مَا شَآءَ ٱللَّهُ لَا قُوَّةَ إلَّا بِٱللَّهِ
Purpose:
The aim of Zaynab Books is to spark and help tend the light of iman in the hearts of readers. Muslim children, including yours possibly, who are being raised with the English language don’t have a large selection of literature written in English specifically for them. Often, parents offer them classics of children’s literature written in English. These are easy to find in public libraries and bookstores around the globe, along with mass market, commercial stuff.
Zaynab Books was founded to offer Muslim parents books and stories that reflect their values, beliefs and culture. Zaynab Books titles are intended to complement the lives of young readers growing up in English-speaking, multicultural societies. The books are designed and developed with the intention of helping readers increase in proximity to the Divine, through remembrance for example.
Origins:
In the summer of 2012, the company founder was about to move to Norwich, England to continue his research in writing and literature at UEA. During a visit home to the US that summer, an unexpected medical emergency compelled him to defer his plans. Instead, he relocated with his wife and two year old son to south London. Three months of in-patient rehab and meditations on mortality, health risk factors, and life expectancy pushed him to write a book, for his son and the newborn daughter Allah blessed him with during the family’s two years in Tooting. Seeking creative control over every detail of his book’s publication, he founded a company to publish it and named the company after his late sister and irreplaceable friend Zainub. Zainub, may Allah shower her grave with His mercy, had died in her twenties on an icy highway in Pennsylvania.
Zaynab Books was founded in 2015, initially with the name Zainub Perisa Publishing. Journey Beyond the Great Tree, the inaugural title, was launched at the ISNA national convention in metro Chicago that year. A family-centered company, the company paused when the Ashraf family again moved overseas. In 2019, Zaynab Books LLC was revived with a mission to provide young Muslim readers with novels and short fiction that combine the literary, the artistic, and the contemporary, while honoring and manifesting the norms and culture of Islamic tradition.
The founder / editor’s career in publishing began in 1988 at Workman Publishing in Manhattan. With academic degrees in literature and languages, and writing courses completed at UEA London and the Center for Literature and Theatre in Miami, he combines literary skill with Islamic knowledge gained from traditional scholars since the early 2000s. He has taught English globally, including in Asia, the Middle East, and the US, where in the space of the last few years he has taught world, British, and American literature in metro Chicago.
Zaynab Books was also conceived as a haven for Islamic arts and letters that will, if Allah wills, provide opportunities for Muslim writers, artists, educators, and others to contribute and be fairly and honorably compensated.
Journey Beyond the Great Tree began as a bedtime story, grew into a novella, and then expanded into a 300 + page adventure novel. It is the first Zaynab Books title.
Parent & Child: Seven Stories, a limited edition anthology featuring short fiction written by Muslim children with their parents, was the second publication and is out of print.
The third publication is Safa’s Palette: Coloring & Vocabulary Book of Allah’s Names, authored by Shaykh Hatim Yousef, PhD., with illustrations by Sanah Z. Shan, and Arabic calligraphy by Ustadh Usman Ghani.
The most recent publication is Reflective Friend: Anthology of Student Writing (Volume 1).
الحَمدُلِلهِ رَبِ العَا لَمين