English Texts

Title of the Novel/Novella/Play	Author’s Name	Water Body Name	Water Body Type	Publication Details	Year of Publiction	Genre	Theme
Waterlife	Rambharos Jha	Undefined	Undefined	Tara Books	2016	Graphic Novel	Waterlife features Mithila art, a vibrant and delicate form of painting from Bihar in eastern India. In this visually stunning book that renders images of water and the life it contains, artist Rambharos Jha creates an unusual artist’s journal, where aquatic motifs of the Mithila style are transformed to invoke childhood memory and lore. Waterlife is silkscreen-printed by hand on handmade paper.
A Disappearance in Fiji	Nilima Rao	South Pacific Islands	Ocean	Soho Crime	2023	Novel	Nilima Rao’s debut mystery offers an unflinching look at the impact of colonialism in Fiji when an indentured Indian woman goes missing from a sugarcane plantation.
A Long Walk to Water	Linda Sue Park	Undefined	Undefined	Clarion Books	2010	Novel	Water symbolizes survival in the stories of both Nya and Salva. Both characters walk long distances, enduring hardships along the way, to survive. Finally, through Salva’s leadership, and as a result of the difficulties he has overcome, a new, life-giving source of water is provided for the villagers, who will no longer need to walk a long distance to find water. This story is based on the life of a man named Salva Dut, who came to the United States as one of the Lost Boys of Sudan. Author Linda Sue Park worked with Dut while writing the novel. Salva’s fundraising efforts for the people of South Sudan are ongoing today.
Admiring Silence	Abdul Razzak Gurnah	Zanzibar Islands	Ocean	The New Press	1996	Novel	A man who has escaped from his native Zanzibar and built a new life in England is finally able to return to visit his native land where he finds a changed country and is able to view his life with a new clarity.
Anil’s Ghost	Michael Ondaatje	Undefined	Undefined	McClelland & Stewart	2000	Novel	This novel is set in Sri Lanka, an island nation in the Indian Ocean, and follows the story of a forensic anthropologist investigating the civil war.
Black Mamba Boy	Nadifa Mohamed	Red Sea	Sea	Leicester, UK : Ulverscroft	2010	Novel	The novel talks about the life of Jama, a ten year-old boy, who leaves his country Somalia and takes an an epic journey which will take Jama north through Djibouti, war-torn Eritrea and Sudan, to Egypt. And from there, aboard a ship transporting Jewish refugees just released from German concentration camps, across the seas to Britain and freedom.
Blue Bay Palace	Nathacha Appanah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Aflame Books	2009	Novel	The novel exposes the poverty, class divisions, and housing problems in island of Mauritius as result of constructiong of luxurious resorts for rich tourists.
By the Sea	Abdulrazak Gurnah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury Publishing	2001	Novel	Set in Zanzibar, England, and East Germany, the novel narrates the story of two families who experience exile, migration, and perptual loss intertwined with memory and longing for return.
Circle of Reason	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Hamish Hamilton, Viking Press	1986	Novel	This book deals in part with South Asia and in part with the crossocean connections between India and the Arab world.
Crossbones	Nuruddin Farah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Riverhead Books	2011	Novel (part of a trilogy)	The novel depicts the lives of sea pirates, war crimes against the backdrop of Somalian crises.
Desertion	Abdul Razzak Gurnah	East Coast of Africa	Indian Ocean	Bloomsbury Publishing	2005	Novel	Story of Rashid, Amin and Farida’s growing up in colonial Zanzibar and its independence.
Djibouti	Elmore Leonard	Indian Ocean	Ocean	William Morrow	2010	Novel	The novel explores sea piracy in the Gulf of Aden and the larger Indian Ocean.
Flood of Fire	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Murray	2015	Novel	Flood of Fire is based on the first Opium War, which took place in Canton in 1840, when the British invaded to break China’s opium trade blockade and demanded compensation for their losses after Chinese commissioner Lin destroyed their goods.
For Pepper and Christ	Keki Daruwalla	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin India	2009	Novel	Portuguese incursion to the region
Glorious Boy: A Novel	Aimee Liu	Bay of Bengal	Sea	Red Hen	2020	Novel	This novel offers a family drama set against the backdrop of World War II and the rumblings of Indian independence from British colonialist rule in remote Andaman Islands.
Gun Island	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	John Murray	2019	Novel	A dealer of rare books, Deen is used to a quiet life spent indoors, but as his once-solid beliefs begin to shift, he is forced to set out on an extraordinary journey, one that takes him from India to Los Angeles and Venice via a tangled route through the memories and experiences of those he meets along the way.
Half a Life	V. S. Naipaul	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Alfred A Knopf	2001	Novel	The son of a Brahmin ascetic and his lower-caste wife, Willie Chandran grows up sensing the hollowness at the core of his father’s self-denial and vowing to live more authentically. That search takes him to the immigrant and literary bohemias of 1950s London, to a facile and unsatisfying career as a writer, and at last to a decaying Portugese colony in East Africa, where he finds a happiness he will then be compelled to betray.
Heaven’s Edge	Romesh Gunesekera	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Grove Press	2002	Novel	The novel tells the story of an immigrant from “the island” who comes back to a warn torn homeland in search of his lost family and falls in love love with Uva, an eco-warrior who tries to repair the damage to the island by planting crops and raising animals against the decrees of the warlords
Idris: Keeper of the Light	Anita Nair	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Harper Collins	2014	Novel	The book is set in the year 1659 when a Somali trader comes to Malabar to attend the Zamorin’s Mamangam festivities
In an Antique Land	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean, Persian Gulf, Arabian Sea	Ocean	Ravi Dayal Publishers	1992	Novel	A crucial text, cited in both historical and literary critical accounts of the place.
Island’s End	Padma Venkatraman	Andaman Sea	Sea	G.P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers	2011	Novel	The novel narrates the story of an island in Bay of Bengal which is untouched by time and modern developments.
The Last Gift	Abdulrazak Gurnah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury Publishing	2011	Novel	The novel explores the life of Abbas was formerly a merchant navy sailor and that he comes from the Indian Ocean coast of East Africa.
Life of Pi	Yann Martel	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Knopf Canada	2001	Novel	This novel tells the story of a young Indian boy who survives a shipwreck and spends 227 days on a lifeboat in the Atlantic Ocean with a Bengal tiger.
Litanies of Dutch Battery	NS Madhavan	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin India	2010	Novel	The novel is a historical fiction set in the 1950s in Lanthan Bathery or Dutch Battery – a tiny island in the Vembanad lake with mainlaind Cochin ‘looming’ across, the novels provides a riveting account of the history of Kerala, the influences of the Portugese, the Dutch and the later British.
Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route	Saidiya Hartman	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Farrar, Strauss and Giroux	2006	Novel	Hartman recounts her travels along slave routes in Ghana to find traces of slaves forced to migrate from the West African coast to the Americas between the late fifteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Memory of Departure	Abdul Razzak Gurnah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Jonathan Cape	1987	Novel	It follows a Muslim man in an unnamed African country who seeks to be educated abroad.
Migritude	Shailja Patel	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Kaya Press	2008	Novel	Migritude, written by Shailja Patel, is a migrating story of a girl who moves from Kenya to the United States. The book includes political history, family history, poetry, and news coverage.
Moby Dick	Herman Melville	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Richard Bentley	1851	Novel	This classic novel takes place in the Pacific Ocean.
Mutiny	Lindsey Collen	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury Paperbacks	2002	Novel	The novel is set in an island in the Indian Ocean and narrates the lives three women who are locked away in prison as they navigate through natural disaster and the prison.
Opium Clerk	Kunal Basu	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Phoenix	2001	Novel	The novel depicts the effects of the Eastern opium trade on three generations of an Anglo-Indian “family”. While the novel is nominally about the opium trade it also tells the story of the British trading presence in China and Southeast Asia from the perspective of one of the Indian labourers.
Paradise	Abdulrazak Gurnah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Hamish Hamilton	1994	Novel	Paradise explores the impact of colonialism and slavery in Tanzania, which used to be a cultural melting pot for maritime merchants and trade communities especially in the 19th century.
Phosphorus and Stone	Susan Visvanathan	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Zubaan	2007	Novel	Examines a fishing hamlet from the perspectives of the bourgeois enclaves set both in a village called Valli, Kerela, and in Chennai, and Bangalore.
Prisoner of Paradise	Romesh Gunasekara	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury	2012	Novel	Prisoner of Paradise tells the story of a Ceylonese prince exiled to Mauritius.
Reef	Romesh Gunesekera	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Granta Books	1994	Novel	Reef is a historical fiction that narrates the story of a talented young chef named Triton who is so committed to pleasing his master, Mr. Salgado, a marine biologist obsessed with swamps and seafood, that he is oblivious to the political unrest threatening his country.
River of Smoke	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	John Murray Publishers	2011	Novel	River of Smoke is set in 1838, as the ship Ibis carries convicts and indentured laborers across the Indian Ocean. Two of the convicts escape and travel to Canton where they attempt to join the opium trade.
Salt to the Sea	Ruta Sepetys	Baltic Sea	Sea	Philomel Books	2016	Novel	Set during World War II, this novel follows several characters seeking refuge and passage on a ship in the Baltic Sea, which eventually connects to the Atlantic Ocean.
Sea Creatures	Susanna Daniel	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Harper	2013	Novel	Set in Florida, this novel is intertwined with the Atlantic Ocean and follows a family’s struggles and secrets as they navigate life by the sea.
Sea of Poppies	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	John Murray	2008	Novel	The novel chronicles the journey of different characters from Calcutta to Mauritius on a schooner named the Ibis. This historical fiction spans across the poppy fields of the Ganges, the vast Indian Ocean, and the exotic backstreets of Canton.
Softness of the Lime	Maxine Case	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Umuzi	2017	Novel	The novel spans more than 80 years, from 1782 in the bustling settlement at the Cape of Good Hope where traders, politicians, farmers and fortune-seekers compete for goods, land and power.
Swallow the Moon	Kate Constable and Priya Kuriyan	Undefined	Ocean	Zubaan Books	2015	Graphic Story	Speculative fiction where Ocean plays a significant role.
The Beach	Alex Garland	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Viking	1996	Novel	This thriller is set in Southeast Asia and includes scenes near the Pacific Ocean.
The Blue Notebook	James A. Levine	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Spiegel & Grau	2009	Novel	This novel follows the life of a young girl in India, including her experiences near the Indian Ocean, and addresses themes of human trafficking and exploitation.
The Boat People	Sharon Bala	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Doubleday	2018	Novel	The author is of Canadian and Sri Lankan descent, the novel explores the experiences of Sri Lankan refugees who arrive in Canada via the Indian Ocean.
The Book of Night Women	Marlon James	Caribbean Sea	Sea	Riverhead Books	2009	Novel	It is the story of Lilith, born into slavery on a Jamaican sugar plantation at the end of the eighteenth century. Even at her birth, the slave women around her recognize a dark power that they and she will come to both revere and fear.
The Book of Secrets	M. G. Vassanji	Indian Ocean	Ocean	McClelland and Stewart	1994	Novel	In 1988, a retired schoolteacher named Pius Fernandes receives an old diary found in the back room of an East African shop. Written in 1913 by a British colonial administrator, the diary captivates Fernandes, who begins to research the coded history he encounters in its terse, laconic entries. What he uncovers is a story of forbidden liaisons and simmering vengeances, family secrets and cultural exiles–a story that leads him on an investigative journey through his own past and Africa’s.
The Call of the Wild	Jack London	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Macmillan	1903	Novel	While the story primarily takes place in the Yukon during the Gold Rush, it does include a voyage across the Pacific Ocean.
The Carrier	Jamal Mahjoub	Mediterranian Sea	Sea	Phoenix Paperbacks	1998	Novel	The text is a historical that re-writes Shakespeare’s Othello located in 16th-century Mediterranean
The Deep	Alma Katsu	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Transworld Digital	2020	Novel	A supernatural thriller that explores the mysteries of the Titanic and its connection to a tragic event that occurred in the North Atlantic.
The Dragonfly Sea	Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Knoff	2019	Novel	The novel narrates the story of people living on an island located on the coast of Kenya. The island, Pate, is a palimpsest, a place where people come to forget or rewrite their life stories, and Owuor introduces us to a vivid set of characters who all want to begin their lives again in the island’s embrace.
The Far Pavilions	M.M. Kaye	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Allen Lane	1978	Novel	While much of the story takes place in the Himalayas and Afghanistan, the characters in this epic novel travel to regions along the Indian Ocean.
The Fishermen	Chigozie Obioma	North Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Little, Brown and Company	2015	Novel	In a small town in western Nigeria, four young brothers take advantage of their strict father’s absence from home to go fishing at a forbidden local river.
The Garden of Evening Mists	Tan Twan Eng	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Myrmidon	2011	Novel	Set in the highlands of Malaysia, this novel includes references to the surrounding oceans and their influence on the story’s landscape.
The Ghost of Sani Abacha	Chuma Nwokolo	Indian Ocean	Ocean	County Books	2012	Novel	Set in Nigeria, this novel touches on the Indian Ocean as it follows the adventures of the protagonist, who becomes involved in a conspiracy involving offshore drilling.
The Glass Palace	Amitav Ghosh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Ravi Dayal, Penguin India	2000	Novel	The Glass Palace follows the fortunes of Rajkumar Raha, a Burmese man, and his family. Beginning in Mandalay at the end of the nineteenth century, when the British removed Burmese King Thebaw and exiled him and his family to India.
The God of Small Things	Arundhati Roy	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Random House	1997	Novel
The Gunny Sack	M. G. Vassanji	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Anchor Canada (2005)	1989	Novel	The Gunny Sack is about US-based Salim Juna who inherits his grandmother’s gunny sack and with it comes the torrent of memories of being an Asian in East Africa.
The Harmony Silk Factory	Tash Aw	Indian Ocean	Ocean	HarperPerennial	2005	Novel	This novel takes place in Malaysia and features the nearby seas and oceans as it tells the story of a textile merchant and his mysterious past.
The Hungry Tide	Amitav Ghosh	Bay of Bengal	Bengal Delta	HarperCollins	2004	Novel	The novel explores the unique ecosystem of the Sundarbans delta, formed by the confluence of the Ganges, Brahmaputra, and Meghna Rivers in the Bay of Bengal.
The In Between Life of Vikram Lall	M. G. Vassanji	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Doubleday Canada	2003	Novel	Vikram Lall comes of age in 1950s Kenya, at the same time that the colony is struggling towards independence. Against the unsettling backdrop of Mau Mau violence, Vic and his sister Deepa, the grandchildren of an Indian railroad worker, search for their place in a world sharply divided between Kenyans and the British.
The Last Gift	Abdul Razzak Gurnah	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury	2011	Novel	The plot centres on Abbas, an immigrant from east Africa living in England, who reflects on his past after he has a stroke.
The Light Between Oceans	M.L. Stedman	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Vintage Australia	2012	Novel	This novel takes place on a remote island off the coast of Western Australia in the Indian Ocean, which connects to the Atlantic Ocean through various waterways.
The Lighthouse at the End of the World	Jules Verne	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Jules Hetzel	1905	Novel	This classic adventure novel takes place on an island in the Indian Ocean, where a lighthouse keeper faces various challenges.
The Mermaid Chair	Sue Monk Kidd	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Viking Press	2005	Novel	This novel is set on an island in the Atlantic Ocean and tells the story of a woman’s journey of self-discovery and spiritual awakening.
The Moor’s Account	Laila Lalami	Gulf of Mexico	Caribbean Sea	Pantheon Books	2014	Novel	It is a fictional memoir of Estebanico, the Moroccan slave who survived the Narvaez expedition and accompanied Cabeza de Vaca. He is widely considered to be the first African explorer of America, but little is known about his early life except for one line in Cabeza de Vaca’s chronicle: “The fourth [survivor] is Estebanico, an Arab Negro from Azamor.”
The North Water	Ian McGuire	North Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Scribners	2016	Novel	This historical novel is set aboard a whaling ship in the North Atlantic and explores the brutal and dangerous life of 19th-century whalers.
The Old Drift	Namwali Serpell	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Hogarth Press	2019	Novel	The novel is a saga that follows three families living in Zambia across three generations. These families are intertwined by the actions of the novel’s first narrator, Percy M. Clark,[3] who is based on a real man from Cambridge, England, who moved to Zambia (then Rhodesia) in the early 20th century as one of Europe’s many colonists across the African continent.
The Old Man and the Sea	Ernest Hemingway	The Gulf Stream	Sea	Charles Scribner’s Sons	1952	Novella	This novella tells the story of an aging Cuban fisherman’s epic battle with a marlin in the waters of the Gulf Stream.
The Pagoda	Patricia Powell	Caribbean Sea	Sea	Harper Perennial	1998	Novel	The Pagoda is a novel about Chinese Immigration to Jamaica during the 19th century. Specifically, it follows the experiences of Lowe, a Chinese woman passing as a male shopkeeper in rural Jamaica.
The Pearl	John Steinbeck	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	The Viking Press	1947	Novella	This novella takes place in a coastal town on the Gulf of California, which is connected to the Pacific Ocean, and follows a poor pearl diver’s quest for a valuable pearl.
The Rape of Sita	Lindsey Collen	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Minerva (1995)	1993	Novel	Lindsey Collen re-writes the Hindu epic, the Ramayana, which is recontextualised in contemporary Mauritius Island in order to make a subversive political comment on patriarchal society.
The Secret River	Kate Grenville	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Text Publishing	2005	Novel	While this novel primarily takes place in Australia, it begins with a voyage from London to the shores of the Atlantic Ocean and explores the impact of colonization.
