but cast away like a bad-luck omen too. Now I must give myself to others to survive. The world has judged t…"

-Dimitri Nasrallah, Hotline

Cover of The Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr

14. The Sleeping Car Porter

By: Suzette Mayr

3.46

Format: 216 pages, Paperback

When a mudslide strands a train, Baxter, a queer Black sleeping car porter, must contend with the p… read more

Similar categories in Suzette Mayr's The Sleeping Car Porter book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • fiction
  • canada
  • audiobook
"Desperate feelings can swivel into loathing."

-Suzette Mayr, The Sleeping Car Porter

Cover of Bad Cree by Jessica Johns

15. Bad Cree

By: Jessica Johns

3.92

Format: 259 pages, Hardcover

In this gripping debut tinged with supernatural horror, a young Cree woman's dreams lead her on a p… read more

Similar categories in Jessica Johns's Bad Cree book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • fiction
  • canada
  • audiobook
"On cloudless days I swear the prairies are closer to the sun than anywhere else in the world. Not because of the heat. It's the size of the floating orb when nothing else is around it. Beating like a…"

-Jessica Johns, Bad Cree

Cover of Denison Avenue by Christina Wong

16. Denison Avenue

By: Christina Wong

4.17

Format: 328 pages, Paperback

A moving story told in visual art and fiction about gentrification, aging in place, grief, and vuln… read more

Similar categories in Christina Wong's Denison Avenue book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • adult fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
Cover of The Strangers by Katherena Vermette

17. The Strangers

By: Katherena Vermette

4.10

Format: 336 pages, None

From the bestselling author of The Break comes a staggering intergenerational saga that explores ho… read more

Similar categories in Katherena Vermette's The Strangers book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • adult fiction
  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
"Summer was always the worst season. Everyone always complained about winter, but winter was simple, you just didn't go outside. Summer always tried to sneak in where it was not wanted."

-Katherena Vermette, The Strangers

Cover of The Story of Us by Catherine  Hernandez

18. The Story of Us

By: Catherine Hernandez

4.19

Format: 304 pages, Kindle Edition

From the author of Canada Reads finalist Scarborough, a stunning new novel about the unbreakable bo… read more

Similar categories in Catherine Hernandez's The Story of Us book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • adult fiction
  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
Cover of The Circle by Katherena Vermette

19. The Circle

By: Katherena Vermette

4.05

Format: 272 pages, Hardcover

From the award-winning and #1 bestselling author of The Break and The Strangers comes a poignant an… read more

Similar categories in Katherena Vermette's The Circle book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • adult fiction
  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • fiction
  • contemporary
  • audiobook
Cover of All the Quiet Places by Brian Thomas Isaac

20. All the Quiet Places

By: Brian Thomas Isaac

3.85

Format: 288 pages, Kindle Edition

Brian Isaac's powerful debut novel All the Quiet Places is the coming-of-age story of Eddie Toma, a… read more

Similar categories in Brian Thomas Isaac's All the Quiet Places book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • literary fiction
  • canada
  • social justice
  • fiction
  • audiobook
Cover of Life in the City of Dirty Water: A Memoir of Healing by Clayton Thomas-Muller

21. Life in the City of Dirty Water: A Memoir of Healing

By: Clayton Thomas-Muller

3.65

Format: 200 pages, Paperback

For much of his life, Clayton Thomas-Muller's very existence has been scrutinized and vilified. As … read more

Similar categories in Clayton Thomas-Muller's Life in the City of Dirty Water: A Memoir of Healing book and Omar El Akkad's What Strange Paradise

  • social justice
  • canada
  • audiobook

17 Best fiction books like What Strange Paradise by Omar El Akkad

Transform Your Habits

Moon of the Turning Leaves (Moon, #2)

Waubgeshig Rice

4.28

Transform Your Habits

Washington Black

Esi Edugyan

3.95

Transform Your Habits

The Son of the House

Cheluchi Onyemelukwe-Onuobia

4.11

Transform Your Habits

Fight Night

Miriam Toews

4.04

View all the books

18 best-selling fiction books like Hotline by Dimitri Nasrallah

Transform Your Habits

Moon of the Turning Leaves (Moon, #2)

Waubgeshig Rice

4.28

Transform Your Habits

Ce que je sais de toi

Éric Chacour

4.43

Transform Your Habits

Shut Up You're Pretty

Téa Mutonji

3.57

Transform Your Habits

La version qui n'intéresse personne

Emmanuelle Pierrot

4.45

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