{"product_id":"no-god-but-us","title":"No God But Us","description":"\n\u003ctable align=\"center\" border=\"0\" cellpadding=\"2\" cellspacing=\"0\" width=\"100%\"\u003e\n\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd class=\"productDetailSmallElements\"\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Quotes\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"[An] impressive debut . . . Sayed skillfully balances the personal with the political.\" \u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"In a powerful debut, Bobuq Sayed reveals how forces of rejection from state and family meet the alchemy of attraction, desire, and belonging. \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e not only expands American literature, but also Muslim, gay male, and migration writing. A new kind of novel, with vast geographies of nation and heart.\" \u003cb\u003e--Sarah Schulman, author of\u003ci\u003e The Fantasy and Necessity of Solidarity\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"A sprawling, tender debut about queer refugees finding each other across continents. . . . Sayed weaves together geopolitics, queer history, Persian poetry, and the textures of daily life in exile, but those expecting Delbar and Mansur to ride off into the sunset together will be disappointed. The novel is too wise for such easy comforts. Their connection is real but provisional, like everything else in exile. At its core, this is that rare thing: a political novel that remembers to be a human one.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e-Kirkus\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Audacious, propulsive, and tender-hearted, \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e explores the bonds we create and destroy around love, desire, country, and community with startling honesty. Pulsing with hope, desire, and fury, Bobuq Sayed boldly interrogates the sacrifices one must make to live according to the truth of the human heart. A simply dazzling and unforgettable debut.\" \u003cb\u003e--Patricia Engel, author of \u003ci\u003eInfinite Country \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe Faraway World\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"I can't remember the last time I was so moved by a book. Bobuq Sayed's \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us \u003c\/i\u003easks what might happen to one's consciousness when it's mangled by the forces of empire. The deeply felt and irreverent story traces two Quixotic journeys through personal pain, faith, exile, and queer self-discovery, all the way from the Afghan refugee community in Tehran to the suburbs of Northern Virginia. At its heart, this is a novel about family--chosen and not--and I am lucky to count this story among my literary kin. This book is simply necessary, and very gorgeous.\" \u003cb\u003e--Aria Aber, author of \u003ci\u003eGood Girl\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e is a bold, tender novel about queer kinship and the fragile architectures of faith. Bobuq Sayed moves between voices and continents with rare confidence, tracing how exile and desire shape who we become. This is a story alive to contradiction--ferocious in its longing, unsparing in its honesty, and deeply attuned to the ways love and belief survive their own undoing.\" \u003cb\u003e--Garrard Conley, author of\u003ci\u003e Boy Erased\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eAll the World Beside\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e moves beyond the family's carbon copy dedication to the state, threading a spate of overburdened needles between necessity and promise, romance and desire, and ultimately returns us, with impressive grace and compassion, to one of fiction's central concerns, our attempts to imagine formative change within and outside ourselves, always against the banal expectations of power.\" \u003cb\u003e--Joseph Earl Thomas, author of \u003ci\u003eSink \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eGod Bless You, Otis Spunkmeyer\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e is a polyphonic dream of a novel that spans borders, language, and time, with rich, lyrical prose that brings to life the harrowing journeys of its protagonists. Sayed captures with beauty and tremendous dignity the pains of dislocation and hierarchy, in the process gifting us a work that has been sorely missing from the queer and literary canons.\" \u003cb\u003e--Alejandro Varela, author of \u003ci\u003eMiddle Spoon \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe Town of Babylon\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"...[an exploration of] freedom and authoritarianism from a new voice in fiction.\" \u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eShe Reads\u003c\/i\u003e, \"Traci Thomas' Most Anticipated Books of 2026\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"I received a PDF of this months and months ago and can't stop thinking about it. It moved me to my core. Sayed's emotional intelligence provides a strong backbone to a tender story.\" \u003cb\u003e--Debutiful, \"The Most Anticipated Debut Books of 2026, Part One\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"One of my personal most eagerly anticipated books of 2026, Bobuq Sayed's debut novel follows two gay Afghan men whose lives intertwine in a shared exile in Istanbul, and who must navigate the antagonisms of many states and oppressive forces that shape their lives. Sayed's writing is vibrant, hilarious, and sharply critical, presenting a rich and real set of characters reeling across the world. I can't wait to see this book get the readership it deserves!\" \u003cb\u003e--Mizna, \"30 New SWANA Books to Read in 2026\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Desire, belonging and sacrifice knot tight. Sensual, political and beautifully wrought. Controversial themes that challenge the stereotypes.