A Place for Us

It's the debut novel from 26 year old Fatima Farheen Mirza and the first published under Sarah Jessica Parker's SJP Imprint over at Hogarth. Mirza delivers an absolute stunner.

A Place for Us focuses on Hyderabad Muslims living in America and how they grapple within the confines of their faith and family in a post 9/11 world.

Hadia is getting married as the book opens and is hoping to see her brother Amar who has been missing for years. She is a doctor now, the eldest daughter fulfilling all the heavy expectations of a second generation child. Amar exists in opposition and has strayed from the fold. But naturally it's all a bit more complicated than that.

The story jumps back and forth in time and is told from the perspective of different family members as they recount their lives leading up to Amar's estrangement. The shifts of time and character are handled with the sure hand of someone who feels like they've been doing this for years. Seamless and assured, but I still felt the story sag in the middle. As we build to the climax, I was increasingly impatient for the inevitable collision we're clearly driving towards.

Mirza delivers and just wrecked me. Rafiq, the father is rendered with such clear-eyed understanding that belies the author's young age. Complicated, beautiful and heartfelt. It's like you're watching all the tedious brushwork at the start, sections of colour carefully laid out, but it's not until you step back from the finished canvas that you see how it comes together in a rich, nuanced tapestry that leaves you gasping.