The Shipping News	E. Annie Proulx	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Scribner	1993	Novel	Set in Newfoundland, Canada, this novel follows a man who moves to a coastal town along the Atlantic Ocean and becomes involved in the local fishing industry.
The Star Side of Bird Hill	Naomi Jackson	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Press	2015	Novel	This novel is set in Barbados and features the Atlantic Ocean as a significant backdrop, as it follows two sisters sent from Brooklyn to live with their grandmother.
The Whale Caller	Zakes Mda	Undefined	Undefined	Penguin Books South Africa	2005	Novel	The novel is set in a seaside village which attarcts tourists and whale watchers. It focuses on the lives of shoreline community and their relationship with the marine world.
The Zanzibar Wife	Deborah Rodriguez	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Sphere (2018)	2017	Novel	Set in Zanzibar, an island in the Indian Ocean, this novel explores the lives of its diverse characters and their interconnected stories.
The Zealot’s Bones	D.M. Mark	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Harvest House Publishers	2017	Novel	It takes place in Zanzibar and involves mysteries connected to the Indian Ocean.
The ZigZag Way	Anita Desai			Harper Perennial (2006)	2004	Novel
There is a Tide	Lindsey Collen	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Ledikasyon pu Travayer	1990	Novel	Exploring the manifold connections between local ecologies and global economies in colonial and postcolonial times, There Is a Tide traces the changing relationships that its protagonists have to Mauritian food and nature—and to their own bodies—under these conditions.
Unconfessed	Yvette Christiansë	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Other Press	2007	Novel	The novel narrates the life of Sila van den Kaap, a slave woman, spends her days in the prison quarry, breaking stones for Cape Town’s streets and walls.
Voices From the Lost Horizon: Stories and Songs of the Great Andamanese (2021)	Anvita Abbi	Andaman Sea	Sea	Niyogi Books	2021	Collection of stories	Voices from the Lost Horizon is a collection of a number of folk tales and songs of the Great Andamanese.
What Strange Paradise	Omar El Akkad	Mediterranean Sea	Sea	Knoff	2021	Novel	The book talks about Syrian refugee crises and migration through the sea.
Wide Sargasso Sea	Jean Rhys	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	André Deutsch	1966	Novel	This novel, a prequel to Charlotte Brontë’s “Jane Eyre,” is set in the Caribbean and explores themes of race and identity as it relates to the Atlantic Ocean.
The Djinn Waits a Hundred Years (2024)	Shubnum Khan (Durban)	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Viking	2024	Novel	The novel depcits issues of racism, identity, and culture of people in Durban.
Sand Roses	Hamza Koudri (Algeria)	Mediterranian Sea	Sea	Holland House Books	2023	Novel	Sand Roses is a historical novel about the semi-nomadic Ouled Nail group in Algeria whose women are trained as dancers—but are also forced into sex work by the community at an early age.
The House of Rust	Khadija Abdalla Bajaber (Kenya)	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Graywolf Press	2021	Novel	The novel depicts the mytholigies and traditions of Swahili and Hadrami cultures.
Like Water Like Sea	Olumide Popoola (Nigerian-German)				2024		The text is an immersive story of self-discovery, resilience, and the unifying power of love. It follows the life of Nia, a queer, bi/pansexual naturopath in London.
Daughters of Dust	Julie Dash (African American)	Carolina Coast	Ocean	Plume (1999)	1997	Novel	Set in the 1920s in the Sea Islands off the Carolina coast where the Gullah people have preserved much of their African heritage and language, Daughters Of The Dust chronicles the lives of the Peazants, a large, proud family who trace their origins to the Ibo, who were enslaved and brought to the islands more than one hundred years before.
Salvage the Bones	Jesmyn Ward (African American)	Gulf of Mexico	Ocean	Bloomsbury	2011	Novel	The novel explores the plight of a working-class African-American family in Mississippi as they prepare for Hurricane Katrina and follows them through the aftermath of the storm.[
Feeding the Ghost	Fred D’Aguiar	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Harper Collins (2000)	1997	Novel	novel chronicles an incident of courage and rebellion that took place aboard a disease-riddled slave ship returning from Africa.
At the Full and Change of the Moon	Dionne Brand	Caribbean Sea	Sea	Grove Press (1999)	1999	Novel	In 1824 on the island of Trinidad, Marie Ursule, queen of a secret society of militant slaves called the Sans Peur Regiment, plots a mass suicide”an act of revolt.
Shark Dialogues	Kiana Davenport	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	1995 (Plume)	1994	Novel	Beginning with the fateful meeting of a nineteenth-century Yankee sailor and the runaway daughter of a Tahitian chief, and sweeping over a century and a half of passionate, turbulent Hawaiian history, Shark Dialogues takes its place as the first novel to do justice to the rich heritage and cruel conflicts of the beautiful and beleaguered islands and their people.
More Sea than Tar	Osahon Ize-Iyamu (Nigerian)	North Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Reckoning Press	2019	Short Story	In “More Sea than Tar,” Osahon Ize‑Iyamu puts forward an explicitly Anthropogenic African topography, in the sense that the African environment described has been deeply affected by human activity,
Tentacle	Rita India (Dominican Republic)	Caribbean Sea	Sea	And Other Stories Publishing	2015	Novella	Plucked from her life on the streets of post-apocalyptic Santo Domingo, young maid Acilde Figueroa finds herself at the heart of a Santería prophecy: only she can travel back in time and save the ocean – and humanity – from disaster.
The Cat’s Table	Michel Oddaatje	Mediterranian Sea	Sea	Knoff	2011	Novel	The central character and narrator named Michael, an unaccompanied 11-year-old boy, boards an ocean liner, the Oronsay, in Colombo en route to England via the Suez Canal and the Mediterranean.
The Ordinary Seaman	Francisco Glodman	North Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Grove Press	1997	Novel	The ordinary seaman is Esteban, a 19-year-old veteran of the war in Nicaragua, who has come to America with 14 other men to form the crew of the Urus. Docked on a desolate Brooklyn pier, the Urus is a wreck, and the men, without the means to return home, become its prisoners. Esteban, haunted by the loss of his first love in the war, gradually works up the courage to escape the ship and start a new life in the city. His story and those of his shipmates come to life, illuminating the conflicts and triumphs of the human heart.
The Whale Rider	Witi Ihimera (Maori)	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Harcourt (2003)	1987	Novel	Eight-year-old Kahu craves her great-grandfather’s love and attention. But he’s focused on his duties as chief of the Maori in Whangara, New Zealand—a tribe that claims descent from the legendary “whale rider.” In every generation since the whale rider, a male has inherited the title of chief. But now there is no male heir—there’s only Kahu. She should be next in line for the title, but her great-grandfather is blinded by tradition and sees no use for a girl.
Lady with a Spear	Eugenie Clark	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Harper and Brothers	1954	Novel	This book describes when she was a pioneering female scientist, having adventures and following her extraordinary obsession with the ocean.
Blow the Man Down: A Yankee Seaman’s Adventures Under Sail	James H. Williams	Undefined	Sea	Literary Licensing	2011	Novel	A weathered manuscript discovered among old papers was the foundation of this powerful book. James H. Williams’ spellbinding recollections of his adventures before the mast in sailing-ship days bring alive again that gruelling but romantic era on the seas.
Latitudes of Longing	Shubhangi Swarup	Andaman Islands	Andaman Sea	One World (2020)	2018	Novel	One of the first Indian novels to engage with environmental changes, it is a “novella in four parts” featuring nature as a living, heaving entity.
The Antique Hunter’s Death on the Red Sea	C.L. Miller	Red Sea	Sea	Atria Books	2025	Novel	In this follow-up to the USA TODAY bestselling “utterly charming mystery” (Robyn Harding, author The Party), The Antique Hunter’s Guide to Murder, Freya Lockwood and Aunt Carole are on the hunt once again to return priceless stolen antiques and catch a dangerous criminal aboard a cruise ship.
Red Sea	Emily Benedek	Red Sea	Sea	St. Martin’s Press	2007	Novel	Four airplanes are blown out of the sky-hundreds of civilians are dead, and the world is gripped by fear. As young American reporter Marie Peterssen investigates the attacks, she meets Julian Granot, a mysterious Israeli operative who offers her an enticing lead-one that points them to maverick FBI agent Morgan Ensley and the ravages of war-torn Iraq. Soon Marie, Julian, and Morgan discover a connection between the crashes and a devastating plot to detonate a nuclear bomb in a New York City port-and time is running out.
Red Sea	Diane Tullson	Red Sea	Sea	Orca Book Publishers	2005	Novel	A fourteen-year-old girl faces danger while sailing through the Red Sea with her parents.
Treason’s Harbour	Patrick O’Brian	Red Sea	Sea	Collins	1983	Novel	The Surprises wait at Malta while their ship is slowly repaired after their successful mission on the Ionian coast.
The Red Sea Sharks	Hergé	Red Sea	Sea	Casterman	1958	Novel	The narrative follows the young reporter Tintin, his dog Snowy, and his friend Captain Haddock as they travel to the fictional Middle Eastern kingdom of Khemed with the intention of aiding the Emir Ben Kalish Ezab in regaining control after a coup d’état by his enemies, who are financed by slave traders led by Tintin’s old nemesis Rastapopoulos.
Lord Jim	Joseph Conrad	Red Sea	Sea	Blackwood’s Magazine	1900	Novel	An early and primary event in the story is the abandonment of a passenger ship in distress by its crew, including a young British seaman named Jim. He is publicly censured for this action and the novel follows his later attempts at coming to terms with himself and his past and seeking redemption and acceptance.
Henry’s Red Sea	Barbara Smucker	Red Sea	Sea	Herald Press	1955	Novel	Barbara Smucker relates the dramatic and courageous story of refugees from Russia. This is a story of suspense–American soldiers, Russian officers, and a midnight train ride in darkened boxcars. An actual event that happened in Berlin in 1946.
The Red Sea (The Cycle of Galand, Book 1)	Edward W. Robertson	Red Sea	Sea	Self-published	2016	Novel	When Dante Galand was just a boy, his father Larsin sailed away to make his fortune. And never returned. Since then, Dante has become a great sorcerer. A ruler. A destroyer of kings. And he’s just learned that his father is living on a forbidden island at the edge of the known world. Where he’s dying of a mysterious plague. In the company of his friend, the swordsman Blays, Dante travels to the island. There, his magic can do nothing for his father. As Dante and Blays quest for a cure—beset by strange beasts, angry spirits, and violent coastal raiders known as the Tauren—Dante falls sick, too. To save his father and himself, he’ll have to rediscover the island’s long-lost magic. But the hunt for its secrets leads Dante on a crash course with the Tauren—and island-wide civil war. And as he’s away, an old threat begins to move against his homeland.
The Red Sea	Stephen Spahn	Red Sea	Sea	CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform	2013	Novel	Satirical, iconoclastic, absurd, this journey starts in Korea, ricochets through Key West, bounces off Vermont and winds up in the pristine mountain highlands of southwest Saudi Arabia in 1973. Set in the steamy 70’s, the ex-pats working in The Kingdom keep their decadent habits under cover and one jump ahead of the religious police who enforce a strict moral code and dole out biblical retribution.
Under the Red Sea	Hans Hass	Red Sea	Sea	Jarrolds Publishing	1952	Novel	In 1952 the Austrian adventurer Hans Hass went to the completely unknown and little visited countries bordered by the Red Sea. In this book he details, and photographs, his adventures both on dry land and underneath the sea.
Deep as the Sky, Red as the Sea	Rita Chang-Eppig	Red Sea	Sea	Bloomsbury Publishing	2023	Novel	When Shek Yeung sees a Portuguese sailor slay her husband, a feared pirate, she knows she must act swiftly or die. Instead of mourning, Shek Yeung launches a new plan: immediately marrying her husband’s second-in-command, and agreeing to bear him a son and heir, in order to retain power over her half of the fleet.
Desert God	Wilbur Smith	Red Sea	Sea	HarperCollins	2014	Novel	Pharaoh Tamose has succeeded in securing a capital at Thebes in Upper Egypt, and the brilliant eunuch Taita is his chief advisor, even as he continues to try to expel the Hyksos from Egypt. Taita receives intelligence that the Hyksos and the Minoans have signed a secret treaty, and that the Minoans are sending a large shipment of silver to a fortress they have constructed on Hyksos territory in an effort to expand their maritime empire.
Blue Water Djinn	Téa Obreht	Red Sea	Sea	The New Yorker	2010	Short Story	In the story, an Ethiopian fisherman named Fawad tells a young boy, Jack, about the malevolent “blue water djinn” that inhabits a shipwreck to keep him away from it. The story culminates in Jack discovering that there is no djinn, but a trapped sea turtle, and he must reconcile the fantastical story with the harsh reality of what he witnessed.
The Outlaw Sea	William Langewiesche	Ocean world in general	Ocean	North Point Press	2005	novel	The open ocean–that vast expanse of international waters–spreads across three-fourths of the globe. It is a place of storms and danger, both natural and manmade. And at a time when every last patch of land is claimed by one government or another, it is a place that remains radically free.
Where the Air is Sweet	Tasneem Jamal	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Harper Collins Publishers, 2014	2014	novel	This absorbing novel about family secrets, generational differences, and the search for identity chronicles a young woman’s quest across four continents to reconcile her nomadic spirit with an inner longing for a home.
A House by the Sea	Sikeena Karmali	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Vehicule Press	2004	novel
The Last Wave: An Island Novel	Pankaj Sekhsaria	Andaman Islands	Indian Ocean	Harpercollins	2014	novel	Based out of Andaman Islands, The Last Wave is a story of lost loves, but also of a culture, a community, an ecology poised on the sharp edge of time and history.
Blow the Man Down	Don Holliday, Victor J. Banis	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Late Hour Library	1968	novel	When Atlantic ships start disappearing just before a Summit Cruise, Lou Upton calls on Jackie and U.S. Agent Andy Parks for help; they are sucked into the domed city of Atlantis, ruled by the emperor Machas Fruche, a.k.a. Mother Schmucker, where Jackie’s musical skills save the day.
Funny Boy	Shyam Selvadurai	Indian Ocean	Ocean	McClelland & Stewart, Canada	1994	Novel	Set in Sri Lanka in the 1970s and 1980s. It is about Arjie, a young Tamil boy, who is dealing with his homosexuality against the backdrop of increasing conflict between the Tamils and Sinhalese. As he comes of age, he grapples with the desires he feels and the identity he is forming, only to witness the crumbling away of whatever peace and innocence he had known in the country before the onset of ethnic violence. Arjie’s journey towards self-acceptance is played out against the sea and island life, both of which symbolize, respectively, his sense of freedom and sometimes, isolation.
Island of a Thousand Mirrors	Nayomi Munaweera	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Perera-Hussein Publishing House (Sri Lanka) and later St. Martin’s Press (United States of America)	2012	Novel	The novel describes the parallel tales of two women – Yasodhara, a Sinhalese girl, and Saraswathi, a Tamil girl – whose lives have been shaped by the decades-long civil war in Sri Lanka. The novel narrates the ways in which war destroys families and childhoods, while also showing that love and humanity exists, even amid violence. The island, and the surrounding oceans, both separate and connect the divided communities.
The Beach at Galle Road: Stories from Sri Lanka	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story collection	This linked collection depicts the present-day nation of Sri Lanka through the personal stories of ordinary people who are dealing with the consequences of war, displacement, and changes to their culture. Many of Luloff’s characters include fisherfolk, merchants, migrants, and families living through loss, memory, and small manifestations of grace during social upheaval. These narratives reflect upon how personal narrative and experience are placed within the construct of national happenings, presenting grief, humor, and survival with equal sensitivity.
Counting Hours	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
I Love You, Come Home Soon	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Galle Road	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Let Them Ask	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
The Sunny Beach Hotel	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Where She Went from Here	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Up North	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Change	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
January Tie	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Ghost Neighbors	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Children’s Games	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
Preparations	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
And Now Home Again	Joanna Luloff	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Algonquin Books	2012	Short story
The Jam Fruit Tree	Carl Muller	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Books India, New Delhi	1993	Novel	The Jam Fruit Tree provides an engaging if occasionally bittersweet, representation of the Burgher community in Sri Lanka through the stories of the Laiser family in Kandy. Muller uses humor and affection to portray eccentricity faced with love, belief, and identity, set against postcolonial ambiguity. The story honors a celebration of cultural blending and the importance of laughter as a survival mechanism, all while critiquing prejudice and social transition.
Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew	Shehan Karunatilaka	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Self – Published	2010	Novel	This novel chronicles W.G. Karunasena, a decrepit and drunken sports journalist, on his quest to uncover the truth about Pradeep Mathew, the obscure Sri Lankan cricket genius. As Karunasena pursues the resolution of the riddle, he discovers a politics of corruption, ethnic identity, and national disillusionment. Against the backdrop of Sri Lankan politics and a national obsession with cricket, Chinaman presents elements of humour, tragedy and social commentary. It demonstrates the ways in which history and myth complicate collective memory on a postcolonial island.
Padma and the Elephant Sutra	W. L. Snowden	Indian Ocean	Ocean	CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform	2017	Novel	The novel, set in Sri Lanka, follows the parallel lives of Padma, a village girl, and an elephant whose paths collide in an arena of environmental extraction and Buddhist thought. A confluence of myth and meditation and activism shape Snowden’s narrative, presenting the ocean and the forests as living things. The language of the novel flows like a stream of poetry and investigates compassion, suffering, and the sacred relationship between humanity and nature, and encourages ecologically mindful awareness, in a changing landscape, on an island the size of South Carolina.
