Stay ConnectedWelcome to The Diverse Bookshelf. I’m Samia Aziz, celebrating the power of literature and the voices of authors and change makers from the global majority. Join me as we explore the stories that inspire, connect, and transform our world. Each week I interview an inspiring guest about a whole host of themes and issues while focusing on diverse literature.
Let’s uncover the stories that truly matter—together.
Copyright: © 2025 The Diverse Bookshelf
Sairish Hussain was born and brought up in Bradford, West Yorkshire. She studied English Language and Literature at the University of Huddersfield and progressed onto an MA in Creative Writing. Sairish completed her PhD in 2019 after being awarded the university’s Vice-Chancellors Scholarship. Her debut novel, The Family Tree, was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award, and longlisted for the Diverse Book Awards and the Authors Club Best First Novel Award. She is now writing her second book.
I absolutely loved speaking with Sairish in this episode. We talk about the importance of good representation, positive role-models, writing and all about the wonderful characters in The Family Tree.
Buy The Family Tree here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/5890/9780008297480
Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan is a writer, poet and educator disrupting understandings of history, race, knowledge and violence. She works to equip herself and others with the tools and faith to resist the unliveable conditions we find ourselves in, and work towards another reality.
In 2019 Suhaiymah’s debut poetry collection Postcolonial Banter was published, featuring eight years worth of poetry including her viral poem This is Not a Humanising Poemwhich placed her as runner-up of the National Roundhouse Poetry Slam in 2017 and has over two million views online. Postcolonial Banter critiques and troubles narratives about racism, systemic Islamophobia, the function of the nation-state and secularist visions of identity.
Her latest book, Tangled in Terror: Uprooting Islamophobia was published with Pluto Press in 2022. The non-fiction work has been widely endorsed and is described as ‘our book’ by former Guantanamo Bay prisoner, Moazzam Begg, 'courageous' by rapper, Lowkey, 'one of the most exciting voices of her generation' by award-winning channel 4 journalist Fatima Manji, and 'fierce' by feminist activist Lola Olufemi.
In this interview, we talk about moving beyond acknowledging Islamaphobia and towards understanding its impact and doing something to bring it to an end. Suhaiymah talks about the work, research and experiences that have fuelled her recent book, and the importance of conversations like these taking place all over the world.
Buy Tangled in Terror here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/5890/9780745345413
Brought up in London, Christy Lefteri is the child of Cypriot refugees. She is a lecturer in creative writing at Brunel University. The Beekeeper of Aleppo was born out of her time working as a volunteer at a Unicef supported refugee centre in Athens. It became a Sunday Times bestseller and the winner of the 2020 Aspen Words Literary Prize. Christy's latest novel, Songbirds, is about the plight of domestic workers in Cyprus.
It was such an honour to speak to Christy, who I find to be intelligent, warm and bright. Having also worked in the charity sector for the last (almost) decade, I was keen to unpack and dive deep into Christy's thoughts and experiences around Beekeeper.
In this interview, we talk about the power of story-telling, love for writing, inter-generational trauma, human dignity and respect.
Buy Beekeeper of Aleppo here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/5890/9781838770013
Buy Songbirds here: https://uk.bookshop.org/a/5890/9781786580856
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