\" \u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eThe Australian\u003c\/i\u003e, \"Most Anticipated Books of 2026\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Impish, irreverent, deeply felt, and deadly serious, Bobuq Sayed's \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e is a novel that stays in the body long after its final page has turned. This is a book unafraid; Sayed gives us raucous laughs and strutting truths, intimate portraiture of queer Afghan diaspora, anti-imperial clarity, fun, and pleasure. \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e is a tessellation of borders and longings, love and danger\u003cb\u003e--\u003c\/b\u003eand in that sense it is like life itself, revealed to us, made a little new.\" \u003cb\u003e--Sarah Thankam Mathews, author of \u003ci\u003eAll This Could Be Different\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Extraordinarily moving, astute, and often very funny, \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us \u003c\/i\u003eis an exhilarating debut from a writer whose work I'll always want to read.\" \u003cb\u003e--R. O. Kwon, author of \u003ci\u003eExhibit \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eThe Incendiaries \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Mischievous and assured, writing across faith, exile, and desire, Sayed brings wit, nerve, and a novelist's instinct for where the sacred and the profane most fruitfully collide. A brilliantly subversive book.\" \u003cb\u003e--Zain Khalid, author of \u003ci\u003eBrother Alive\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"One of the year's buzziest LGBTQ+ novels.\" \u003cb\u003e--\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGoodreads\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"I'm reading this right now, and let me tell you, you should be reading it, too! It alternates perspectives between two gay men from the Afghan diaspora who eventually collide in Istanbul. It's about family, friendship, home, and the violence of borders. But it's also so, so deeply tender in its portrayals of romance and desire. It's a strong debut from a writer I cherish.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--Autostraddle\u003c\/i\u003e, \"Our Most Anticipated Queer Books for May 2026\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"As . . . the reader comes to understand Mansur's caution in opening his heart . . . the emotional effect is stunning. No life is ever perfect, the book acknowledges, but much can be made from what we already have.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--The Atlantic\u003c\/i\u003e, \"The Summer Reading Guide\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eNo God but Us \u003c\/i\u003ecan't promise a romantic happy ending for its two queer leads, but this doesn't reduce its richness, or the emotional impact of the relationships that form between its characters, despite the risks of misunderstanding, sudden departure and violence. The immediacy of Sayed's writing allows us briefly into the shifting realities of 2015 Istanbul, into the warmth that exists among this queer and trans crew--and the pain as well. . . . In a world shaped by war, repressive immigration laws and migrant exploitation, fairy-tale romances might not be possible; nevertheless, Sayed's characters keep their dignity and their humour, and learn things from one another that no government or border can strip from them.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--Xtra\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"An important book with a fresh perspective.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--The Australian\u003c\/i\u003e, \"Ten Great Books to Read in May\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Sayed is careful to avoid tipping the book over into political polemic; the characters in \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us \u003c\/i\u003eare fully realized people with complications . . . not tragic figures acting out a morality play. . . . \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us \u003c\/i\u003evividly illuminates what life is like for the many queer refugees who live in liminal space for years, whose only home is the state of uncertainty. . . . But perhaps more than anything, it's a moving testament to the power of queer community, as imperfect as it may sometimes be.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--Who Even Reads\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"Bobuq Sayed's début, \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e, reinvents the modern American Abroad novel . . . . reimagined as a story in which characters displaced by imperial war confront the limits of a seemingly shared identity and contend with their differing relationships to love, desire, and relative privilege or devastation within the diaspora. \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us\u003c\/i\u003e is a necessary and powerful intervention in American literary history--a novel that challenges tradition with new narrative form to show how the US's imperial wars are carried within us wherever we go, shaping our loves and imaginations on the most intimate and psychic levels.\" \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003e--Electric Literature\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"A stunning debut novel about finding chosen family in liminal spaces . . . . Sayed defies expectations and gives us a messier, more realistic story, but one with great moments of beauty all the same.\" \u003cb\u003e--Maris Kreizman, The Maris Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"To compliment Bobuq Sayed on this work as just a remarkable narrative, a breathtaking account of underrecognized experiences, feels like sand slipping between my fingers. I can't stop thinking about \u003ci\u003eNo God but U\u003c\/i\u003es, Sayed's debut novel. I am walking around with their prose in my pocket. . . . I am so glad it exists, and thank God it does.