A Passage North	Anuk Arudpragasam	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Hogarth Press (United States of America), Granta Books (United Kingdom)	2021	Novel	After hearing about the death of his grandmother’s caretaker, Krishan, a young Tamil man in Colombo, travels north. Traveling through Sri Lanka’s post-war landscape allows Krishan to reflect and meditate on themes of loss, violence, and remembrance. The novel combines the personal and the political, ultimately showing how the wounds of war persist. The ocean and land are used as metaphors for distance, grief, and reconciliation.
A Maiden’s Prayer	Srianthi Perera	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Evocative Journeys	2020	Novel	A Maiden’s Prayer is set between the country of Sri Lanka and the United States, and it reveals a Sri Lankan woman’s life of migration, marriage, and culture shock. With the descriptive imagery of sea crossings, and a deep sense of yearning for home, Perera evokes the emotional sweeps of exile and belonging. The novel ruminates on faith and loss, and the quest for self across oceans and generations.
The Sweet and Simple Kind	Yasmine Gooneratne	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Perera Hussein Publishing House, Colombo	2006	Novel	The novel takes place in Sri Lanka during the 1950s–70s and tracks cousins Tsunami and Latha as they maneuver through the complexities of love, ambition, and the constrainment of customs and traditions within a privileged Burgher family. As the struggles facing the island shift politically and socially, Gooneratne paints a nuanced representation of women’s lives in an increasingly volatile and changing country.
Bone China	Roma Tearne	Indian Ocean	Ocean	HarperCollins	2008	Novel	Over generations, Bone China follows Grace de Silva and family across Sri Lanka colonial twilight and into England. Tearne conveys both the ache of dislocation and the symbolic pull of the sea across the distances of home and exile; the novel beautifully integrates political history with intimate loss to illustrate the ways in which memory and loss travel across borders with an undulating, wave-like quality.
It’s Not in the Stars	Rizvina Morseth de Alwis	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Vijitha Yapa Publications	2015	Novel	A modern Sri Lankan romance at the crossroads of love, fate, and class divisions. De Alwis explores the vibrancy and complexities of Colombo society through multiple points of view, where present aspirations rub up against the past, and the ocean is a force of unpredictability in life and love – it is wide, uncontrollable, and profoundly human.
Love in the Tsunami	Ashok Ferrey	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin India	2012	Novel	Set in the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, the novel examines how the disaster alters lives, relationships, and values. Ferrey combines facets of humor and tragedy, revealing hypocrisy among Colombo’s elite, and engages in social thinking on grief and endurance. The sea becomes a symbol of change and renewal in post tsunami Sri Lanka, both destroyer and healer.
Anusha of Prospect Corner	A. M. Blair, Maram Ken & Samira Ken	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Self – Published	2017	Novel	In Anusha of Prospect Corner, a young girl of Sri Lankan descent growing up outside her family’s culture is trying to navigate expectations from her family and her friend’s, while struggling to balance the two cultures she lives in. Written with humor and captivating recollections of island life, the novel addresses the immigrant experience and desire for connection and belonging. The ocean represents both separation and union, both literally, and symbolically between Sri Lanka and the diaspora.
The Hungry Ghosts	Shyam Selvadurai	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Doubleday Canada	2013	Novel	The Hungry Ghosts focuses on Shivan Rassiah, a young gay Sri Lankan-Canadian who struggles with his Buddhist background and contemporary identity. As he returns to Sri Lanka to care for his terminally ill grandmother, he faces intergenerational trauma, desire, and the ghosts still remaining from the island’s civil war. The Indian Ocean acts as a boundary and a bridge that links a state of exile to a homeland while negotiating longing and reconciliation.
The Fountains of Paradise	Arthur C. Clarke	Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean	Ocean	Victor Gollancz (UK) Harcourt Brace Jovanovich (US)	1979	Novel	The novel focuses primarily on a project known as the Orbital Tower proposed by the main character, Vannevar Morgan.
Saree	Su Dharmapala	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Simon & Schuster Australia	2014	Novel	This expansive narrative moves between Sri Lanka and Australia, told through the stories of five women, united physically by one saree. In Dharmapala’s work, the themes of tradition, loss, and resilience are traced across generations. The ocean’s waves carry the passage of time and migration, intertwined with memories of love, survival, and threads that connect women across oceans.
Love Marriage	V.V. Ganeshananthan	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Random House Trade Paperbacks	2008	Novel	Presented as interconnected narratives, Love Marraige looks at the inheritance of Sri Lanka’s ethnic conflict through the experiences of a Tamil-American family. From a distance, Yalini, the narrator, considers arranged marriages, exile, and belonging. In this context the ocean denotes both separation and disconnection: the geographical distance from the U.S. to SriLanka offers a metaphor of the emotional and cultural fragmentation associated with Sri Lanka’s diaspora.
The Waiting Earth	Punyakante Wijenaike	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Colombo Apothecaries’ Company	1966	Novel	In The Waiting Earth, Wijenaike captures the stark yet spiritual bond between the land and rural Sri Lankans. Wijenaike reveals through Punchi Menika, a peasant woman caught in the struggle between love, duty, and poverty, the quiet strength of women and the rhythms of agrarian life. The novel is set inland, yet its tone represents the elemental relations that the island has with the sea, its waiting earth representing both fertility and waiting through change.
A Little Dust on the Eyes	Minoli Salgado	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Peepal Tree Press, United Kingdom	2014	Novel	A Little Dust on the Eyes tells the interconnected story of sisters Savi and Nadi, split apart by the Sri Lankan Civil War and reconnected after decades apart. Salgado uses poetic prose to examine ideas of diaspora, silence around loss, and the fragility of memory. The Indian Ocean works as a literal and metaphoric bridge—binding home and diaspora, presence and absence. It is a beautiful meditation on reconciliation and belonging.
Homesick	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short story collection	Homesick is a blend of interconnected narratives about Sri Lankan immigrants in Britain and their experiences of love, faith, and identity across generations. Fernando explores what it means to belong to a place in a foreign land while nostalgia for the homeland is weighed against learning how to adjust to a new, modern life. The sea serves as a symbol separating the aspects of memory and migration while establishing the emotional space between home and diaspora.
The Bottle of Whisky	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
The Clangers	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
The Fluroscent Jacket	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Love Me Tender	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
The Turtle	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Sophocles’ Chorus	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Nil’s Wedding	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Mumtaz Chaplin	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
The Comfort, the Joy	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
The Barn Dance	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Research	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
The Terrorist’s Foster Grandmother	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Test	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Honey Skin	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Meta General	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Funeral	Roshi Fernando	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Impress Books, United Kingdom	2010	Short Story
Ruins	Rajith Savanadasa	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Hachette, Australia	2016	Novel	Ruins offers a rich depiction of post-war Colombo through the multiple voices of a family: a father, a mother, a son, a daughter, and a servant. Each speaks to the different faces of ambition, corruption, and hope in a rapidly changing Sri Lanka. The oceanic analogy of “ruins” evokes both the remnants of civil conflict and the search for regeneration in a nation that has only recently emerged from that loss.
All Is Burning	Jean Arasanayagam	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Books India	2000	Short story collection	All Is Burning shows the agonizing disintegration and loss brought about by Sri Lanka’s ethnic violence. With powerful, reflective prose, Arasanayagam gives fully voiced attentiveness to those displaced by war—engaged with trauma, exile and resilience. The sea appears as both an observer and a limit, such that it signals the everlasting cycle of loss and rebirth. Arasanayagam’s writing embodies a gesture of poetic intensity and psychological inquiry.
The Sandglass	Romesh Gunesekera	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Granta Books, United Kingdom	1998	Novel	The Sandglass portrays the lives of two families of Sri Lankan origin through several generations, all influenced by colonial history and postcolonial disturbances in Sri Lanka. Time and migration, from Ceylon to London, instruct Gunesekera as he studies memory and identity moving like sand and shifting. The ocean serves as both divider and connector, a symbol of dislocation and yearning that historically remains in place. Different spaces cannot disregard the past that travels across geographies.
A Nice Burgher Girl	Carl Muller	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Vijitha Yapa Publications, Colombo, Sri Lanka	2006	Novel	Against the backdrop of colonial and postcolonial Ceylon, Muller’s novel humorously and satirically portrays the quirky Burgher community. The novel’s protagonists are young Burghers negotiating themes of love, identity and cultural displacement in the midst of changing political realities. The setting shaped by the ocean conditions their sensibility as they are stuck on the dividing line of European ancestry and Sri Lankan belonging. With wit and nostalgia, Muller examines how memory, race and class are woven together in the social fabric of the island, while exposing the bittersweet inheritance of colonial legacies.
The Far Spent Day	Nihal de Silva	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Vijitha Yapa Publications	2004	Novel	Nihal de Silva’s The Far Spent Day is a gripping political thriller that takes place during Sri Lanka’s civil conflict. The narrative centers on a government official whose life is linked to the corruption, violence, and moral degradation of postcolonial politics. De Silva combines the calmness of the island’s coastal and riverine landscapes with the turbulence of human greed and conflict. Here, the “far spent day” stands for a nation’s lost innocence, enhancing themes of loss, conscience, and reconciliation.
The Story of a Brief Marriage	Anuk Arudpragasam	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Granta Books, United Kingdom	2016	Novel	Taking place in the last days of the Sri Lankan Civil War, Arudpragasam’s novel tells the story of Dinesh, a young Tamil man who finds himself married in chaos and loss. During the brief time we are with Dinesh and his wife, he searches for meaning and humanity in a dark moment of devastation. The style is meditative, and the prose renders this worn-out landscape — with its beaches and rain, and the winds of the ocean — into embodiments of fleetingness and staying power.
Heaven’s Edge	Romesh Gunesekera	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury Publishing PLC	2002	Novel	Set in a futuristic island terraformed to resemble Sri Lanka, Heaven’s Edge tells the story of Marc as he returns to his ancestral homeland for peace and identity. The novel occurs at a time of environmental ruin and social decay, with the sea always returning as a symbol of memory, isolation, and renewal. Gunesekera emerges the themes of displacement, violence, and hope through poetic prose, showcasing both land and sea’s fragility.
Yakada Yaka	Carl Muller	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Books India	1994	Novel	Yakada Yaka (which translates to “Iron Devil”) is the second installment in Muller’s Burgher trilogy and is a continuation of the Von Bloss family saga characterized by comedy and socio-political criticism. Set in Sri Lanka along its coastal areas, the work is rife with maritime imagery and local vernacular, which are utilized to consider issues of identity, belonging, and the absurdity of living in a postcolonial condition. The ocean acts as both an escape and a confinement for the Burgher community.
Once Upon a Tender Time	Carl Muller	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Books India	1999	Novel	The final novel in Muller’s Burgher trilogy, Once Upon a Tender Time traces the waning days of colonial Ceylon through the lives of the mixed-race Burgher community. With the sea as a constant motif, Muller explores how coastal environments shape personal and communal identities. Humor and nostalgia intertwine as the Burghers face cultural displacement in an evolving island nation.
Viajero	F.sionil Jose	Philippine Sea	Sea	Solidaridad Publishing House, Inc.	1993	Novel	Voyages, archipelago identity, Filipino diaspora
White Turtle	Merlinda Bobis	Philippine Sea	Sea	Spinifex Press	1999	Short Story collection	Ocean myths, ritual, migration, dream and death
Smaller and Smaller Circles	F.H. Batacan	Philippine Sea	Sea	University of the Philippines Press	1999	Novel	Crime novel set partly in coastal Manila; moral pollution vs sea purity
Fish-Hair Woman	Merlinda Bobis	Philippine Sea	Sea	Spinifex Press	2011	Novel	Sea imagery, memory, war, mythic woman tied to water
Dwellers	Eliza Victoria	Philippine Sea	Sea	Turtle Publishing	2014	Novel	Speculative fiction with coastal myth and body-swapping; moral tides
Sula’s Voyage	Catherine Torres	Philippine Sea	Sea	Scholastic	2016	Novel	Sea voyage, self-discovery, ocean journey, courage.
Yniga	Glenn Diaz	Philippine Sea	Sea	Ateneo de Manila University Press	2022	Novel	Return to fishing town, sea as memory, environmental trauma
Marikit and the Ocean of Stars	Caris Avendano Cruz	Philippine Sea	Sea	Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)	2022	Children’s Novel	Oceanic quest, folklore, sea deities, grief and courage
Lalani of the Distant Sea	Erin Entrada Kelly	Philippine Sea	Sea	Greenwillow Books	2019	Children’s Novel	Philipino mythic sea, courage, family, environmental balance
Afterlives	Abdulrazak Gunrah	Indian ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury(UK)	2020	Novel	Afterlives begins in the early years of the 20th century, in the years following World War I. The novel opens with the story of Ilyas, a young boy living in Zanzibar, who is forcibly conscripted by the German colonial army. The violence and brutality of colonial warfare during the German rule of East Africa (present-day Tanzania, Rwanda, and Burundi) set the tone for the novel. Ilyas’s life is drastically changed when he is pressed into service as a soldier, and his eventual return home is marked by the trauma of war.
Links	Nuruddin Farah	Indian ocean	Ocean	Riverhead Books (US)	2003	Novel	Jeebleh, an academic returning to Mogadishu after years of exile, confronts his homeland’s devastation and his own haunted memories. As he reconnects with friends and faces violence, Farah explores Somalia’s collapse and diaspora consciousness. Thematically, it examines exile, homecoming, and national identity. The Indian Ocean frames Somalia’s history of trade and migration, symbolizing both separation and continuity. The novel’s Oceanic essence lies in how it situates personal memory within maritime flows of exile and return.
Silent Winds, Dry Seas	Vinod Busjeet	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Doubleday			Silent Winds, Dry Seas by Vinod Busjeet is a novel set in Mauritius tracing the life of Vishnu Bhushan, a descendant of Indian indentured laborers, as he navigates the complexities of a multiracial society marked by tensions between tradition and modernity, freedom and repression. The book highlights family pressures, clan feuds, and societal divides against a backdrop of historical and cultural shifts on the island. Oceanic fiction qualities are evident in its setting—Mauritius surrounded by the Indian Ocean—where the sea symbolizes both connection and isolation, reflecting broader themes of identity, migration, and cultural hybridity in an island context. The novel richly portrays the evolution of Mauritian society with poetic charm while exploring the legacies of colonialism and community dynamics
Boy	Lindsey Collen	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Bloomsbury	2005	Novel	Lindsey Collen’s Boy is a coming-of-age novel set in Mauritius that follows 17-year-old Krish Burton over three transformative days. After failing his school exams, Krish embarks on a journey of self-discovery, initially running away from home under false pretenses. As he travels through lush landscapes filled with sugar cane fields and mango trees, he confronts the complexities of adulthood, social expectations, and freedom. The novel explores themes of social and sexual awakening, family pressures, and identity within the context of Mauritius’s diverse cultural landscape. Oceanic fiction qualities are present in the vivid depiction of the island’s environment and the interconnections between land, sea, and society, symbolizing the fluidity of personal and cultural identity.
Genie and Paul	Natasha Soobramanien	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Myriad Editions	2012	Novel	Natasha Soobramanien’s Genie and Paul tells the story of Genie’s deep love for her brother Paul, who disappears after a night out in London. After waking in a hospital and learning of Paul’s disappearance, Genie embarks on a quest to find him. Her search leads her to Rodrigues Island, their ancestral home in the Indian Ocean. The novel explores themes of family bonds, loss, and the search for identity, reflecting on the complexities of diaspora and home. As Genie uncovers Paul’s troubled past and love for the island, the narrative delves into personal and cultural memory intertwined with the impact of natural disasters like cyclones.
Darwin’s Wink: A Novel of Nature and Love	Alison Anderson	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Thomas Dunne Books	2004	Novel	Alison Anderson’s Darwin’s Wink is the story of an exquisite romance between two naturalists working to save a rare bird species on an island off the coast of Mauritius. Both are devastated by their Fran mourns the unexplained death of her Mauritian lover; Christian, a former Red Cross worker, has recently left war-torn Bosnia after the mysterious disappearance of his fiancée. As they slowly teach each other to trust again, the two must also contend with strange attacks on the island that place both their lives and livelihoods in grave danger.
That Others Might Live	Deepchand Beehary	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Orient Paperbacks	1976	Novel	Deepchand Beeharry’s That Others Might Live is a powerful novel about the tragic lives of early Indian immigrants brought to Mauritius as indentured laborers in the 19th century. It follows characters like Manish, Thomas, and Dinesh, who navigate the harsh realities of colonial exploitation, poverty, and displacement. The narrative portrays the struggle for freedom and equality amid social unrest and racial oppression. Through personal stories intertwined with historical events, Beeharry highlights the sacrifices and resilience of these migrants striving for a better life. The novel is considered foundational in Indian diasporic literature, influencing later works such as Amitav Ghosh’s Sea of Poppies
Short Stories from Mauritius	Abu Alladin,Ysz Yun So	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Editions Le Printemps	2000	Collection of Short Stories	Short Stories from Mauritius by Abu Alladin and Ysz Yun So is a collection of diverse tales that vividly portray life on the island. The stories feature a range of characters, from everyday people to mythical figures, reflecting the rich multicultural fabric of Mauritian society. Themes include humor, social conflict, nature, migration, and cultural identity. The collection captures the island’s unique landscapes, traditions, and challenges, offering readers an intimate glimpse of Mauritius through engaging narratives that balance local specificity and universal human experiences. The collaboration between Alladin and Ysz Yun So emphasizes Mauritius’s plural cultural heritage and storytelling traditions
The Mauritius Command	Patrick O’Brian	Indian Ocean, Waters around La Reunion and Mauritius, Chagos Archipelago	Ocean	Collins	1977	Novel	Patrick O’Brian’s The Mauritius Command is a historical naval novel following Captain Jack Aubrey, who is promoted to Commodore and assigned to lead a British naval squadron in the Indian Ocean during the Napoleonic Wars. The mission is to capture the French-held islands of La Réunion and Mauritius. After a successful campaign on La Réunion, Aubrey faces setbacks during the assault on Mauritius, including battles with the French fleet and challenges among his own captains. The novel blends detailed naval strategy with rich character development and historical accuracy, showcasing themes of leadership, loyalty, and warfare during the early 19th century colonial conflicts.
