Author: Atia Abawi
Publisher: Penguin
Rating: WARTY!
I picked this up at the library because it looked like it would be really interesting - and really different. It's set in Afghanistan and is a story of forbidden love between Fatima (of one tribe), and Samiullah (of another tribe) living under a brutal religious regime. The author has actually lived in Afghanistan, so I was hoping for a lot of local color and insights, but in the end all I got was a bog-standard American-style YA novel and I really didn't appreciate that.
We still hear much about Afghanistan - it seems like every alpha male in every TV show, movie, and novel is boringly a special forces soldier who did at least one or two tours in Afghanistan. I know it's awful there, particularly for women, which is why I thought that this story - written by an honorary Afghani woman who has lived in Kabul, would have something new and different to say, but the story was exactly the same as your typical trope story of this nature written by any other author. The big question for me was: why? This could have been so much more.
Rather than being tied to a time and place, It could have been set anywhere at any time (and I don't mean that as a compliment). It could have been written by anyone. Other than a reference here and there to a tandoor (oven), or a payron (smock), or some other such object, or an Afghani phrase dropped here and there, there was no reason for it to be set in Afghanistan. The setting was rendered into a mere gimmick instead of being an integral and enthralling part of the story. Worse than this, the author shows nothing, tells all.
I found it odd that every time mom or dad was referred to in this novel, we got the Afghani term of endearment for it, but when an aunt shows up, she's consistently referred to as 'Aunt'! Weird. Unless, of course, the Afghani word for aunt is aunt, which I somehow doubt. I'm not a fan of novels set in foreign places where the author's sole idea of creating a foreign atmosphere is merely to drop a local language word or phrase into the narrative and immediately afterwards translate it for us. It becomes irritating and metronomic, and it's a constant reminder that we're reading a story by someone who is hoping desperately to convince us that this is really taking place amidst a foreign culture whilst employing the laziest method of doing so.
We get the same fluttering heart (yawn), electric shocks from merely brushing against the object of your desire (yawn, yawn), square jaw (yawn), muscled chest (yawn, yawn) and so on, that we get in a really badly written YA novel from the US. I know that love has common elements no matter in which culture it arises, but can we not think of something new to describe attraction? Can we not get away from tired cliché and trope even in a novel set halfway around the world? Evidently not.
The villain (named Rashid, of course) is a laughable cardboard cut-out, an uncompromising fundamentalist who festers and fumes, and schemes and waits patiently to unleash his wrath, and chews-up the scenery every time we get the story told from his PoV, which was blessedly rare.
Yes, there are three PoVs in what amounts to a sort of warped love triangle. Each chapter is headed with the name of the character so we can't mistake one for another lol! Rashid is far more of a joke than ever he is a threat. Samiullah is such a Mary Sue that this is almost a lesbian affair. Given the upbringing of these three children, it makes no sense that two of them would suddenly abandon all rules and propriety and start meeting secretly. It makes no sense that Samiullah (we're told) loves and respects Fatima, yet puts her very life at risk every day by meeting with her unchaperoned. Yes, it's necessary for this sad effort at writing a "love" story, but please, do the work to make it seem possible that they would behave like this! Don't simply tell us this is the way it is merely because I want to tell a forbidden love story and can't be bothered to work at it.
I was hoping for a lot more, and got a lot less. I couldn't finish this novel, and I cannot recommend it based on what I read. Life is far too short to waste it reading ordinary stories.
