Emirates LitFest releases list of Top Reads for the New Year

The Emirates Literature Foundation has published its top list of books from the critics choices to readers’ favourites.

The Director of Emirates Airline Festival of Literature, Ahlam Bolooki, says all books on the list are guaranteed to spark conversations, stimulate debate and share new perspectives on the world around us.

“We are always looking for authors and conversations that will entertain, intrigue, and make us question the world around us," says Bolooki. "All the books on this list will do this and more, and best of all, once you have read the books you can come to meet the author at the Emirates LitFest in February.”

The creation of the list involved members of the Foundation team proposing and voting for the final books, which could be of any genre as long as they prompted new discussions and ideas.

First on the list came Toshikazu Kawaguchi’s Before the Coffee Gets Cold, with his utterly unique and moving time-travelling drama playing out in a small coffee shop in Tokyo. Along with carefully brewed coffee, it also offers the chance to travel back in time, but only within the confines of the café’.

Other books featured on the list include:

• 'A Horse Walks into a Bar' by David Grossman
• 'The Vanishing Half' by Brit Bennett
• ’My Heart is a Chainsaw' by Stephen Graham Jones
• 'Saints & Misfit's' by SK Ali
• 'Yesterday' by Felicia Yap
• 'My Best Friend’s Murder' by former Dubai resident Polly Philips

The full list is available on the Foundation’s website, and all the listed authors will be speaking at the Emirates Airline Festival of Literature, 3-13 February 2022 at the Al Habtoor City hotels. Tickets are available from the website.