Riambel	Priya Hein	Indian Ocean	Ocean	French Publishers: Globe Editions(2022) English publishers: The indigo Press(2023)	2022	Novel	Priya Hein’s novel Riambel follows fifteen-year-old Noemi, forced to leave school to work for the wealthy De Grandbourg family living just across the road from her impoverished slum in Mauritius. Noemi’s life reveals the stark social and ethnic divides on the island, shaped by the lasting scars of slavery and colonial rule. Haunted by the histories of enslaved women and encouraged by caring teachers, she slowly confronts the oppressive structures limiting her future. Mauritius, portrayed through Noemi’s eyes, is a place of haunting beauty and deep-seated injustice, embodying the complexities of history, identity, and resistance within a fractured society
The Coral Heart: A Shopkeeper’s Journey	Peggy Lampotang	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Atelier d’écriture	2014	Novel	Peggy Lampotang’s The Coral Heart follows the journey of a hardworking young Hakka Chinese boy who arrives in Mauritius in 1911 with his family as immigrants. The boy assists his father, a shopkeeper, adhering to Chinese traditions of family duty. As he interacts with the island’s diverse community, he navigates racial divisions and falls in love, all set against historical events including the overthrow of the Chinese emperor, the rise of communism, Japanese invasion of China, and the World Wars. The novel captures the immigrant experience, exploring themes of cultural identity, familial duty, and resilience on the island of Mauritius.
Birth of the Pearl Island	Pahlad Ramsurran	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Sterling Publishing	1982	Folktale	Pahlad Ramsurrun’s Birth of the Pearl Island is a Mauritian folk tale inspired by the Ramayana. The story recounts how Mareech, a sorcerer who aided in Sita’s abduction, is killed by Rama during his exile. Mareech’s body transforms into pearls, which Rama throws into the sea, where they become islands including Mauritius. The tale connects the island’s origin to Indian cultural heritage and reflects Mauritian multiculturalism. It emphasizes how traditional narratives preserve cultural memory and identity in a diverse society, linking myth, history, and the formation of the island’s unique character. This folklore highlights the enduring ties between Mauritius and its Indian diaspora roots
Folk tales of Mauritius	Pahlad Ramsurran	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Sterling Publishing	1987	Collection of Folktales	Folk Tales of Mauritius by Pahlad Ramsurrun is a collection of eighteen engaging folk stories originating from the African, Asian, and European roots that shape Mauritius’s multicultural heritage. These tales, recounted in simple, flowing language, convey the island’s rich oral storytelling tradition. Stories include mythical accounts such as the Ramayana-inspired “Birth of the Pearl Island,” explaining Mauritius’s origin through the transformation of a sorcerer’s body into pearls that became islands. The collection features trickster tales, moral fables, and explanations for local natural phenomena. Ramsurrun’s work preserves and celebrates the diverse cultural fabric of Mauritius by illustrating the blend of influences that have formed the island’s unique identity through folklore, emphasizing the close ties between mythology, culture, and history
Indian Folktales from Mauritius	Dawood Auleear and Lee Haring	Indian Ocean	Ocean	National Folklore Support Centre	2006	Collection of Folktales	Indian Folktales from Mauritius by Dawood Auleear and Lee Haring is a collection of eighteen Bhojpuri oral tales brought to Mauritius by indentured laborers from Bihar, India, in the 19th century. The stories feature a wide range of characters such as kings, ministers, thieves, clever siblings, and mythical creatures. They reflect moral lessons, social justice, and cultural values important to the Bhojpuri community. For example, “Son Avenges Father” highlights justice prevailing over corruption, while “Wicked King Caused to Repent” stresses karma. The collection preserves the cultural identity and group solidarity of the Bhojpuri diaspora in Mauritius through language and folklore, illustrating how immigrant communities maintain their heritage across time and geography
Red Ocean	Han Song	the water body highlighted is not named as a specific sea (e.g., “South China Sea” or “East China Sea”), but rather presented as “the Ocean” (hǎiyáng) in a broad, mythic-ecological sense. Thus it functions more like a primordial world-ocean, the “Age of the Sea” from which human civilization emerges and to which it ultimately returns.			2004	Chinese Science Fiction	The novel explores posthuman and ecological themes that the human race confronts in the future. The novel draws a distinction between the “Earth” (East) and the population on “Moon” (West).The ocean is central; the title itself is “Red Sea / Red Ocean.” It deals with underwater human societies.The novel speculates on a future where humans (and created entities) seek shelter under or within the sea, and explores how civilization, identity, power, etc., are constructed through oceanic space, environmental catastrophe. It is dystopian/speculative. This is a strong instance of maritime fiction in a sci-fi context
Exorcism	Hang Song	no specific water body shown but rather a setting simply as a “hospital ship floating in a red sea”			November 28, 2023	Second book in Hospital Trilogy	Yang wakes up on a hospital ship, which is a huge AI-controlled system that has turned reality into a hospital in order to perform a mass-scale “exorcism.” Yang goes deep into the ship with other elderly patients to find out the truth about this strange world, which is run by algorithms and has medical robots instead of human doctors. The novel explores themes of reality, technology, and control, with “the hospital” serving as a metaphor for China and its political system.The sea here serves metaphor and literal location: isolation, disorienting environment, control (possibly oppressive), interaction with water as boundary and “otherness.” This shows how maritime settings are used for psychological / dystopian effect.
Sea of Dreams	Liu Cixin	global-ocean scenario			2017	Novella	A fusion of speculative, surreal, ecological, cosmic images. The ocean is an important part of the plot (loss/transformation of water), and is symbolic of environmental crisis, human loss, alien otherness. A good case study of maritime fiction with ecological themes. The sea/oceans are at the heart of the story: The story has to do with the seas around Earth being frozen, or ice, oceans, taken or changed, with an alien artist taking the ice blocks out of the oceans that were on Earth, and lifting them into orbit, and so on. So bodies of water are Earth’s oceans and seas.
If we dream too long	Goh Poh Seng	Kallang Basin, South China sea/Singapore straits	Sea		1972	Novel	If we dream too long is often regarded as Singapore’sfirst true novel in English. It follows the life o Kwang Meng, a young clerk in 1960’s Singapore, who feels trappd in the monotonous office job and an uninspiring social routine. Dissatisfied with his work, love, life and future, he spends long hours by the Kallang Basin, watching ship and daydreaming of freedom at sea. Around him his friends pursue practical goals, marriage, money and status, while he remains uncertain torn between passive dreaming and te pressures of modern Singaporean society. The sea functions as a recurring symbol of escape and possibility, but also refects his inertia and inability to act. Through its portrayal of youth alienation, scial expectations, and maritime imagery, the novel highlights the struggles of generation negotiating identity in a rapidly changing postcolonial nation.
Fistful of colours	Suchen Christine Lim	Singapore Strait	Sea		1993	Novel	Suchen Christine Lim’s Fistful of Colours (1993) is a landmark Singapore novel that won the inaugural Singapore Literature Prize. At its core, it tells the story of Su Wen, an artist piecing together her identity through art, family memories, and national history. The novel moves between personal stories and collective memory, weaving in voices of women from different ethnic and social backgrounds. Central to its narrative is Singapore’s maritime identity as a port city, where communities from China, India, and Southeast Asia arrived by ship, crossing the Singapore Straits. Through generational narratives, Lim examines questions of race, gender, class, and belonging in a postcolonial nation. The sea functions as both a literal route of migration and a metaphor for historical crossing, displacement, and cultural encounter. By interlacing personal and national histories, the novel highlights the struggles and resilience of individuals negotiating identity within Singapore’s complex multicultural fabric.
Corridor	Alfian Sa’at	Singapore River	Singapore Strait		1999	Short Stories (Collection)	Corridor is a collection of twelve short stories by Singaporean writer Alfian Sa’at, first published in 1999. Set in contemporary Singapore, the stories delve into the lives of ordinary individuals—students, housewives, factory workers, and more—who navigate the complexities of urban life. Each narrative offers a poignant exploration of personal aspirations, societal expectations, and the search for meaning in a rapidly modernizing city-state. Themes of alienation, identity, and the fragility of happiness permeate the collection, reflecting the tensions between individual desires and collective norms. Through authentic dialogue and vivid settings, Sa’at captures the nuances of daily existence, portraying characters who grapple with love, loss, and the yearning for connection. The stories serve as a mirror to Singapore’s evolving landscape, highlighting the emotional landscapes of its inhabitants amidst the backdrop of progress and change.
A Dance of Moths	Goh Poh Seng	Singapore River	Singapore Strait		1995	Novel	A Dance of Moths interweaves the stories of two men in Singapore: Salim, a Malay hospital orderly, and Vincent, a Eurasian civil servant. Their seemingly ordinary lives unfold against the rapid modernization of Singapore in the late 20th century. Salim grapples with feelings of invisibility and marginalization, while Vincent wrestles with personal guilt, strained relationships, and a fractured sense of belonging. Through alternating perspectives, Gopal Baratham portrays a city caught between tradition and modernity, where individuals struggle to locate meaning in a society obsessed with progress. The Singapore River, once the lifeline of commerce, becomes a subdued metaphor for cleansing, loss, and the erasure of historical memory as Singapore reinvents itself. The novel highlights themes of urban alienation, fractured identities, and the dissonance between personal histories and national narratives, making it both a social critique and a psychological portrait of life in modern Singapore.
Or Else, the Lightning God & Other Stories	Catherine Lim	Seaport / migrant arrivals referenced in stories (port city background)	Singapore Strait		1980	Short Stories	Catherine Lim’s early short-story collections (including Or Else, the Lightning God) are staples of Singapore literature. Several stories in the collection stage migrants, working-class families and port-linked communities whose lives are shaped by arrivals and departures across sea routes. Lim focuses on gender relations, filial duty, class anxieties and cultural friction. The maritime element often sits in the background (the port as source of jobs, migrant origins or community memory) rather than as a continuous seascape; nonetheless these stories belong in an oceanic cluster because they foreground people whose lives were made possible by sea crossings and port economies. The volume was widely taught and influential in Singapore curricula.
The Bondmaid	Catherine Lim	Seaport / migrant arrivals referenced in stories (port city background)	Singapore Strait		1997	Novel	This novel tells the moving story of Han, aged four and the youngest daughter of an impoverished family. Sold as a slave into the House of Wu, she quickly forms a close bond with the young heir, but the idyll of childhood attachment quickly turns into a nightmare of frustrated passion as Han reaches her teens – beautiful, proud and in love with the young master. Her life becomes a struggle against the forces of tradition and tyranny in a world where lustful male relatives use bondmaids for indiscriminate pleasure, visiting monks devise ingenious schemes to combine holy public duty with unbridled private indulgence, and gods and goddesses, with careless insouciance, smile to see the human drama unfold.
Gift from the Gods	Suchen Christine Lim	Regional seaways implied (migration, folklore with coastal circulation)	Sea		1990	Novel / Long Fiction	Gift from the Gods (1990) by Suchen Christine Lim treats three generations of women and the cultural stories that shape them. Set in Singapore and Malaysia, the narrative draws on folklore, migration stories and the communal memory that travelled across seaways — merchants, migrants, and maritime cultural transmission — to situate women’s experiences in a changing society. Lim frames family histories against the longer flows that created diasporic communities, and the sea is present in that historical layering — not as a single named body but as the connective route of trade, migration, and oral tales. The novel complements Lim’s other maritime-inflected works and is useful to oceanic studies for its historical span.
A Bit of Earth	Suchen Christine Lim	Regional waterways & seafaring past evoked (Malayan coastal/plantation contexts)	Sea		2001	Novel	A Bit of Earth spans Malayan/Singapore history across families, migration and capitalist transformation. While its focus is on land and property (the title signals “earth”), the book frequently situates characters in port-region economies and in histories shaped by coastal migration and maritime trade in the Malay world. Pirates, migrant workers and seafaring diasporas appear as background conditions that influence class formation and family destinies. The novel’s sweep and attention to historical movements make it relevant to oceanic studies that read the sea in the background of economic and migratory flows, even when the plot’s primary focus is on land.
A River of Roses	Rex Shelley	Singapore River / Straits	Sea		1998	Novel	Traces four generations of a Eurasian family whose history is deeply tied to migration routes across the Straits and Singapore River. The sea appears as a backdrop of journeys, arrivals, and departures, shaping family fates. Shelley blends history and fiction to show how maritime crossings forged identity.
Island Voices: A Collection of Short Stories	ed. Robert Yeo	Coastal / Island settings	Island		1994	Short Stories	Anthology of Singaporean short stories where multiple entries engage the sea/island motif. Characters often confront coastal change, migration, or memories of seafaring ancestors. The anthology frames Singapore as an island whose literature cannot escape the presence of the surrounding waters.
Sonata in Sea Major (short story in anthology)	Gopal Baratham	Singapore Strait	Sea		1980	Short Story	Baratham’s lesser-known short story situates characters in sight of the sea, juxtaposing sensual longing and maritime imagery. The sea functions as backdrop for human alienation.
Saltwater Spirits	Syahidah Ismail	Kampung coastal waters	Sea		2010	Short Story	Contemporary short story reworking Malay coastal legends of kampungs by the sea. Sea spirits, tides, and fishing life appear as metaphors for loss of tradition amid modernisation.
Island and the City	Edwin Thumboo (poetry, but with oceanic reference)	Island/sea imagery	Sea		1970	Poetry (included for completeness)	Thumboo’s poems repeatedly invoke Singapore’s island identity and sea boundaries. They situate the nation in its maritime setting, using the sea as metaphor for openness, contact, and vulnerability
Stories by the Sea (children’s fiction anthology)	Various Singaporean writers	Coastal / Singapore Strait	Sea		2000	Short Stories	Aimed at young readers, this anthology collects sea-based tales, from fishermen to sea monsters. While written for children, it documents contemporary uses of oceanic imagination in Singaporean storytelling.
The Hidden Papyrus of Hen-taui	Rex Shelley	Maritime Singapore, shipping routes	Sea		2001	Novel	Shelley weaves a story about Eurasian roots and cultural journeys, with maritime trade routes shaping cross-cultural identity. The sea is central to history and belonging.
The Adventures of Nonya Mouse	Stella Kon	Singapore River, sea trade	Sea		1980	Children’s Fiction/Novella	A whimsical children’s tale linking Peranakan culture to maritime Singapore. The sea and river represent livelihood, migration, and stories passed across waters.
The Sum of Our Follies	Shih-Li Kow (Malaysia but includes Singapore maritime ties)	Rivers and Straits as cultural borders	Sea		2008	Novel	Though Malaysian, the text includes maritime Singapore as part of its setting, linking rivers and straits to identity and migration. Sea forms a unifying geography.
A Song of the Wind	Goh Poh Seng	South China Sea, Singapore coasts	Sea		1970	Poetic Novella	A lyrical narrative blending poetry and prose, where the sea embodies the longing for freedom and return. The waters surrounding Singapore form the backdrop for meditations on exile, homeland, and belonging.
Heartland	Daren Shiau	Kallang Basin, Singapore River	Sea		1999	Novel	A bildungsroman exploring Ah Boy’s coming of age, shaped by Singapore’s evolving urban spaces. Kallang Basin and the river act as markers of memory and shifting landscapes, contrasting the permanence of the sea with the transience of city life.
City of Small Blessings	Simon Tay	Singapore River, coastal Singapore	Sea		2009	Novel	A retired professor returns to Singapore, facing changes in the city-state. Maritime spaces mark transition and alienation. The sea represents continuity amid rapid modernity.
Love in a Small Island	Arthur Yap	Island seas, Straits	Island, Sea		1980	Short Fiction/Prose-poetry	A poetic prose narrative where the island’s love stories unfold against the seas surrounding Singapore. The sea is constant—background to fleeting relationships.
The Crocodile’s Egg	Rex Shelley	Mangrove estuaries, Singapore Straits	Sea		1990	Short Story	A Eurasian family story where the mangroves and estuaries shape identity. The river-sea boundary becomes a metaphor for danger, memory, and resilience.
Tides of Time	Philip Jeyaretnam	Singapore River	River		1990	Short Story	A modern story where love and urban history are tied to the river and tides.
The Great Reclamation	Rachel Heng	Coastal seas, reclaimed land (East Coast)	Sea		2023	Novel	A sweeping narrative set in mid-20th-century Singapore, charting a fishing boy’s love story alongside the massive land reclamation projects that reshaped the island’s coastline. It merges oceanic space with political history.
Descendants of the Eunuch Admiral	Ming Cher	Voyages of Zheng He, South China Sea	Sea		1995	Novel	Reimagines Zheng He’s legacy, the great eunuch admiral who led voyages across Southeast Asia. Maritime history becomes allegory for personal and national displacements.
Twisted Temasek	Ng Yi-Sheng	Singapore River, surrounding seas	Sea		2025	Historical fiction / Educational narrative	Middle-grade book presenting precolonial Singapore’s history with humor and satire. Explores maritime heritage, folklore, and past figures in a way accessible to young readers. Combines factual history with storytelling to make Singapore’s maritime past engaging and memorable.
