Winner of the 2021 Barbara Gittings Stonewall Book Award in Literature and the 2021 Lambda Literary Award in Transgender Fiction

Indie Next Book Pick, December 2020

French translation available now from Rue de l’echiquier (Les trente noms de la nuit).

“An affecting, multigenerational coming-of-age story about a young Syrian American artist’s discovery of self and the truth behind his mother’s mysterious passing. Featuring alternating perspectives that weave the past into the present, this novel embodies the epistolary not just in form and address, but in the way it reads like a love letter to New York City, especially the immigrant, working-class, and LGBTQ underground of New York. A book with a heartbeat, despite all its ghosts.” — Serena Morales, Books Are Magic, Brooklyn, NY

“Gorgeous and alive.” – ⭐️Starred Review, Kirkus Reviews

“Quietly lyrical and richly imaginative, Joukhadar’s tale shows how Laila and Nadir live and love and work past the shame in their lives through their art. This is a stirring portrait of an artist as a young man.” – Publisher’s Weekly

“Make everyone you know read this!” – Randa Jarrar, author of Love Is An Ex-Country

“Zeyn Joukhadar’s new book is a vivid exploration of loss, art, queer and trans communities, and the persistence of history. Often tender, always engrossing, The Thirty Names of Night is a feat.” – R.O. Kwon, author of The Incendiaries

“Evocative and beautifully written, reading this is like opening a treasure trove of memories and images that shimmer both with light and the darkness of our times. It addresses important issues of migration, belonging, sexuality and love.” – Christy Lefteri, author of The Beekeeper of Aleppo

“Long after the story ended, I remain haunted by Zeyn Joukhadar’s novel, The Thirty Names of Night: part ghost story, part history, part art, all magic. Using gorgeous prose, Joukhadar deftly takes the reader on a journey of migration and belonging, explores the price of silence and of secrets, and tells an exquisite tale of family and love.” – Devi S. Laskar, author of The Atlas of Reds and Blues

“With his second novel, Joukhadar cements his place as one of Arab America’s boldest and most stirring voices.” –Susan Muaddi Darraj, author of The Inheritance of Exile

The author of the “vivid and urgent…important and timely” (The New York Times Book Review) debut The Map of Salt and Stars returns with this remarkably moving and lyrical novel following three generations of Syrian Americans who are linked by a mysterious species of bird and the truths they carry close to their hearts.

Available now wherever books are sold, including from:

Five years after a suspicious fire killed his ornithologist mother, a closeted Syrian American trans boy sheds his birth name and searches for a new one. He has been unable to paint since his mother’s ghost has begun to visit him each evening. As his grandmother’s sole caretaker, he spends his days cooped up in their apartment, avoiding his neighborhood masjid, his estranged sister, and even his best friend (who also happens to be his longtime crush). The only time he feels truly free is when he slips out at night to paint murals on buildings in the once-thriving Manhattan neighborhood known as Little Syria.

One night, he enters the abandoned community house and finds the tattered journal of a Syrian American artist named Laila Z, who dedicated her career to painting the birds of North America. She famously and mysteriously disappeared more than sixty years before, but her journal contains proof that both his mother and Laila Z encountered the same rare bird before their deaths. In fact, Laila Z’s past is intimately tied to his mother’s—and his grandmother’s–in ways he never could have expected. Even more surprising, Laila Z’s story reveals the histories of queer and transgender people within his own community that he never knew. Realizing that he isn’t and has never been alone, he has the courage to claim a new name: Nadir, an Arabic name meaning rare.

As unprecedented numbers of birds are mysteriously drawn to the New York City skies, Nadir enlists the help of his family and friends to unravel what happened to Laila Z and the rare bird his mother died trying to save. Following his mother’s ghost, he uncovers the silences kept in the name of survival by his own community, his own family, and within himself, and discovers the family that was there all along.

Featuring Zeyn Joukhadar’s signature “magical and heart-wrenching” (The Christian Science Monitor) storytelling, The Thirty Names of Night is a timely exploration of how we all search for and ultimately embrace who we are.

“The Thirty Names of Night” is a multifaceted jewel of a novel and each facet is brilliant in its own way… This incredibly courageous novel, full of suspense and discoveries, reminds us of the dignity we all deserve and the pain suffered by those who still feel the need to hide themselves.” – The Washington Post

““The Thirty Names of Night” reminds us that the stories of queer people are stories of survival that span generations.” – USA Today

“Ultimately, both Nadir and Laila Z learn how to make space for themselves in a world that tries to reject them, and that space allows their worlds to open up to even further possibilities. This clarifying and moving tale has far-reaching significance and appeal.” – Biz Hyzy, Booklist

“History and memory, art and literature, queer and immigrant identities, … self-discovery and exploration all blend together toward a crescendo of heartbreaking brilliance we’ve come to expect from this incredibly talented writer.” — BrocheAroe Fabian, River Dog Book Company

“Enormous in scope and theme, this book is a force.” — Miranda Sanchez, Epilogue Books

Press for The Thirty Names of Night

Read an Excerpt in Shenandoah

Read an Excerpt in Guernica

Listen to Zeyn’s interview on NPR’s All Things Considered

Talking with Simon & Schuster about THE THIRTY NAMES OF NIGHT, October 2020.