Love, Hate & Other Filters by Samira Ahmed

Maya is in her final year of high school in a small American town.  She is quiet and often hides behind her video camera which she employees to make documentaries.  She'd love to attend NYU for film studies though her parents expect her to follow their wishes of meeting a nice Indian boy while she attends a near by law school.  Maya is torn between pleasing her parents and following her heart  All these plans are thrown in turmoil when a response to a serious incident elsewhere in the country unleashes islamaphobic attacks upon the family.

Maya is your typical girl next door that you'd want your child to be friends with.  She is kind and sensitive to others, smart and studies hard.  She also happens to be Indian and Muslim.  These shouldn't and don't matter to most people, but there are some who hold these differences against her.  Just because a person is different than you, it doesn't automatically diminish that person nor does it make them bad.

At an age where so many teens are struggling with what they want to do with their future, Maya has a very clear view.  She wants to study film so she can make and direct documentary films.  She also wants to be able to tell her parents that she wants a love match and not an arranged marriage.  She wants to be given the freedom to make her own choices.

I love this book.  It spoke to me on so many levels.  As a parent, Maya is a daughter that I would be pleased to call my own. She was brought up in a warm and loving family by attentive parents.  She is intelligent and well prepared to face the adult world.  When the world crashes into her life and her family, her response is realistic.  She is concerned for the well being of those who were directly impacted by the incident before she questions how this might reflect back on the Muslim communities across the United States.

Author Samira Ahmed has shone a light on an ugly incident of the type that happens far too often in our so called 'civilized communities'.  She helps to call attention to racial and religious bigotry.  Such hatred has no place in this world.  All it does is create damage.  Education is the best weapon against such ignorant actions.  This book needs to be widely read.  It would be a good starting place for class room discussions about combating racism.  This is a strong debut novel by Ms. Ahmed and I eagerly await her next novel.

I received an advanced reader copy of this book from Indigo Books & Music Inc., in exchange for an honest review.

Cover image courtesy Penguin Random House Canada.

#IndigoEmployee

City of Veils by Zoe Ferraris

Imagine trying to identify a murder victim where her face and her hands have been systematically destroyed.  Then by luck you discover a photo of her in her possessions, only to realize that because of her religious practices her face would be virtually un-recognized by anyone outside her immediate family, which you haven't yet identified.

This is the starting point for Zoe Ferraris's new novel.  Set in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, Detective Osama Ibrahim faces just these barriers or you could call them challenges.With the assistance of Katya Hijazi, from the coroners office,  and her friend(?) Nayir Sharqi, he wades through social and religious customs to identify the victim and find her murdered.

This is a world that I have had no exposure to, other than a Canadian sitcom called Little Mosque on the Prairie.  I was intrigued.  How were Osama and Katya going to solve this mystery and how were they going to work together when they are not related and Katya is not supposed to talk to a non-family male.  How was Katya going to deal with her male office mates. How would Osama interview women surrounding this investigation.   Every page of this novel revealed issues that each of the characters had to weigh their understanding of their religion and how it would impinge on them, their families, their co-workers and those who they had to interview.  Ms. Ferraris did a wonderful job of portraying these dilemmas and the seriousness with which each character dealt with them. 

Excellent mystery and wonderful handling of the topic (seclusion of Muslim women).  Some of the same characters in this story are also found in Zoe's earlier book  Finding Nouf.

Thanks to Little, Brown and Company for my review copy.

note: the cover of this book is quite dark and it was very difficult to photograph without a glare.