Leaving	M.G. Vassanji	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Heinmann, Nairobi(1992),McClelland and Stewart	1992	Short story	The narrative centers on a young Dar es Salaam resident whose family is getting ready to immigrate to Canada in the midst of political turmoil. The sea serves as a transitional area between exile and belonging. The backdrop of the Indian Ocean, with its harbors, ships, and farewells, reflects the internal turmoil that comes with moving away from home. According to Vassanji’s diasporic realism, the Indian Ocean both unites and divides identities.
The boy who counted stars	Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor	Indian Ocean(Lamu Archipelago)	Ocean	New daughters of Africa, Myriad Edition	2019	short story	The protagonist of the tale is a Lamu boy whose desire to flee political unrest is reflected in his fascination with the stars. His quest for purpose beyond colonial borders is reflected in the sky and ocean. Mysticism, cosmology, and maritime identity are all blended together in Owuor’s poetic language.
The Maracot Deep	Arthur Conan Doyle	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	John Murray (UK), Doubleday Doran (US)	1929	Short novel	Discovery of the sunken city of Atlantis by Prof Maracot.
The House in the Cerulean Sea	T. J. Klune	Fictional Ocean	Fictional	Tor Books	2020	Novel	An enchanting story, masterfully told, The House in the Cerulean Sea is about the profound experience of discovering an unlikely family in an unexpected place—and realizing that family is yours.
Percy Jackson and The Lightning Thief	Rick Riordan	Undefined	Fictional	Disney Hyperion	2005	Novel Series	Percy Jackson is a good kid, but he can’t seem to focus on his schoolwork or control his temper. And lately, being away at boarding school is only getting worse – Percy could have sworn his pre-algebra teacher turned into a monster and tried to kill him. When Percy’s mom finds out, she knows it’s time that he knew the truth about where he came from, and that he go to the one place he’ll be safe. She sends Percy to Camp Half Blood, a summer camp for demigods (on Long Island), where he learns that the father he never knew is Poseidon, God of the Sea.
The Sea of Monsters	Rick Riordan	Atlantic Ocean, Bermuda Triangle	Ocean	Disney Hyperion	2006	Novel Series	After a year spent trying to prevent a catastropic war among the Greek gods, Percy Jackson finds his seventh-grade school year unnervingly quiet. His biggest problem is dealing with his new friend, Tyson–a six-foot-three, mentally challenged homeless kid who follows Percy everywhere, making it hard for Percy to have any “normal” friends.
Island of the Blue Dolphins	Scott O’Dell	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	HMH Books for Young Readers	1960	Novel	The book is based on the true story of “The Lone Woman of San Nicholas Island,” a Nicoleño Native Californian who lived alone for 18 years on San Nicolas Island, one of the Channel Islands off the California coast.
Bug Eater	Nathan M. Beauchamp	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	When the boats that sustain the tribe don’t return from their most recent raid, Angi must take a terrible risk to try and protect her people from starvation. But will anyone listen to someone with the nickname “Bug Eater” in the first place?
Tide Sweeping	P.K. Tyler	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	Dust and sand have devoured the Earth, leaving behind only pockets of salt water protected by Sweepers who serve the Tide.
The Titan’s Daughter	Daniel Arthur Smith	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	A mysterious longing haunts a man.
Dancing in the Midnight Ocean	Daniel Arthur Smith	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	At depths below the midnight line, there is no sunlight from the surface. The genetically-modified humans who dwell in that darkness shine with the light of their own bioluminescence and build pipelines to power the brightwater cities. The lure of the cities threatens to pull two lovers apart, and forces them to question what it means to be human.
Siren Song of the Mississippi Queen	Hank Garner	Gulf of Mexico	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	Will is a commercial fisherman who has made his living from the Gulf of Mexico, like his father before him. Gabby, his sister, hears voices she believes are from the queen of an ancient civilization off the Mississippi coast. When she goes missing, Will has to decide if the legends his mother passed down to him and his sister are real, or a figment of his sister’s imagination.

The Hunt for the Vigilant	Alex Shvartsman	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	Magic is real — and it’s programmable. Eldritch gods exist but can be held at bay by consuming coffee and playing YouTube videos of warding chants. And now the whole world knows this. An eccentric billionaire sees this as a business opportunity. He recruits the man responsible for revealing the existence of magic to the public for a mission to the bottom of the South Pacific that is more dangerous than either of them realize.

Aquagenic	Will Swardstrom	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	Allergic to water, Cora is a mystery. Four months ago she was found on a beach in Oregon, covered in a rash with no memory of her life. The memory never recovers, leaving Cora with no family and no life. Struggling to make sense of everything, Cora befriends Dana, a nurse at her residential facility. Together, the two work to figure out how her memory and water allergy connect and who—or what—Cora actually is.
New Year’s Eve	Joshua Ingle	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	The life story of a renowned oceanographer, told backward from the brink of her death in the 2070s to her childhood in the 1990s, as she probes the memories from her life full of hardship and failure for an answer to the question: Was it all worth it?
Turtle: An A.L.I.V.E. Story	R.D. Brady	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	A short breather from the mysterious R.I.S.E. base should be a relief. But for former D.E.A.D. agent Norah Tidwell, her break opens her eyes to the damage humanity is inflicting upon this planet, and offers a clue to the terrifying reason the base was created.
Girt by Sea	S. Elliot Brandis	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	During an outbreak that wiped out most of humanity, a fleet of eleven ships sought refuge on the ocean. Generations later, they returned to resettle on land.
Full Circle: A CHRONOS Story	Rysa Walker	Undefined/ Fictional	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	A strange glowing circle buried in her great-great-grandmother’s garden transports a young historian to the site of an underwater crypt. Will Madi escape from the Cyrists, or is she in too deep?
Dispatches from the Cradle: The Hermit—Forty-Eight Hours in the Sea of Massachusetts	Ken Liu	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Holt Smith Limited	2017	Short Story	Venus is settled, and the technology exists for the Grand Task—the terraforming of both Earth and Mars—to bring Earth back. But some inhabitants like the planet as it is.
Two Thousand Seasons	Ayi Kwei Armah	Gulf Stream, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Heinemann Educational Books	1973	Novel	An epic narrative where the Atlantic becomes a historical symbol of enslavement and disruption of communal life during transatlantic slave trade. Although the water body is also used as a site of spiritual return by invoking the Godhead in the novel. This reflects how a single water body can be portrayed as a site of binarisation, struggle and reclamation.
Feeding the Ghosts	Fred D’Aguiar	West African coast, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Chatto & Windus	2007	Novel	The novel is based on the true story of a slave ship Zong that can be read as an enclosed space of inhumane confinement, and the sea as the representation of a suspended space and time in the form of an in-betweenness – a “non space” that could also be synonymous with an unending Middle Passage. The sea can also be seen as a space of imagination, a space where the voices of the past can be both heard and reappropriated through acts of creative remembering. Besides, the novel can also be analysed as a sea of (his)story/stories, a “road of bones”, re-routing history by expressing historical facts through new narrative devices, while preserving history and allowing it to endure.
The Beautiful Ones Are Not Yet Born	Ayi Kwei Armah	Mali to Atlantic coast	Ocean	Houghton Mifflin	1968	Novel	This Ghanaian novel centers on an unnamed protagonist in Accra during the transition from Nkrumah’s government to military rule. The Atlantic Ocean’s presence in Ghana’s capital city permeates the narrative, with characters living and working near the coast. The harbor and fishing communities appear throughout, showing how the ocean shapes economic life and social structures. The sea represents both Ghana’s connection to the wider world through trade and the corrupting influences that arrive via maritime routes. Scenes set near the ocean showcase the contrast between natural beauty and urban decay, between the eternal rhythms of the Atlantic and the temporary political upheavals consuming the nation. The protagonist observes ships in the harbor, symbols of the international commerce that enriches some while impoverishing many. The ocean’s constancy provides a counterpoint to rapid social change, while coastal landscapes reflect the novel’s themes of moral decay and the possibility of renewal.
The Famished Road	Ben Okri	Nigerian waterways leading to Atlantic	Ocean	Jonathan Cape	1991	Novel	This Booker Prize-winning novel follows Azaro, a spirit child in Nigeria who exists between the physical and spiritual worlds. The Atlantic Ocean serves as a powerful presence throughout the narrative, particularly in scenes where characters journey to coastal areas and interact with the sea. The ocean represents both a barrier and a gateway, embodying the liminal spaces that Azaro himself inhabits. Lagos, Nigeria’s coastal setting provides a backdrop where the sea influences daily life, trade, and the movement of people. The novel weaves magical realism with the harsh realities of post-colonial Nigeria, and the Atlantic appears in pivotal moments as characters seek freedom, contemplate migration, or engage with the spirits that inhabit the waters. The ocean’s rhythms mirror the cyclical nature of Azaro’s existence, constantly being pulled between life and death, the spirit world and the material realm, while the coastal environment shapes the community’s spiritual beliefs and economic survival.
The Sacred River	Syl Cheney-Coker	Ogbanje spirit’s river or the waters of Ala (the Earth goddess)—metaphorically and literally connected to the Niger River system in southeastern Nigeria.	Ocean	Simon &Schuster Ltd.	2014	Novel
The Radiance of the King	Camara Lye		Ocean	NYRB Classics (2001)	1954	Novel	This allegorical novel follows Clarence, a white man who arrives on Africa’s Atlantic coast after being financially ruined. Stranded in a fictional West African coastal kingdom, he journeys inland seeking an audience with the king. The opening sections vividly depict the Atlantic coastal town where Clarence disembarks, disoriented and desperate. The ocean represents his separation from Europe and his inability to return to his former life. Maritime imagery recurs as Clarence recalls his arrival by sea and contemplates the impossibility of departure. The coastal setting establishes the novel’s dreamlike quality, with the Atlantic serving as the boundary between worlds. The sea voyage that brings Clarence to Africa marks his descent from privilege into dependence and eventual spiritual transformation. The novel reverses colonial narratives, showing a European lost in African spaces, and the ocean marks this reversal rather than bringing European power and civilization, it delivers a broken man seeking redemption.
Atlantic Crossing	Nii Parkes	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Time Life Books	2019	Short Story Collection	The Atlantic Ocean is central to the novel’s plot and themes, primarily because it represents the historical and cultural connection, as well as the traumatic separation, between West Africa (specifically Ghana) and the Caribbean and the Americas. The Middle Passage and Trauma: The “crossing” referenced in the title alludes to the Middle Passage, the forced transatlantic voyage that brought millions of enslaved Africans across the Atlantic to the New World.
Everything Good Will Come	Sefi Atta	Ghanaian coast, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Interlink Books	2005	Novel	This Nigerian novel follows Enitan from childhood through adulthood against the backdrop of Nigeria’s political turbulence. Set largely in Lagos, the Atlantic Ocean serves as a constant presence in the narrative. Enitan and her friends spend time at Lagos beaches, and the ocean marks the boundary of her geographical and imaginative world. Childhood scenes at Bar Beach show innocent play alongside poverty and danger, establishing the novel’s themes of class, gender, and power. As Enitan matures, the Atlantic continues to appear in significant moments:romantic encounters, political discussions, and personal revelations occur in coastal settings. The ocean represents both freedom and limitation for Nigerian women navigating patriarchal constraints. Fishing communities along the coast provide contrasting perspectives to middle-class Lagos life. The Atlantic’s international scope mirrors Enitan’s growing awareness of Nigeria’s place in global politics, particularly during military dictatorships when the ocean represents potential escape or isolation. The novel’s feminist perspective incorporates oceanic imagery when addressing women’s autonomy and resistance against oppressive systems.
Fragments	Ayi Kwei Armah	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Heinemann Educational Books	1969	Novel	This Ghanaian novel follows Baako, who returns home to Ghana after studying in America, arriving via the Atlantic. The ocean journey marks his reentry into Ghanaian society and his growing alienation from both Western and traditional African values. Accra’s coastal setting situates the narrative at the intersection of African and global cultures, with the Atlantic representing connection and distance simultaneously. The harbor appears as a site of economic activity and symbolic importance, cargo ships bring the material goods that Baako’s family desires, representing Ghana’s neocolonial dependence on foreign trade and consumption. The ocean also appears in scenes depicting fishing communities whose traditional ways of life contrast with urban corruption and materialism. Baako walks along beaches, contemplating his fragmented identity and Ghana’s fragmented post-independence trajectory. The Atlantic’s presence reinforces the novel’s themes of connection and disconnection, tradition and modernity, as Ghana navigates its relationship with the oceanic routes that bind it to former colonial powers and global capitalism.
Half Of A Yellow Sun	Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie	Niger river	Ocean	4th Estate	2006	Novel	This powerful novel set during the Nigerian Civil War includes scenes in Port Harcourt and other coastal areas. The Atlantic Ocean and Niger Delta waterways play significant roles, particularly as the Biafran conflict intensifies. Characters flee toward or from coastal regions, and the naval blockade of Biafra makes the Atlantic a source of starvation and isolation. Port Harcourt, an Atlantic-facing city, becomes a refuge before falling to federal forces. Scenes describe the importance of coastal access for Biafra’s survival and the devastating effects of losing it. The ocean represents both Biafra’s hope for international intervention (which never materializes) and its vulnerability to blockade. Characters discuss ships that might bring weapons or food, making the Atlantic a source of desperate speculation. Refugee movements toward coastal areas seeking escape show the ocean as both barrier and possible salvation. The novel’s structure, alternating between pre-war comfort and wartime suffering, uses coastal settings to mark this transformation: peaceful beach holidays give way to militarized coastlines and desperate attempts to control Atlantic access.
No Longer At Ease	Chinua Achebe	Atlantic Ocean, Niger Delta	Ocean	Heinemann	1960	novel	This novel follows Obi Okonkwo, grandson of Okonkwo from Things Fall Apart, as he returns to Nigeria after studying in England. The protagonist works in Lagos, Nigeria’s Atlantic coastal capital, navigating corruption and cultural conflicts in the colonial civil service. Lagos’s coastal setting pervades the narrative, with the city’s harbor, beaches, and maritime activities forming part of the urban landscape. The Atlantic Ocean represents Nigeria’s connection to the colonial power across the sea and the route of Obi’s transformative journey to and from England. Lagos’s identity as a port city shapes the novel’s themes of cultural collision, with goods, people, and ideas flowing through its Atlantic gateway. The novel examines how coastal urban Nigeria differs from traditional inland villages, with the ocean symbolizing modernity, opportunity, and moral corruption. Scenes occur near the harbor and coastal neighborhoods, showing how the Atlantic influences Lagos life. The ocean remains a constant presence—sometimes explicit, sometimes implicit in this portrait of postcolonial Nigerian coastal society struggling between tradition and Western influence.
What it means when a man falls from the sky	Lesley Nneka Arimah	Lagos	Ocean	Riverhead Books (US) Tinder Press (UK)	2020	Short Story	Arimah’s title story unfolds in a dystopian, mathematically engineered world where the laws of physics and emotion have shifted after cataclysmic floods have reshaped the Earth’s geography. In this speculative context, parts of the world particularly West Africa along the Atlantic coast, have been transformed by rising sea levels and climate collapse. The ocean is thus a literal agent of change: it has redrawn maps, drowned nations, and forced migrations. It represents the new physical reality of a planet paying for human arrogance and colonial exploitation of nature.
The Joys of Motherhood	Buchi Emecheta	Atlantic coast	Ocean	Allison & Busby	1979	Novel	This Nigerian novel follows Nnu Ego from her Igbo village to Lagos, where she lives near the coast. The Atlantic Ocean appears in Lagos scenes, marking the city’s geography and its role as colonial and post-colonial capital. The novel addresses women’s exploitation and the contradictions of motherhood in rapidly changing Nigeria. Lagos’s coastal setting represents modernity and opportunity contrasted with traditional inland villages. The ocean’s presence reminds characters of Lagos’s connection to colonial power, the city grew as a British port on the Atlantic. Nnu Ego’s struggles occur in neighborhoods where the ocean’s proximity shapes climate, economy, and culture. Market scenes near the coast show women trading fish and imported goods arriving via Atlantic shipping routes. The ocean represents the broader world that has disrupted traditional Igbo life, bringing both opportunities and oppression. As Nnu Ego ages, the Atlantic remains a constant background presence in her Lagos life, symbolizing the unchanging forces against which her personal tragedies unfold.
The Water Dancer	Ta-Nehisi Coates	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	One World	2019	Historical Fiction	The Water Dancer is a melancholic and suspenseful novel that merges the slavery narrative with the genres of fantasy or quest novels. The book’s most poignant and painful gift is the temporary fantasy that all the people who leaped off slave ships and into the Atlantic were not drowning themselves in terror and anguish, but going home.
Ama: A Story of the Atlantic Slave Trade	Manu Herbstein	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean		2000	Novel	The major water body mentioned in Ama Ata Aidoo’s “The Slave Girl” (specifically, her play “Anowa,” which is most often studied in this context) is the sea—or, more specifically, the Atlantic Ocean. The sea is described in the story as “bigger than any river and boils without being hot.” It symbolizes the vastness and the terror associated with the trans-Atlantic slave trade, serving both as a literal reference to the route taken by slave ships and as a metaphor for trauma and loss in the play.Vividly depicts the transatlantic slave trade from the West African shore; includes detailed maritime imagery and shipboard life across the Atlantic.
