bipoc books

uplifting bipoc authors

The Other Americans

The Other Americans

Late one spring night in California, Driss Guerraoui—father, husband, business owner, Moroccan immigrant—is hit and killed by a speeding car.

The aftermath of his death brings together a diverse cast of characters: Guerraoui’s daughter Nora, a jazz composer returning to the small town in the Mojave she thought she’d left for good; her mother, Maryam, who still pines for her life in the old country; Efraín, an undocumented witness whose fear of deportation prevents him from coming forward; Jeremy, an old friend of Nora’s and an Iraqi War veteran; Coleman, a detective who is slowly discovering her son’s secrets; Anderson, a neighbor trying to reconnect with his family; and the murdered man himself.

As the characters—deeply divided by race, religion, and class—tell their stories, each in their own voice, connections among them emerge. Driss’s family confronts its secrets, a town faces its hypocrisies, and love—messy and unpredictable—is born. Timely, riveting, and unforgettable, The Other Americans by Laila Lalami is at once a family saga, a murder mystery, and a love story informed by the treacherous fault lines of American culture.

***2019 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST***

Winner of the Arab American Book Award in Fiction

Book Details

Publisher: Pantheon
Publish Date: March 26, 2019
ISBN: 9780525436034
Language: English

About the Author

Laila Lalami was born in Rabat and educated in Morocco, Great Britain, and the United States. She the author of four novels, including ‘The Moor’s Account’, which won the American Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and ‘The Other Americans’, which was a Los Angeles Times bestseller and a finalist for the National Book Award. Her essays and criticism have appeared in The Nation, Harper’s, the Washington Post, and the New York Times. She has received fellowships from the British Council, the Fulbright Program, and the Guggenheim Foundation and is currently a professor of creative writing at the University of California at Riverside. She lives in Los Angeles.

Browse More Books