Hard Damage works to relentlessly interrogate the self and its shortcomings. In lyric and documentary poems and essayistic fragments, Aria Aber explores the historical and personal implications of Afghan American relations. Drawing on material dating back to the 1950s, she considers the consequences of these relations—in particular the funding of the Afghan mujahedeen, which led to the Taliban and modern-day Islamic terrorism—for her family and the world at large.Invested ...

**Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025****A Time Book of the Year 2025**'Kaleidoscopic, full of style and soul' Raven Leilani'A must-read … Dark, breathtaking, profound, so fresh' Guardian'A no-bullshit must-read debut' Kaveh Akbar...

Bloomsbury presents Good Girl by Aria Aber, read by Mozhan Navabi.**Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction 2025****A Time Book of the Year 2025**A portrait of the artist as a young woman in a Berlin that can’t escape its history: an electric debut novel about the daughter of Afghan refugees and her year of nightclubs, bad romance, and self-discovery‘Kaleidoscop...

**“An exhilarating debut novel” (R.O. Kwon, The New York Times Book Review) about the daughter of Afghan refugees and her year of self-discovery—a portrait of the artist as a young woman set in a Berlin that can’t escape its historyA girl can get in almost anywhere, even if she can’t get out.**SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION • FINALIST FOR THE EDMUND WHITE AWARD FOR DEBUT FICTION AND THE VERMONT BOOK AWARD • LONGLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN ...

**“An exhilarating debut novel” (R.O. Kwon, The New York Times Book Review) about the daughter of Afghan refugees and her year of self-discovery—a portrait of the artist as a young woman set in a Berlin that can’t escape its historyA girl can get in almost anywhere, even if she can’t get out.**SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE FOR FICTION • FINALIST FOR THE EDMUND WHITE AWARD FOR DEBUT FICTION AND THE VERMONT BOOK AWARD • LONGLISTED FOR THE DUBLIN ...