Graceland	Chris Abani	Atlantic Ocean, Moroccan coast	Ocean	Farrar, Straus and Giroux	2004	Novel	This Nigerian novel follows Elvis, a teenage impersonator living in Lagos slums. The Atlantic Ocean pervades the narrative through Lagos’s coastal geography, characters frequent beaches, work at the docks, and navigate neighborhoods shaped by proximity to the ocean. The Atlantic represents both hope and despair in the novel’s exploration of urban poverty. Beach scenes show Lagos residents seeking respite from harsh living conditions, with the ocean offering temporary escape. The harbor’s economic activity demonstrates Lagos’s role as a maritime hub, with shipping, smuggling, and fishing providing precarious livelihoods. Elvis dreams of America, and the Atlantic represents the distance between his dreams and reality. Scenes involving beach erosion and flooding show the ocean’s destructive power, particularly affecting poor coastal communities. The novel’s unflinching portrayal of child abuse, poverty, and violence occurs against the backdrop of Atlantic Lagos, with the ocean serving as witness to human suffering and resilience. The international dimension of Lagos’s problems: drug trafficking, corruption arrives via oceanic routes, making the Atlantic complicit in urban decay.
Our Sister Killjoy	Ama Ata Aidoo	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Longman	1977	Novel	Aidoo, a Ghanaian writer, tells the story of Sissie, or Our Sister Killjoy, a young Ghanaian woman who travels around Europe before eventually returning home. She spends most of the narrative in Germany, where she befriends a young German mother named Marija. She also visits England. Sissie is frustrated that so many Africans travel to Europe to study or work but never go home. She deals with the alienation that comes with being a foreigner in Europe in the 1960s and questions common post-colonial attitudes in the African diaspora. The sea and ocean physically represent the vast distance—geographical, cultural, and psychological—between Africa and Europe. Sissie’s journey across this water is a literal and symbolic movement from her homeland to a “strange land” that often leaves the African protagonist feeling uprooted and in exile.
Arde el monte de noche	Juan Tomas Avila Laurel	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	And Other Stories (2014)	2009	novel	This novel recounts a narrator’s childhood on Annobón, a remote island off the West African coast in the Atlantic Ocean, part of Equatorial Guinea. The islanders live in complete isolation, dependent entirely on the ocean for survival through fishing. The narrator describes how “we islanders had no one to depend on but ourselves. That’s to say, we were on our own out in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean,” as they watch the horizon daily hoping for supply boats. When disasters strike, a devastating bush fire and a cholera outbreak killing hundreds, the superstitious islanders believe they must sacrifice their possessions to appease the enraged ocean god. The Atlantic surrounds every aspect of life: fishing provides their only food source, canoe-building employs entire communities, and the sea determines survival or death. The novel employs oral storytelling techniques, building from quiet observation of daily island rhythms into gripping drama. Laurel, Equatorial Guinea’s most important living writer, based this on memories of growing up on Annobón Island before going into political exile.
Ghana Must Go	Taiye Selasi	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Group	2013	novel	This family saga follows the Sai family across multiple continents: from Accra, Ghana to Lagos, Nigeria to London and New York, beginning with surgeon Kweku Sai’s sudden death at dawn in suburban Accra. Kweku grew up in a small fishermen’s village on Ghana’s Atlantic coast, and after his death, his family returns to Ghana for a funeral held next to the ocean, eventually scattering his ashes in the Atlantic waters where he spent his childhood. The narrative explores the trauma experienced by the twin children Taiwo and Kehinde during a disturbing episode in Lagos, Nigeria’s coastal city. The novel moves fluidly between coastal African cities and diaspora locations, with the Atlantic Ocean serving as both separator and connector for this transnational African family. While not exclusively focused on oceanic settings, significant sequences occur in Accra and Lagos, both Atlantic coastal cities, and the ocean bookends the narrative, from Kweku’s childhood by the sea to his final return to those waters. The title references the 1983 expulsion of Ghanaian immigrants from Nigeria, a coastal migration crisis.
Beneath the Waves: Newfoundland Sea Stories	Clarence Vautier	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Flanker Press	2006	Collection of personal history	These recollected pieces of the past involved shipwrecks, family tragedies, collisions at sea, and much more.
The Coast of Newfoundland: The Southwest Corner	Clarence Vautier	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Flanker Press	2002	Collection of Short Stories	Clarence Vautier illuminates the great seagoing traditions of the remote, southwest waters of Newfoundland. The Coast of Newfoundland is a tribute to the men and women who faced the challenge of the sea, usually with success, but not without personal tragedy.
Lament for an Ocean: The Collapse of the Atlantic Cod Fishery, A True Crime Story	Michael Harris	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	McClelland & Stewart	1998	True Crime Story	In Lament for an Ocean, the award-winning true-crime writer Michael Harris investigates the real causes of the most wanton destruction of a natural resource in North American history since the buffalo were wiped off the face of the prairies. The story he carefully unfolds is the sorry tale of how, despite the repeated and urgent warnings of ocean scientists, the northern cod was ruthlessly exploited.
Indonesian Gold	Kerry B. Collison	South China Sea, the Java Sea, and the Makassar Strait		Sid Harta Publishers	2002	Novel	The novel fictionalises the events of the Bre-X gold mining fraud. The story follows a Canadian mining company, Borneo Gold Corporation, as it fakes a massive gold discovery in the rainforests of Kalimantan. The fraudulent discovery propels the company’s stock to unprecedented heights, attracting powerful and corrupt figures from three different countries. In the process, the Dayak indigenous tribes are forcibly displaced from their ancestral lands, leading to ethnic violence and environmental destruction
Noto of Java	Jono Hardjowirogo	Southern Ocean		Xlibris US	2012	Novel	Orphaned during the political turmoil of 1965, the protagonist Noto navigates a complex journey through life. He finds success through cunning and determination, rising quickly through the ranks of the military. When he uncovers the mystery of his parentage, he is led to the palace and the Sultan, who has received a spiritual premonition of his arrival. His story is intertwined with the myth of Nyai Roro Kidul, the Goddess of the Southern Ocean, which marks him as a special and powerful individual.
Maiba: A Papuan Novel	Russell Soaba	sea/ocean		Lynne Rienner Publishers	1979	Novel	The novel centers around Maiba, a prominent figure in her remote coastal village. The story revolves around the internal and external conflicts arising from the encroachment of modern influences on the traditional Papuan way of life. It critiques the erosion of traditional values and the chaos that ensues when new, less effective forms of leadership (like Doboro Thomas) replace established systems. The novel portrays the struggles of the villagers to maintain their cultural identity amidst rapid social change.
When All Else Fails	Rayyan Al-Shawaf	Middle Eastern waters (implied)		Interlink Books	2019	Literary Fiction	Darkly humorous novel set in post-9/11 America and Middle East following Iraqi college student Hunayn navigating US aftermath of 9/11. Although Chaldean (not Muslim), Hunayn’s identity constantly under question. While primarily about identity and discrimination, incorporates references to Iraqi waterways as part of homeland memory and cultural identity.
Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life	Herman Melville	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	John Murray	1846	Novel	A semi-fictionalised account of Melville’s experiences among the Typee people in the Marquesas Islands after deserting a whaling ship, offering observations of Polynesian culture and society.
Omoo: A Narrative of Adventures in the South Seas	Herman Melville	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	John Murray	1847	Novel	Drawing from personal experiences in the Pacific, Melville crafts a vivid portrayal of life aboard a South Sea whaling vessel, exploring recruitment practices, authority conflicts, and even mutiny among the crew and islander sailors.
Mardi: and A Voyage Thither	Herman Melville	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Harper and Brothers	1849	Novel	Chronicles the journey of Taji, a restless sailor who abandons his whaling ship to embark on a philosophical quest across the Pacific Ocean, seeking deeper meaning beyond conventional maritime life.
The Adventure of Elizabeth Morey, of New York	Louis Becke	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Dodo Press (2008)	1901	Novel	Set in the early 1800s South Pacific, this historical maritime tale follows an American woman’s extraordinary journey through betrayal, shipwreck, and eventual captivity on Tongatabu island.
Tom Wallis: A Tale of the South Seas	Louis Becke	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (2018)	1905	Novel	The narrative centres on a young Australian boy whose coastal town upbringing ignites dreams of South Seas adventure, culminating in a courageous rescue mission after discovering a shipwrecked vessel.
The Moon and Sixpence	W. Somerset Maugham	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	William Heinemann	1919	Novel	Inspired by Paul Gauguin’s life, this novel depicts one man’s radical departure from Western society as he seeks artistic liberation in Tahiti, portraying the island as a mythic paradise.
The Cruise of the Kawa: Wanderings in the South Seas	George S. Chappell (Walter E. Traprock)	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Kessinger Publishing (2007)	1921	Novel	This satirical travelogue follows the yacht Kawa’s crew exploring the fictional Filbert Islands in the South Pacific.
The Trembling of a Leaf: Little Stories of the South Sea Islands	W. Somerset Maugham	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	George H. Doran Company	1921	Novel	Maugham’s collection delves into the nuanced relationships between Western visitors and Pacific islanders, examining cultural differences and human psychology against the backdrop of South Sea island life.
Hawaii	James A. Michener	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Random House (1986)	1959	Novel	An epic historical saga tracing the Hawaiian islands from their volcanic formation through Polynesian settlement, highlighting the Pacific voyagers who navigated vast distances and the cultural transformations brought by American missionaries.
Makutu	Thomas Davis & Lydia Henderson	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Michael Joseph	1960	Novel	Distinguished as the first published novel from Oceania, set on the fictional island of Lei, this work navigates the complex tensions between traditional Pacific customs and encroaching Western influences.
Wild Justice: Stories of the South Seas	Lloyd Osbourne	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Kessinger Publishing (2008)	1965	Novel	This collection captures early 20th-century Pacific life through stories of cultural collision, featuring characters like Jack Wilson who find the ocean both an escape route and a catalyst for personal transformation.
The Crocodile	Vincent Eri	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Jacaranda Press	1970	Novel	Depicting pre-colonial Papua New Guinea, the novel integrates traditional mythology, legends, and magical narratives to illustrate village life where sacred customs intertwine with daily experiences.
A Childhood Experience	Sitiveni Kalouniviti	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	NIU, Yearbook of the Student’s Association, University of the South Pacific	1972	Novel	A short fiction piece cantered around Dakuwaqa, the Fijian shark-god.
Pounamu Pounamu	Witi Ihimaera	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Reed Publishing	1972	Novel	One of the earliest published Maori fiction collections in English, exploring Indigenous identity, community bonds, and the profound connection to both terrestrial landscapes and oceanic environments.
Leaves of the Banyan Tree	Albert Wendt	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Longman Paul Limited	1979	Novel	A multigenerational family saga set in Western Samoa that examines the corrosive effects of greed, colonialism, and external influences on traditional island society across three distinct generations.
Flying-Fox in a Freedom Tree	Albert Wendt	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Longman Paul Limited	1974	Novel	This collection portrays Pacific islanders confronting rapid modernisation, blending humour with observations about cultural dislocation and identity formation amid changing traditions.
The Bone People	Keri Hulme	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Spiral	1984	Novel	The ocean serves as both physical setting and metaphorical force in this novel exploring the complex relationships between three outcasts in New Zealand, where marine environments embody mystery and psychological trauma.
Kauai Tales	Frederick B. Wichman	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Bamboo Ridge Press	1985	Novel	Comprising 18 traditional stories from oral and written sources, this collection preserves Kauaʻi’s cultural heritage through tales explaining natural phenomena like dangerous ocean currents and coloured river waters.
Potiki	Patricia Grace	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Penguin	1986	Novel	Through multiple narrators in a coastal Maori community, the novel chronicles resistance against development threatening their land and meeting hall, highlighting indigenous connection to place against Pacific backdrop.
The Whale Rider	Witi Ihimaera	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Reed Publishing	1987	Novel	Eight-year-old Kahu challenges gender traditions by seeking to become her Maori tribe’s chief in Whangara, New Zealand, discovering a sacred ability to communicate with whales that links her to ancestral heritage.
The Frigate Bird	Alaister Te Ariki Campbell	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Penguin	1989	Novel	Moving between the Cook Islands, New Zealand, and surreal inner landscapes, this novel explores identity and memory through Polynesian spirituality, grounding psychological journeys in Pacific cultural contexts.
Penelope’s Island	James McNeish	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Hodder & Stoughton Ltd	1990	Novel	Set during political unrest in 1970s-80s New Caledonia, the narrative follows an outsider woman entangled in local tensions through her marriage to a French-descended islander during a turbulent period.
The Old Man, the Boy and the Shark	Joseph Veramu	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Polynesian Press	1991	Novel	Set in a coastal Fijian village, this children’s tale is about relationships and traditional stories connected to marine ecology.
Vaka: Saga of a Polynesian canoe	Tom Davis & Thomas R. A. H. Davis	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	G.P. Putnam’s Sons	1992	Novel	This historical narrative traces three centuries of Pacific navigation through the legacy of a single great canoe, Takitumu, celebrating the maritime achievements of Polynesian voyagers.
The Happy Isles of Oceania: Paddling the Pacific	Paul Theroux	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	William Morrow & Co	1992	Novel	Through an ambitious kayak journey from New Zealand’s rainforests to remote atolls, this travelogue captures the diverse geographies, cultures, and challenges of Pacific exploration.
The Last Night on Bikini	Patricia MacInnes	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Allen & Unwin	1995	Novel	Set on Kwajalein Island, this work examines the devastating aftermath of American nuclear testing programs in the Marshall Islands, interweaving personal trauma with environmental destruction.
Port Villa Blues	Garry Disher	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Kaya Press	1995	Novel	This crime novel featuring thief Wyatt utilises Vanuatu’s Port Vila marina and coastline as both symbolic and practical backdrops for exploring corruption, criminal enterprises, and colonial legacies.
Where We Once Belonged	Sia Figiel	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Headline Publshing Group	1996	Novel	The first novel by a Samoan woman published in the United States blends prose, poetry, and traditional su’ifefiloi storytelling in examining postcolonial tensions and feminine identity formation.
The Web	Jonathan Kellerman	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Big Indian	1996	Novel	This psychological thriller unfolds on fictional Aruk Island, where isolation, secrecy, and moral ambiguity intensify against a backdrop of economic decline and military presence in a remote Pacific locale.
Blackbird	David Crookes	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Hazard Press	1998	Novel	Following the characters Kiri and Ben, this historical novel examines the brutal legacy of Blackbirding-the exploitation of South Sea Islanders on colonial plantations in 19th-century Queensland.
Fantasy With Witches	Alistair Te Ariki Campbell	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Penguin	1998	Novel	On an isolated Pacific island, a mother-daughter pair possessing supernatural abilities to control hurricanes becomes both feared and revered, blending island folklore with themes of power and mysticism.
Burn My Head in Heaven	John Pule	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Kaya Press	1998	Novel	Anchored in Niuean cosmology and island identity, this work integrates magical realism with narratives of migration, exploring indigenous Pacific spirituality and diaspora experiences.
They Who Do Not Grieve	Sia Figiel	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Beacon Press	1999	Novel	Interweaving three generations of Samoan women’s lives, this narrative incorporates myth and supernatural elements centred on the malu-a sacred tattoo connected to ancestral oceanic migration.
Makai	Kathleen Tyau	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	G.P.Putnam’s Sons	1999	Novel	Makai (meaning “toward the sea”) explores identity and resilience through two Chinese-American women in Hawai’i, where oceanic imagery symbolizes longing, transformation, and the pull of heritage.
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex	Nathaniel Philbrick	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Alfred A. Knopf	2000	Novel	Recounting the 1820 sinking of the whaleship Essex by a sperm whale in the South Pacific, this narrative details the crew’s desperate survival at sea and illuminates the perils of 19th-century whaling.
Melal: A Novel of the Pacific	Robert Barclay	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	University of Hawai’i Press	2001	Novel	Chronicles the extraordinary 227-day survival of Pi Patel, a spiritually curious Tamil boy who finds himself stranded on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean alongside an unlikely companion – a Bengal tiger named Richard Parker.
Blue Latitudes: Boldly Going Where Captain Cook Has Gone Before	Tony Horwitz	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Henry Holt and Company	2002	Novel	Set in the Marshall Islands, this work follows a family coping with the enduring consequences of nuclear testing and environmental damage, examining cultural resilience amid ecological devastation.
The Trickster	Jane Downing	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Pandanus Books	2002	Novel	Blending historical research with contemporary travel, Horwitz retraces Captain James Cook’s Pacific voyages, sailing aboard a replica vessel while examining the complex legacy of European exploration on island cultures.
Forever in Paradise	Apelu Tielu	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Pandanus Books	2003	Novel	Based in Majuro, this novel portrays an Australian woman adjusting to Marshall Islands life and motherhood while encountering indigenous mythology woven into contemporary experience.
Sky Dancer	Witi Ihimaera	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Penguin	2003	Novel	Following the Samoan character of Tuisamoa navigating leadership responsibilities, this narrative explores tensions between fa’a Samoa traditions and modernizing influences against coastal landscapes.
Pacific	Judy Nunn	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Arrow Books	2003	Novel	This work integrates contemporary characters into traditional Māori mythology concerning warring terrestrial and aquatic birds, bridging ancient Pacific storytelling with modern narrative approaches.
The Wreck	Déwé Gorodé	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Madrépores (French) Little Island Press (English)	2004	Novel	Spanning both contemporary and World War II-era Vanuatu, this dual-timeline narrative connects an Australian actress with an English advocate for ni-Vanuatu people, examining colonial legacies against island backdrops.
Poinciana	Jane Turner Goldsmith	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Wakefield Press	2005 (French) 2011(English)	Novel	Focusing on returned soldier Tom and his lover Léna in New Caledonia, this novel weaves love, ancestral dreams, and political memory around a symbolically significant shipwreck.
Mutiny on the Bounty	John Boyne	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Black Swan	2006	Novel	Shortlisted for the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, this New Caledonian narrative intertwines Catherine’s search for her father with Robert’s struggle between Kanak heritage and Caldoche upbringing amid divided island society.
