Women Without Men: A Novel of Modern Iran: Banned shortly after publication for its depiction of female freedom, "Women Without Men" by Shahrnush Parsipur creates an evocative and powerfully drawn allegory of life in contemporary Iran.

Like Water for Chocolate: Earthy, magical, and utterly charming, this tale of family life in tum-of-the-century Mexico by Laura Esquivel became a best-selling phenomenon with its winning blend of poignant romance and bittersweet wit.

The Seventh Heaven: Egyptian Nobel laureate Naguib Mahfouz draws on his homeland's rich engagement with the afterlife--and his own near-death experience at the hands of a would-be assassin--in these newly translated, brilliantly mysterious stories of the supernatural.