Ratings43
Average rating4.4
FROM #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLING AUTHOR SABAA TAHIR COMES A BRILLIANT, UNFORGETTABLE, AND HEART-WRENCHING CONTEMPORARY YA NOVEL ABOUT FAMILY AND FORGIVENESS, LOVE AND LOSS, IN A SWEEPING STORY THAT CROSSES GENERATIONS AND CONTINENTS.
Lahore, Pakistan. Then.
Misbah is a dreamer and storyteller, newly married to Toufiq in an arranged match. After their young life is shaken by tragedy, they come to the United States and open the Cloud’s Rest Inn Motel, hoping for a new start.
Juniper, California. Now.
Salahudin and Noor are more than best friends; they are family. Growing up as outcasts in the small desert town of Juniper, California, they understand each other the way no one else does. Until The Fight, which destroys their bond with the swift fury of a star exploding.
Now, Sal scrambles to run the family motel as his mother Misbah’s health fails and his grieving father loses himself to alcoholism. Noor, meanwhile, walks a harrowing tightrope: working at her wrathful uncle’s liquor store while hiding the fact that she’s applying to college so she can escape him—and Juniper—forever.
When Sal’s attempts to save the motel spiral out of control, he and Noor must ask themselves what friendship is worth—and what it takes to defeat the monsters in their pasts and the ones in their midst.
From one of today’s most cherished and bestselling young adult authors comes a breathtaking novel of young love, old regrets, and forgiveness—one that’s both tragic and poignant in its tender ferocity.
Reviews with the most likes.
Now this book is a lot to take it, and a lot to think about, but it was absolutely beautiful in the most heartbreaking of ways.
3.5 stars. Perhaps I was just not in the right mindset to enjoy this book, or it could be because I listened to the audiobook instead of the reading the book. I would have liked to know more about Misbah, her husband and even Noor's uncle. There were a lot of perspectives that could have been shared to make this a more well-rounded book.
Don't be like me and start this before bedtime; you'll stay up to finish it and not even notice. (Also don't be scared of the title; it isn't what you think, in all the best possible ways. It's dark, but not as dark as you think; it's heavy, but not as heavy as you think, and utterly engrossingly human.)