Toki: The True Adventures of William Mariner	Brian K. Crawford	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform	2008	Novel	The historical novel reimagines the HMS Bounty voyage through the perspective of fourteen-year-old John Jacob Turnstile, Captain Bligh’s valet, and depicts 18th-century maritime life from England to Tahiti.
Food of Ghosts	Marianne Wheelaghan	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Pilrig Press	2009	Novel	This novel reconstructs the survival story of a sailor following shipwreck in Tonga, detailing the cultural adaptation and daily existence of an outsider integrated into Pacific island life.
The Secret Life of James Cook	Graeme Lay	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Harper Collins	2012	Novel	Set on Tarawa atoll in Kiribati, this detective story explores the unique challenges of investigating murder in an isolated, ocean-bound community with limited resources and complex social dynamics.
James Cook’s New World	Graeme Lay	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Harper Collins	2013	Novel	First in a trilogy, this historical novel reimagines Captain James Cook’s early life and initial Pacific voyage.
James Cook’s Lost World	Graeme Lay	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Harper Collins	2014	Novel	The second instalment in Lay’s trilogy traces Cook as naval commander leading an ambitious expedition to find the mythical Terra Australis.
Into the Drowning Deep	Mira Grant	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Orbit	2015	Novel	Concluding Lay’s trilogy, this text chronicles Cook’s final voyage seeking the Northwest Passage in 1775, exploring the tension between domestic life and the inescapable allure of uncharted waters.
Whalefall	Daniel Kraus	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	MTV Books	2017	Novel	This science fiction thriller focuses on a scientific expedition to the Mariana Trench investigating a mysterious shipwreck, transforming the deep Pacific into a setting for ecological horror and discovery.
Playground	Richard Powers	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Random House	2023	Novel	In this survival tale, the protagonist diving near Monastery Beach is attacked by a giant squid and subsequently swallowed by a sperm whale, initiating a desperate struggle to survive with limited oxygen.
The Rice Mother	Rani Manicka	The Indian Ocean	Ocean	Penguin Publishing Group (2004)	2002	Novel	Nothing in Lakshmi’s childhood, running carefree and barefoot on the sun-baked earth amid the coconut and mango trees of Ceylon, could have prepared her for what life was to bring her. At fourteen, she finds herself traded in marriage to a stranger across the ocean in the fascinating land of Malaysia.
When Eight Bells Toll	Alistair Maclean	Irish Sea	Sea	Collins	1966	Novel	From the moment agent Philip Calvert begins his pursuit of a superbly organised gang of seagoing hijackers, this pulse-pounding yarn slips into high.
An Ancient Tale from Andaman	Anvita Abbi	Andaman Sea	Sea	National Book Trust	2022	Short Story	This book is a tale from the Andaman Islands, suitable for readers aged 7 and up.
Viper Prison Break	Neelam Francis	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Wings Publication International	2023	Novel	In the days of expanding empires and sprouting penal colonies a dreaded chain of islands, known since ancient times for fierce tribes and inhospitable climate, is chosen to build a place of punishment for all those who opposed the colonial powers. Even the slightest of crimes or even an allegation, is enough to condemn a person to transportation for life to the colony from which no one ever returned. Hemraj, an innocent villager, becomes the victim of a conspiracy that sends him across the black waters with no hope of return. When his requests for parole are repeatedly rejected Hemraj chooses the only path open for him is to escape! Viper Prison Break is the daring tale of escape by Hemraj and his band of fellow convicts. Though partly fictionalized it is a true story.
Mare Tranquillitatis	Soham Guha	Undefined	Ocean	Future Fiction	2024	Short Story	A speculative novel. It takes the current Indian attitudes regarding climate change to their logical progression, perhaps fifty years down the line.
Mother Ocean	Vandana Singh	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Current Futures	2019	Short Story	A South Asian woman harbors a deep fascination with the ocean. When she works with renegade scientists to track a blue whale, the woman and the whale form a deep bond.
The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi	Shannon Chakraborty	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Harper Voyager	2023	Novel	Shannon Chakraborty, the bestselling author of The City of Brass, spins a new trilogy of magic and mayhem on the high seas in this tale of pirates and sorcerers, forbidden artifacts and ancient mysteries, in one woman’s determined quest to seize a final chance at glory—and write her own legend.
Skin of the Sea	Natasha Bowen	Sea in general	Sea	Random House	2021	Nevel	Bowen’s debut novel follows Simi, a mami wata who travels across sea and land in search of the Supreme Creator after breaking a law that threatens the existence of all mami wata.
Twist	Colum McCann
The Last Wave	Pankaj Sekhsaria
Waiting for Turtles	Pankaj Sekhsaria
Across the Kala Pani	Shevlyn Mottai
The Fog Horn	Ray Bradbury
A Matter of Fact	Rudyard Kipling
The Merry Men	Robert Louis Stevenson
After the Storm	Ernest Hemingway
The Treasure Ship	Saki
Through the Tunnel	Doris Lessing
Cruise	John Updike
The Cruise of the Jolly Roger	Kurt Vonnegurt
One for the Islands	Patricia Highsmith
The Open Boat	Stephen Crane
The House of Mapuhi	Jack London
Youth	Joseph Conrad
Titanic Victim Speaks through Waterbed	Robert Olen Butler
The Young Man with the Carnation	Isak Dinesen
John Marr	Herman Melville
Now Wakes the Sea	J. G. Ballard
Sail Shining in White	Mark Helprin
Beyond the Sea	Paul Lynch
Incantations Over Water	Sharanya Manivannan
The Woman Who Breathed Two Worlds	Selina Siak Chin Yoke
	English	Ocean		2016		Set in a fishing village in the 1930s-40s. The community’s life and fate are entirely dependent on the ocean, showcasing traditional life, survival, and the impact of modernization.
The Long Day Wanes	Anthony Burgess	Port City (Malacca/Dahaga)	Ocean
Beyond the Archipelago	Muhammad Haji Salleh	Archipelago, Sea	Sea		1995	Collection/Essays	A work that reflects on the Malay world’s relationship to its wider geography and the global context, moving thematically beyond the physical archipelago.
The House of Doors	Tan Twan Eng	Strait of Malacca, Island (Penang)	Ocean		2023	Novel (Historical)	Set in Penang in the 1920s, exploring secrets and colonial life, constrained by the boundaries of the island port city.
Black Water Sister	Zen Cho	Coastal City (Penang)	Ocean		N/A	Contemporary Fantasy	A contemporary fantasy set in Penang where the protagonist is haunted by her grandmother’s ghost, a medium linked to local gods in the bustling city.
The True Queen	Zen Cho	Undefined	Ocean	N/A	N/A	Fantasy Novel	A historical fantasy series continuation, exploring the connection between colonial England and the magical world of the East.
The Ghost Bride	Yangsze Choo	Port City (Melaka/Penang)	Ocean		2013	Historical Fantasy	Set in colonial Malaya in the 1890s. The protagonist is forced into a “ghost marriage” and drawn into the mysterious world of the afterlife in the port city setting.
The Night Tiger	Yangsze Choo	Inland (Perak, Ipoh, Batu Gajah)		Flatiron Books	2019	Historical Fiction, Magical Realism	Historical mystery set in 1930s colonial Malaya involving weretigers. The narrative contrasts jungle folklore with the modernizing colonial world.
The Weight of Our Sky	Hanna Alkaf	Urban/Coastally Influenced (Kuala Lumpur)			2019	YA Novel	Set during the 1969 racial riots in Kuala Lumpur. It follows Melati, who has OCD, navigating the violence in the major urban center.
An Ocean of Grey	Kamalia Hasni				2018	Novel	A contemporary work focusing on emotional depth and modern relationships.
The Accidental Malay	Karina Robles Bahrin					Novel	A satirical novel exploring identity and racial classification in modern Malaysia, where the protagonist is suddenly classified as “Malay.”
A Town Like Alice	Nevil Shute	Coastal Invasion/Inland				Novel	Set partially in Malaya during WWII, focusing on the harrowing experience of a Japanese death march following the coastal invasion.
The Virgin Soldiers	Leslie Thomas
The Casuarina Tree	W. Somerset Maugham	Colonial Settlements, Coast			1926	Short Stories	Stories set in colonial Malaya.
The Outstation	W. Somerset Maugham	Borneo, Isolation				Short Story	Set in Borneo, about a snobbish British official, emphasizing the isolation and cultural clashes in a remote colonial posting.
The Return	K.S. Maniam			Heinemann Educational Books (Asia)	1981	Novel	Follows Ravi whose life is caught up in social transformations during Malaysian independence. Foundational work for Malaysian Indian literature.
In a Far Country	K.S. Maniam					Novel	Explores themes of displacement, the sense of being an outsider, and the search for a permanent home.
Between Lives	K.S. Maniam					Novel	A complex work exploring the gap between different worlds—cultural, spiritual, and physical—experienced by minority groups.
Joss and Gold	Shirley Geok-Lin Lim			Times Books International	2001	Novel	Explores the relationship between an ambitious young woman from Malaya and her American lover, examining how transnational movement affects identity.
My Life as a Fake	Peter Carey	Coastal Malaysia				Novel	Set heavily in coastal Malaysia, focusing on a literary hoax involving a fabricated Malaysian poet.
The Separation	Dinah Jefferies					Novel	A historical novel set in the 1950s Malaya, focusing on a family divided during the Emergency.
The Planter’s Wife	Ann Bennett	Coastal Estates				Novel	Set during the Malayan Emergency, focusing on the lives of rubber planters near trade routes.
Before the Party	W. Somerset Maugham	Borneo, Sea	Sea			Short Story	A story concerning a woman’s lies about her husband’s death in Borneo, using the vast distance and oceanic isolation to conceal the truth.
The Force of Circumstance	W. Somerset Maugham					Colonial Posting, Sembulu	A story where a new wife discovers her husband’s secret past in a distant colonial coastal posting.
The Last Nyonya		Coastal Cities				Novel	A novel dedicated to exploring the Peranakan culture, particularly in coastal cities like Malacca.
The Rubber Merchant		Port Cities				Novel	A novel focused on the trade and commerce of rubber, linking the plantation economy to the port cities.
Shadows on the Water		Water/ Coast				Novel	An oceanic title suggesting mystery, hidden dangers, or dark secrets related to the sea or the coastline.
The Monsoon Wife		Monsoon Coast				Novel	Uses the powerful seasonal monsoon as a backdrop that dictates the plot and the characters’ actions near the coast.
Jade Palace		Port Cities				Novel	Likely set within the wealthy Chinese community in port cities.
The Tiger’s Wife		Coastal Jungle, Malaysia				Novel	Uses the image of the tiger, symbolizing danger, folklore, or the wildness of the Malayan jungle close to the coast.
Chasing the Straits		Straits of Malacca				Novel	An adventurous or historical novel focused on the strategic and economic importance of the Straits of Malacca.
The Island of Whispers		Isolated Island				Novel	A fictional work set on an isolated island, dealing with secrets and the unique folklore of island life.
The Blue Sarong		Coastal Malaysia				Novel	Uses a distinctive piece of clothing as a symbol for culture or memory in the coastal region.
When The Future Comes Too Soon	Selina Siak Chin Yoke	Coastal Region				Novel	A sequel that continues the family saga set against the backdrop of rapidly changing Malaysian society.
The Blue Horizon		Horizon, Sea	Sea			Novel	An oceanic title suggesting ambition, future possibilities, or the vast unknown represented by the sea.
The Man in the Wooden Hat	Jane Gardam	Malaya				Novel	A novel set in Malaya.
Old Filth	Jane Gardam	Malaya				Novel	A novel set in Malaya.
Terror in Topaz	A.M. Stuart	Colonial Setting, Coast				Novel
Out in the Midday Sun: The British in Malaya	Margaret Shennan	Coastal Cities				Novel	Focusing on the colonial administration centered in coastal cities.
The Virgin Soldiers	Leslie Thomas	Port City (Singapore)				Novel	Focusing on British soldiers stationed in Singapore.
A Town Like Alice	Nevil Shute	Coastal Invasion/Inland				Novel	Set partially in Malaya during WWII.
Monsoon History	Shirley Geok-Lin Lim	Monsoon History				Collection	Uses the powerful seasonal monsoon as a backdrop for a historical narrative.
Stranger in the Forest: On Foot Across Borneo	Eric Hansen	Borneo, Rivers, Coast				Narrative Hybrid	A detailed narrative that provides the rich physical setting for Borneo fiction.
The Wind’s Shadow		Sabah, Coast				Novel	Dealing with challenges faced by indigenous communities living near the coast.
Ghosts of Malacca		Port City (Malacca)				Novel	Set in the ancient city of Malacca.
The Penang Affair		Island (Penang)				Novel	Specifically set in the island port of Penang.
Return to the Straits		Straits of Malacca				Novel	Referring to the Straits of Malacca
The Last Boat		The boat journey, Sea				Novel	An oceanic title symbolizing finality, migration, or escape.
Sands of Time		Coastal				Novel	Relating to the coastal environment, exploring history and the erosion of time.
The Tides of Change		Tides, Sea				Novel	Using the tides to symbolize major social changes.
Kuala Lumpur Noir		Urban/ Coastal				Anthology	A collection of crime and mystery stories set specifically in the capital city.
The Penang Chronicles		Island (Penang)				Novel	A series or collection of stories focused entirely on the history and culture of Penang.
My Life in Sarawak	Margaret Brooke	Borneo, Sarawak					A historical account that provides the rich physical setting for Borneo fiction.
Master and Commander	Patrick O’Brian	Mediterranean Sea	Sea	Lippincott (US), Collins (UK)	1969 (US), 1970 (UK)	Novel	Life of sailors in the British Navy during the Napoleonic wars.
Post Captain	Patrick O’Brian	Off Cape Santa Maria, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Collins (UK), Lippincott (US)	1972	Novel	The protagonists’ (Aubrey and Maturin) life during the Peace of Amiens to Aubrey’s naval missions of capturing prizes to naval skirmishes with ships of the Spanish Navy.
HMS Surprise	Patrick O’Brian	Atlantic Ocean, Antarctic Ocean, Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean	Ocean, Sea, Bay	Collins	1973	Novel
The Mauritius Command	Patrick O’Brian	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Collins	1977	Novel	The protagonists are supposed to protect British interests in some islands on the Indian Ocean against the French Navy.
Desolation Island	Patrick O’Brian	Antarctic Ocean	Ocean	Collins (UK), Stein & Day (US)	1978	Novel	HMS Leopard has to be piloted to Australia while it is chased by a Dutch ship across the Southern Ocean.
The Fortune of War	Patrick O’Brian	Botany Bay, Atlantic Ocean	Bay, Ocean	Collins	1979	Novel	Naval battles between the British and the fledgling American Navies (the latter supported by the French), especially the British blockade of Boston Harbour.
The Surgeon’s Mate	Patrick O’Brian	Baltic Sea, North Sea, English Channel, Douarnenez Bay	Sea, Bay	Collins	1980	Novel	War of 1812 Between England and France, particularly between British and Catalan forces loyal to Napoleon in the Baltic Sea.
The Ionian Mission	Patrick O’Brian	Ionian Sea	Sea	Collins	1981	Novel	Aubrey and Maturin have a mission to the Greek islands to tinker with the balance of power at the borders of the Turkish empire.
Treason’s Harbour	Patrick O’Brian	Mediterranean Sea, Red Sea	Sea	Collins	1983	Novel	Naval missions across the Mediterranean and Red Seas.
The Far Side of the World	Patrick O’Brian	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Collins	1984	Novel	Aubrey’ mission to protect British whalers in the Pacific.
The Reverse of the Medal	Patrick O’Brian	Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Collins	1986	Novel	Aubrey’s return from the Pacific, meeting with his son en-route to Brazil, and his subsequent misfortunes in the stock market.
The Letter of Marque	Patrick O’Brian	Horta Bay, Petrius d’Antioche Strait	Bay, Strait	Collins	1988	Novel	Aubrey’s adventures and naval victories against French ships as a privateer.
The Thirteen-Gun Salute	Patrick O’Brian	South China Sea, Indian Ocean	Sea, Ocean	Collins	1989	Novel	Aubrey is assigned on a mission to the Malay islands as an envoy for England and on the journey his ship faces hardships including a typhoon.
The Nutmeg of Consolation	Patrick O’Brian	South China Sea, Java Sea, Celebes Sea	Sea	HarperCollins (UK), W. W. Norton & Company (US)	1991	Novel	Pirate attacks and sea battles across different seas around China, Java, etc.
Clarissa Oakes (The Truelove in US)	Patrick O’Brian	Pacific Ocean, Tasman Sea	Ocean, Sea	HarperCollins	1992	Novel	Aubrey travels from Australia to handle a political situation in some Pacific islands.
The Wine Dark Sea	Patrick O’Brian	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	HarperCollins	1993	Novel	Naval chase between two ships across the Pacific.
The Commodore	Patrick O’Brian	Atlantic Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, Gulf of Guinea	Ocean, Sea, Gulf	HarperCollins	1995	Novel	Naval battles between British and French ships along the West African coast (the former disrupting the latter’s slave trade) and the Irish coast.
The Yellow Admiral	Patrick O’Brian	Bay of Biscay, Cawsand Bay, Funchal Bay, Atlantic Ocean	Bay, Ocean	HarperCollins	1996	Novel	British naval blockade of the port of Brest, Napoleon’s exile to Elba after announcement of peace and his subsequent escape restarting the war.
