My voyage around Asia

I'm trying to complete a challenge where I have to read a book from each country in the Olympics in 2012, preferanbly by an author from that country. I'm going to try and focus on Asia primarily this year and thought this might be a good place to get tips but also keep track of my journey.
Here's the list of the places I have to go:
Afghanistan
Bahrain
Bangladesh
Bhutan
Brunei Darussalam
Cambodia First They Killed My Father
Chinese Taipei
Democratic People's Republic of Korea
Hong-Kong
India Family Matters,Rohinton Mistry
Indonesia
Iraq
Islamic Republic of Iran Blood Flowers
Japan Goodbye Tsugumi by Banana Yoshimoto
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Korea Read Pyongyang Guy Delise trying to see if I can find a Korea author
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
Lao People's Democratic Republic
Lebanon Varjak Paw by S.F Said
Malaysia
Maldives
Mongolia
Nepal
Pakistan
Palestine
People's Republic of China Sky Burial Xinran
Philippines
Qatar
Saudi Arabia
Singapore
Sri Lanka
Syrian Arab Republic
Tadjikistan
Thailand
Timor-Leste
Turkmenistan
United Arab Emirates
Uzbekistan
Viet Nam
Yemen

As you can see I have a long way to go, I'm reading Sky Burial at the moment for the PR of China and have read previously The Kite Runner, The Bookseller etc. Any suggestions ?

Hmmm for authors i would suggest:

Indonesia: Pramoedya Ananta Toer

PRC: Ma Jian

Bangladesh: Rabindranath Tagore, or Taslima Nasrin

Laos: Another Quiet American (haven't read this one)

Iran: Azar Nafisi (Reading Lolita in Tehran), Satrapi's Persopolis, or Hafiz

fiction, or non-fiction as well?

Regarding South Korea, check out Our twisted hero by Yi Munyol ... a pretty interesting book by the only Korean author I know of ... I'd be very very curious to know what you come up with for the DPRK!

Fiction or non-fiction just looking for a way to complete the challenge

I finished Xinran's Sky Burial last night, it was a good read but not as amazing as I had been lead to believe. The novel is the telling of the life of a Chinese woman, her doctor husband went out to serve in the Chinese army in Tibet, after just weeks he was reported dead, but no body was found and no reason for his death provided. The wife, Wen travels to Tibet in search of answers and finds herself living with a Tibetan family. Through this we get a fantastic look at Tibetan life and culture - something I'd like to read more about in the future.

Thanks for the recommendations

Sri Lanka - try Funny Boy by Shyam Selvadurai, which as well as being a very good read will tell you a lot about that country's recent and troubled history.

Good luck! I'll be following this thread with interest.

Thanks looks really good I'll add it to my wishlist

Hello, Katrinasreads and everyone~~I just dropped by to say I love this thread. I want to follow some of the suggestions, so I hope more will be added to the list.
Cheers!

Will be adding as I go along, hopefully more suggestions will flow in to help

katrina ~ you might also find some ideas at the 'Reading Globally' group http://www.librarything.com/groups/readinggloballyficti

Thailand: maybe The Happiness of Kati by Jane Vejjaveda (current prime minister's sister!). It's a young adult novel but might be easy to find since they just turned it into a movie.

Thailand: Sightseeing by Rattewut Lapcharoenap

Cambodia: There's lots of books on the Cambodia Genocide. Voices from S-21 is good. David Chandler writes many other books on Cambodia as well.

For Laos..a Laotian author!!!! I Little Slave by bounsang khamkeo.

I went to a reading by him today and picked up his book, it's a memoir of being a prisoner in Laos. looks good.

For Thailand I really enjoyed S. P. Somtow's book Jasmine Nights. It is a very funny book about a little Thai boy who lived the first years of his life in England and his parents drop him off at his family's compound in Bangkok and him coming to terms with that.

A book for Vietnam that has gotten quite a bit of acknowledgement to the point that it can now be found in your local Barnes & Noble (in the history section) is When Heaven and Earth Changed Places.

It's an autobiography on the Vietnam War.

For the Philippines, I recommend:

America is in the Heart by Carlos Bulosan
A Season of Grace by N.V.M. Gonzalez
The Woman Who Had Two Navels by Nick Joaquín
Noli Me Tangere by José Rizal

Oh I remember this thread. How is the reading going by the way?

For Afghanistan: The places in between by Rory Stewart. He walked acrossed Afghanistan and then wrote about his journey. good stuff, I would be interested to know if anyone knows a local author from afghanistan?

Thanks for the messages, there are some great recommendations. My reading has really slowed down in the last 6 months so I'haven't got anywhere with this list. I'm going to try and tick off at least one country a month in 2010, and I'll be checking out some of these books

For Saudi Arabia!

I just picked up Wolves of the Crescent Moon by Yousef Al - Mohaimeed

Two things...if you are still reading for this:

Democratic People's Republic of Korea - Most stuff written in NORTH KOREA is written by Kim Jong Il or his father Kim Il Sung. There are other works written by people that "escaped" North Korea: "The Aquariums of Pyongyang: Ten Years in the North Korean Gulag ", etc, etc, etc

For South Korea, you have "Read Pyongyang Guy Delise trying to see if I can find a Korea author"...
Two things here - Pyongyang is in DPR Korea, not South Korea and Guy Delise is French. Try anything by Yi MunYol (Our Twisted Hero) or for something older, try "Wings" by Yi Sang

Disco-grinch: "Most stuff written in North Korea" may be written at the behest of the leaders or their flunkies, but surely it's not actually written *by* them.

In Pyongyang, Guy Delisle writes about his experience working and living for two months in Pyongyang. He's not Korean, but it is quite well done. Here's something I wrote about it: http://www.japantimes.co.jp/text/fb20060129a1.html

For South Korea, run, don't walk, to get your hands on a the three volumes of Land by Pak Kyung-ni that are available in English translation. I can't imagine there is a better modern Korean novel.

I was considering Pak Kyung-ni's "Land": You can now get used copies of it for only $175.89! I may get TWO copies!

-- Gerry

Yeah, I know it's expensive. Perhaps you can get your library to order it?

Even if you have to spring for it yourself it will be money well-spent.