\" \u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eChicago Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\"The buzz around Bobuq Sayed's debut novel is mighty loud. But when you read the opening chapter . . . you'll see what all the fuss is about. This book is \u003ci\u003ealive\u003c\/i\u003e. It's the tale of a collision: two queer Afghan men in exile. Newly outed, Delbar is moving east, away from the United States and the strictures of his family. Unable to live freely in Tehran, Mansur is moving west towards the fragile promise of Europe. When the two meet in Istanbul, it feels like destiny. But destiny is a luxury in a world of borders. The year is 2015. The characters don't know what's coming. But we do.\" \u003cb\u003e--\u003ci\u003eThe Guardian\u003c\/i\u003e (AUS)\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePublisher Marketing\u003c\/strong\u003e:\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA Most Anticipated Read: \u003ci\u003eAutostraddle\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eGoodreads\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eSouthern Review of Books\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Millions\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003ethem\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eSheReads\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eDaily Kos\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eDebutiful\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eMizna\u003c\/i\u003e, and\u003ci\u003e LGBTQ Reads\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA \u003ci\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/i\u003e Writer to Watch\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"Stunning.\"\u003ci\u003e--The Atlantic, \u003c\/i\u003e\"The Summer Reading Guide\"\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"One of the year's buzziest LGBTQ+ novels.\"\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cb\u003e--\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eGoodreads\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"An exhilarating debut from a writer whose work I'll always want to read.\" --R.O. Kwon\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn this wry, provocative debut, two gay Afghan men--cast out of their respective countries of birth by circumstances beyond their control--collide in Istanbul, a city that will test their willingness to sacrifice everything for the ones they love.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen Delbar--a hapless twenty-something with dreams of becoming a drag queen--is spectacularly outed, he flees the insular immigrant-dense suburbs of Washington, DC to seek refuge with his sympathetic aunt in Istanbul. There, he discovers a vibrant community of dissidents, sex workers, activists, poets, and heretics. Among them are Leif and his boyfriend, Mansur, with whom Delbar quickly develops a blazing fascination.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBut Mansur also nurses a wounded heart, having left his own family, and his first love, behind in Iran. This time, Mansur's learned not to dream bigger than his own survival. He'll keep a low profile, work hard to send money back, and remain faithful to Leif--at least until his refugee status is granted.\u003cbr\u003eWhen riot police descend on attendees of the annual Istanbul Pride march, Mansur and Delbar are thrust into dangerous proximity. With the country surging into authoritarianism, each person must ask themselves: \u003ci\u003ewhat constitutes a life well-lived, and how high is the price of freedom?\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eTold through the alternating viewpoints of Delbar and Mansur, Bobuq Sayed's debut is a story of borders and boundaries transgressed, and a seductive exploration of what it means to make a home at the margins of society. At once an immigrant family saga, a thwarted love story, and a searing portrait of politics made intimately personal, \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us \u003c\/i\u003eis an ambitious introduction to a bold new voice.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"A new kind of novel, with vast geographies of nation and heart.\" --SARAH SCHULMAN\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"This is a story alive to contradiction--ferocious in its longing, unsparing in its honesty, and deeply attuned to the ways love and belief survive their own undoing.\" --GARRARD CONLEY\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"I feel lucky to count this story among my literary kin.\" --ARIA ABER\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eReview Citations:\u003c\/strong\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eLibrary Journal\u003c\/span\u003e 02\/01\/2026 pg. 53 (EAN 9780063419469, Hardcover)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003ePublishers Weekly\u003c\/span\u003e 03\/16\/2026 (EAN 9780063419469, Hardcover)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cspan class=\"italic\"\u003eKirkus Reviews\u003c\/span\u003e 05\/01\/2026 (EAN 9780063419469, Hardcover)\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eContributor Bio:\u003c\/strong\u003eSayed, Bobuq\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eBobuq Sayed\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of \u003ci\u003eA Brief History of\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eAustralian Terror\u003c\/i\u003e and the novel \u003ci\u003eNo God but Us. \u003c\/i\u003eThey were a 2022-23 Steinbeck fellow at San José State University, a Lambda Literary scholar, and an award-winning James A. Michener fellow in the University of Miami's MFA program. Bobuq currently lives in New York City.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\n\n\u003cbr\u003e\n\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n\u003c\/table\u003e\n","brand":"Harper","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51496155447574,"sku":"9780063419469","price":36.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0857\/9910\/8886\/files\/9780063419469.jpg?v=1783054290","url":"https:\/\/lusper.myshopify.com\/products\/no-god-but-us","provider":"Lusperbooks","version":"1.0","type":"link"}