The Hundred Days	Patrick O’Brian	Adriatic Sea	Sea	HarperCollins	1998	Novel	Napoleon retakes France from Louis XVIII after his escape from Elba and Aubrey is assigned a mission to destroy shipyards supporting Napoleon along the Adriatic coast.
Blue at the Mizzen	Patrick O’Brian	Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	HarperCollins	1999	Novel	Aubrey sets sail for the Chilean coast to aid in their struggle for independence against Spain.
The Final Unfinished Voyage of Jack Aubrey (UK), 21 (US)	Patrick O’Brian	Strait of Magellan, Atlantic Ocean	Strait, Ocean	HarperCollins	2004	Unfinished Novel	Journeys to and fro River Plate and England; journey to the Cape of Good Hope.
The Happy Return (UK), Beat to Quarters (US)	C. S. Forester	Pacific Ocean, Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Michael Joseph, London	1937	Novel	Horatio Hornblower sails to the Pacific coast of Nicaragua to aid resistance against Spain, naval battles with the Spanish Natividad, return to England from the Caribbean.
A Ship of the Line	C. S. Forester	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Michael Joseph (UK), Little, Brown (US)	1938	Novel	Hornblower goes to escort a convoy of East Indiamen off the Spanish coast, fights of privateer luggers, fights the French occupied Spanish coast and four French ships at once before having to surrender.
Flying Colours	C. S. Forester	Mediterranean Sea, Atlantic Ocean	Sea, Ocean	Michael Joseph, London	1938	Novel	Hornblower is captured and imprisoned by the French a the Rosa island on the Mediterranean Sea from where he manages to escape while being transported to Paris through the port of Nantes.
The Commodore (UK), Commodore Hornblower (US)	C. S. Forester	Baltic Sea, Gulf of Finland	Sea, Gulf	Michael Joseph	1945	Novel	Hornblower is assigned on a mission to the Baltic to enlist Russia in the war against Napoleon, he participates in naval battles against French forces, especially against the latter’ siege of Riga.
Lord Hornblower	C. S. Forester	English Channel	Channel	Michael Joseph	1946	Novel	Hornblower attempts to manage a situation concerning mutineers off the French coast, captures the concerned ship, seizes the city of Le Havre, devises a plan to foil an attack on the city by Napoleonic forces, fights and is defeated against another force of Napoleon after the latter’s escape from Elba, is condemned to death but saved due to Napoleon’s defeat as Waterloo.
Mr. Midshipman Hornblower	C. S. Forester	Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic Ocean, Straits of Gibraltar, Mediterranean Sea	Gulf, Ocean, Strait, Sea	Michael Joseph	1950	Novel	Hornblower’s first naval mission to bring back a captured French ship, its capsizing, him taken prisoner by privateers, fights with other French ships and, later, Spanish ships, plague on the ship, capture by and later parole from Spanish forces.
Lieutenant Hornblower	C. S. Forester	Atlantic Ocean, Samana Bay, Rincon Bay	Ocean, Bay	Michael Joseph	1952	Novel	An arbitrary and incompetent Captain, naval fights against Spanish privateers, Hornblower’s eventual promotion to lieutenant.
Hornblower and the Atropos	C. S. Forester	Mediterranean Sea	Sea	Michael Joseph	1953	Novel	Hornblower salvages treasure in the Mediterranean.
Admiral Hornblower in the West Indies	C. S. Forester	Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, Montego Bay	Sea, Gulf, Bay	Michael Joseph	1957	Novel	Hornblower, now a Rear Admiral, has multiple adventures around the Caribbean primarily during a period of peace.
Hornblower and the Hotspur	C. S. Forester	English Channel	Channel	Michael Joseph	1962	Novel	Hornblower proves his mettle in naval battles against France, especially in the blockade of Brest, and is later promoted to the rank of Post-Captain.
Hornblower and the Crisis	C. S. Forester	English Channel, Atlantic Ocean	Channel, Ocean	Michael Joseph	1967	Unfinished Novel	Hornblower devises a plan to infiltrate Spain in order to mislead the French navy which leads to the British victory in the Battle of Trafalgar. Also contains the two short stories “Hornblower and the Widow McCool” (or, “Hornblower’ Temptation”) and “The Last Encounter.”
The Rescue, A Romance of the Shallows	Joseph Conrad	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Doubleday, Page & Co. (US), J. M. Dent (UK)	1920	Novel	Captain Lingard’s adventures in the Orient attempting to help his friend there and his falling in love with a woman he saves from a damaged yacht.
The Rover	Joseph Conrad	Mediterranean Sea	Sea	Doubleday, Page & Co.	1923	Novel	Set during the rise of Napoleon and the Anglo-French rivalry in the Mediterranean, the protagonist attempts to leave behind his life of naval adventures as master-gunner in the French republican navy and as a pirate.
The Ebb Tide	R. L. Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Heinemann (UK), Smith & Kimball (US)	1894	Novella	Story of dishonest sailors who try to steal a ship and its cargo.
The Cruel Sea	Nicholas Monsarrat	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Cassell & Co.	1951	Novel	The lives of a group of Royal Navy sailors in the Battle of the Atlantic during the Second World War.
H. M. S. Ulysses	Alistair MacLean	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Collins	1955	Novel	Based upon naval battles between Germany and England in the Arctic Ocean during the Second World War
The Guns of Navarone	Alistair MacLean	Aegean Sea	Sea	Collins	1957	Novel	An Allied Forces commando team attempts to destroy a German fortress threatening Allied navy ships in the Aegean.
Pincher Martin	William Golding	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Faber and Faber	1956	Novel	A man drowned in the North Atlantic believes himself to be the sole survivor at sea, is washed ashore and has unrealistic experiences.
Rites of Passage	William Golding	Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean	Ocean	Faber & Faber	1980	Novel	A six month voyage of British migrants to Australia in the early nineteenth century.
Close Quarters	William Golding	Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean	Ocean	Faber & Faber	1987	Novel	Feelings of a sailor during his voyage from England to Australia retrospectively recorded in his journal.
Fire Down Below	William Golding	Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean	Ocean	Faber & Faber	1989	Novel	Description of the perilous journey by British migrants to Australia.
The Sea, The Sea	Iris Murdoch	North Sea, Atlantic Ocean, Indian Ocean	Sea, Ocean	Chatto & Windus	1978	Novel	The tale of a self obsessed playwright and director who goes to live in a seaside house and abuses his former beloved leading to the drowning of a young boy and the woman’s escape to Australia.
The Sea	John Banville	Irish Sea	Sea	Picador	2005	Novel	The recollections of the narrator’s life in episodes culminating in his wife’s death and his contemplation of suicide by the ever present waves of the sea.
To the Lighthouse	Virginia Woolf	Sea of Hebrides, Atlantic Ocean	Sea, Ocean	Hogarth Press	1927	Novel	The narrative of memories associated with a summer holiday home in the Scottish Isle of Skye bringing together the journey of a family across ten years.
Our Wives Under the Sea	Julia Armfield	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Picador	2022	Novel	Horror story of surreal transformations that a deep sea researcher goes through after emerging back from one of her missions.
The North Water	Ian McGuire	North Water Polynya, Baffin Bay	Bay	Henry Holt and Company (US), Simon & Schuster (UK)/Scribner (UK)	2016	Novel	A whaling ship on its voyage to the North Water Polynya with different sailors upon it having various ulterior motives.
The Magus	John Fowles	Mediterranean Sea	Sea	Jonathan Cape	1965	Novel	A postmodernist metafictional novel narrating the life of an Oxford graduate occupied as a teacher on the Greek island of Phraxos.
A High Wind in Jamaica	Richard Hughes	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Chatto and Windus	1929	Novel	As a British family begin their journey home from Jamaican plantations their ship is hijacked by pirates.
Haven	Emma Donoghue	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Little, Brown nad Company	2022	Novel	A scholar and priest in 7th Century Ireland takes two monks to an island he has seen in his dreams to build a monastery to God there leading to a tale of survival.
On Chesil Beach	Ian McEwan	English Channel	Channel	Jonathan Cape	2007	Novel	Experience of two people in love, who meet on the Chesil Beach, but with different expectations, memories and ruminations of lifelong regrets.
The Scar	China Mieville	Fictional Ocean of Bas-Lag	Ocean	Macmillan Publishers	2002	Fantasy Novel	Story of the journey of a small ship from the city New Crobuzon to its new colony Nova Esperium across the ocean when it is attacked by pirates.
The Outrun	Amy Liptrot	Pentland Firth, Fair Isle Channel	Strait, Channel	Canongate Books	2016	Memoir	Memoir of the author returning to her childhood home in Orkney, Scotland.
A Haunting in the Arctic	C. J. Cooke	North Sea, Arctic Ocean	Sea, Ocean	HarperCollins	2023	Novel	A gothic horror narrative of the discovery of a 1901 shipwreck near Iceland and Greenland in the present day.
The Island of Sheep	John Buchan	North Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Hodder & Stoughton	1936	Novel	Treasure hunt across England, Scotland and to the Island of Sheep (based on present day Faroe Islands).
The Man with the Golden Gun	Ian Fleming	Caribbean Sea	Sea	Jonathan Cape	1965	Novel	Final instalment in the James Bond spy universe franchise.
And Then There Were None (Ten Little Niggers)	Agatha Christie	Bristol Channel, English Channel	Channel	Collins Crime Club	1939	Novel	Detective fiction set in the island of Devon.
The Shadow over Innsmouth	H. P. Lovecraft	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Visionary Publishing Company	1936	Novella	Horror narrative featuring the Cthulhu and set around the Innsmouth Harbour.
Cloud Atlas	David Mitchell	South Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Sceptre	2004	Novel	Interconnected nested stories of metafiction, historical fiction, science fiction and contemporary fiction.
The Sea Wolf	Jack London	Pacific Ocean	Ocean	Macmillan	1904	Novel	This adventure novel involves a voyage in the Pacific Ocean and explores the conflict between a young literary critic and a brutal sea captain.
Malay Sketches	Alfian Sa’at	Tebrau Strait	Sea		2012	Short Stories (Collection)	Malay Sketches by Alfian Sa’at is a collection of short stories that captures the everyday lives of Malay individuals living in modern Singapore. Through vivid depictions of neighborhoods, streets, and communal spaces, the stories explore the tension between tradition and modernization, highlighting how cultural identity is maintained amidst rapid urban development. Characters navigate personal struggles, familial expectations, and societal pressures, often reflecting on the past while confronting present realities. The Singapore River and other local landmarks serve as symbolic backdrops, emphasizing memory, change, and the passage of time. Sa’at’s narratives offer intimate glimpses into the thoughts and emotions of his characters, portraying feelings of alienation, nostalgia, and resilience. By focusing on ordinary experiences, Malay Sketches presents a nuanced understanding of urban life, the persistence of cultural heritage, and the ways individuals adapt to and resist the pressures of a transforming cityscape.
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea Adapted by Ye Yonglie	Ye Yonglie	Deep sea / global oceans			not found	Chilren’s series	Known Chinese reimagination of Jules Verne’s nautical classic for children, reaffirming enthusiasm for technology and marine mysteries. In China, Ye localized the ocean voyage familiarizing audiences with ocean exploration and ocean science. Widely available in children’s series across Mainland and Taiwan; simplified & traditional Chinese editions.
Beneath the Waves: Tales from Philippine seas	Various Authors	Philippine Sea	Sea		2024	Long Form Fiction/ Anthology	Anthology of sea-based stories; mermaids, fishermen, archipelagic myths
The Fountains of Paradise	Arthur C. Clarke	Indian Ocean	Ocean	Victor Gollancz (United Kingdom), Harcourt Brace Jovanovich (United States Of America)	1979	Science fiction novel	Taking place on the fictional island of Taprobane (inspired by sri Lanka), the story attempts to build a space elevator. Clarke weaves scientific fantasy together with myth and religious history of the island, pairing oceanic space and geography with cosmic vision. The plot is an allegory of human beings moving from the terrestrial to the divine, with the mountains and seas of Sri Lanka standing as metaphors for ultimate transcendence.
Island Voices: A Collection of Short Stories	ed. Robert Yeo	Coastal / Island settings	Island		1994	Short Stories	Anthology of Singaporean short stories where multiple entries engage the sea/island motif. Characters often confront coastal change, migration, or memories of seafaring ancestors. The anthology frames Singapore as an island whose literature cannot escape the presence of the surrounding waters.
Waiting in the Future for the Past to Come	Sabiha Al Khemir b. 1959, Korba, Tunisia	Mediterranean Sea (Gulf of Tunis); coastal town of Korba, Cap Bon peninsula	Sea	Quartet Books, London	1993	Novel	Set in the Mediterranean coastal town of Korba, Tunisia, this novel follows Amina through a narrative moving between reality and imagination, childhood and adulthood. The Mediterranean is a constant presence—its light, smell, and rhythms permeating scenes of women’s domestic life, mourning, and cultural transition in post-colonial Tunisia. Al Khemir, exceptional as a Tunisian writing directly in English, deploys vivid sensory imagery of the coastline to map cultural shifts of independence-era Tunisia.
Fae Visions of the Mediterranean	Hella Grichi (Tunisian author)	Mediterranean Sea; fantastical coastal setting	Sea		c. 2020s	Novel	A Tunisian diaspora author writing in English, Grichi sets this work against the Mediterranean coast, blending fantasy and romance with a Mediterranean backdrop. The novel features two characters who ‘form their own constellation’ in a Mediterranean-inflected world where the sea serves as a mystical and emotional space. Limited scholarly documentation exists; part of an emerging wave of English-language Tunisian fiction engaging with the Mediterranean as a fantastical and romantic space.
Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits	Laila Lalami	Strait of Gibraltar / Mediterranean Sea	Sea	Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill	2005	Novel	Four Moroccan protagonists—Murad, Halima, Aziz, and Faten—attempt an illegal crossing of the Strait of Gibraltar on an inflatable raft bound for Spain. The narrative pivots between their lives before departure and their fates afterward, weaving a composite portrait of poverty, aspiration, and systemic exclusion. Lalami grounds the sea crossing as both literal peril and metaphorical threshold. Inspired by a Le Monde report on drowned migrants, the novel gained wide critical acclaim and was a Caine Prize shortlistee (2006). Publisher: Algonquin Books, 2005.
Whoever fears the Sea	Justin Fox	Indian Ocean	Sea	Umuzi (Penguin random house)	2014	Novel	South African scriptwriter Paul Waterson is sent to Kenya to research a documentary film about Swahili culture. It is October 2001, and Paul has just been dumped. He spends time in Mombasa, Malindi and Lamu and falls in love with the place and the people. He becomes consumed with finding what is rumoured to be the last remaining mtepe dhow — a craft stitched together with thread rather than built with nails — an obsession that takes him closer and closer to Somali waters. Piracy is in its infancy but Paul finds it very difficult to find someone willing to take him into Somali waters. Eventually he talks a dhow captain into the journey, but the entire group is captured by Somali pirates. What follows is not simply a tale of survival, but a deeper reckoning with the history of the East African coast, the legacy of colonialism, and a revisionist understanding of why Somali piracy exists at all — rooting it in the long and proud maritime traditions of a people who once ruled these waters
Oil on Water	Helon Habila	Niger Delta	Delta	Penguin books	2010	Novel	Oil on Water (2010) is a Nigerian novel set in the ecologically devastated Niger Delta. The story follows Rufus, a young journalist who travels with a veteran reporter, Zaq, into the region’s dangerous creeks and waterways to find Isabel Floode, a British woman kidnapped by militants protesting oil company exploitation. As the two journalists venture deeper into the Delta, they witness communities destroyed by oil spills, gas flares, and corporate greed. They encounter soldiers, militants, and displaced locals, each reflecting the human cost of decades of environmental neglect. The search for Isabel gradually becomes less important than the broader portrait of suffering and moral complexity surrounding them. Through Rufus’s reflections, the novel also explores his personal history and his uneasy relationship with the older, disillusioned Zaq. Habila’s lyrical prose paints the Delta as both hauntingly beautiful and irreversibly damaged, serving as a powerful symbol of postcolonial exploitation. The novel is ultimately a searing indictment of the oil industry’s destruction of land, culture, and human dignity in Nigeria.
Lagoon	Nnedi Okorafor	Atlantic ocean	Ocean	Hodder & Stoughton	2014	Novel	Lagoon (2014) is a Nigerian science fiction novel set in Lagos, where an alien spacecraft lands in the Atlantic Ocean off the city’s coast. Three strangers — Adaora, a marine biologist; Anthony, a famous rapper; and Agu, a soldier — are drawn to the beach at the moment of arrival and become the first humans to encounter the aliens. Their leader, a shape-shifting being named Ayodele, announces that her kind has come in peace, possessing the power to transform the world. However, her arrival plunges Lagos into chaos, triggering panic, religious hysteria, and political confusion as various groups — pastors, government officials, and criminals — react in conflicting ways. Okorafor uses the alien invasion as a lens to explore themes of corruption, environmental destruction, faith, and African identity, while portraying Lagos itself as a chaotic yet resilient city. The novel celebrates African culture and mythology while critiquing human greed, making it a vibrant and thought-provoking work of Afrofuturist fiction.
Soul of the Deep	natasha Bowen	Atlantic Ocean	Ocean	Random House Books	2022	Novel	The highly anticipated sequel to the New York Times bestseller Skin of the Sea, in which the world must pay the price for one mermaid’s choice, and a dark force reverberates across realms. Perfect for fans of Children of Blood and Bone and those eagerly anticipating the live-action film adaptation of The Little Mermaid.
Chimamanda:The adventures of little Mermaid’s African Cousin	Rudolf Ogoo okonkwo	River Niger and Atlantic ocean	Ocean	Irokopost Media Group Inc.	2018	Novel