After "Désirs d'Afrique", its first edition in 2022 devoted to African literature, Livres d'ailleurs will turn to the Orient in 2023. Chaired this year by the Franco-Lebanese writer Hyam Yared, it will welcome some thirty authors of fiction, children's books and comics from a dozen countries. The programme includes round tables, poetry recitals, book signings and exhibitions on Arabic calligraphy, as well as numerous meetings between the guest authors and pupils, students and teachers from schools and universities in the region. 

Launched following the success of the first Salon du Livre du Monde Arabe in Nancy in 2019, the Livres d'ailleursbook fair is supported by the Diwan en Lorraine association in partnership with the Alliance of Independent Publishers, the bookshops of Nancy, the Jules Verne media library in Vandœuvre-lès-Nancy and the Lillebonne Youth and Culture Centre (MJC) in Nancy.

With the aim of becoming an annual international event alternating between African and Oriental publishing, the fair's ambition is to evoke "ancient and beautiful civilisations rich in their diversity but today too often torn apart by wars, colonisation, fundamentalist violence and dictatorships", as stated by Élisabeth Daldoul (Elyzad), Kenza Sefrioui (En toutes lettres) and Mathilde Chèvre (Le Port a jauni), the fair's publishers and literary advisors.

As with the first edition, the fair clearly displays its ambition to promote independent publishing, to bring bibliodiversity to life and to give a voice to other literary voices, representing the richness of Eastern literature. Hyam Yared, president of this edition, wishes to place at its centre "the contradiction that saves" and the "sum of otherness that makes the elsewhere". Among the authors invited this year are the 2022 Goncourt des Lycéens prize winner Sabyl Ghoussoub, Taha Siddiqui, winner of the 2014 Albert Londres prize, Karim Kattan, winner of the Cinq Continents de la Francophonie prize, Mana Neyestani, winner of the 2010 CRNI (Cartoonists Rights Network International) Courage prize, international press cartoon prize and member of the Cartooning for Peace association.