Love from A to Z

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Offers readers a look at insults, false assumptions that can be an almost everyday occurrence for young Muslim women. On flight to Doha, woman seated next to Zayneb (muttering things like "bitch" under her breath since she first sat down) sees Zayneb writing in her journal in Arabic, demands to be moved, loudly telling flight attendant she's being threatened. In an odd twist, when Zayneb tries to swim in pool at her aunt's apartment complex in Doha, a man reports her for wearing a modest non-revealing swimsuit. In author's note, Ali relates that these two incidents were based on personal experience. Zayneb tells friends in Indiana about hateful reactions she often gets from feminists who see her hijab as sign of oppression rather than symbol of her faith. I honestly never thought I'd ever get the chance to read a book like this. My heart is so full and I'm so grateful to have been given the chance to read and review this. I think every Muslim will appreciate the effort that was put into this. I hope this book also helps change the perception of Muslims in the world right now. Because I read this and I felt represented like never before. It brings tears to my eyes just typing this. I want the world to read this book and see things from our point of view. See the way we live and how it's so unlike what is shown on the media today.

I now bent down over the sheet of paper on my desk and pressed hard with my pen. Fencer is not going to be here. I’m going to make sure of it.

But maybe Kerr saw my wet eyes. Because suddenly she cleared her throat, and when she next spoke, her voice was calmer. “The only reason we’ve decided to give Miss Malik a week’s suspension instead —which will go into her records, by the way—is due to her exemplary academic record over the years. I’ll see this as a terrible, terrible decision she’s made. Mr. Fencer agrees with me on this.” Her voice hardened again. “But give me one more thing to make me reconsider, Miss Malik, and we may be seeing your college future at stake. I will not hesitate to make that so.” Beside Mom, Fencer sighed as if he were pondering college-less me. Anger welled and churned inside. Eat them alive. I’m going to get him. I’m going to get Fencer. • • • As soon as we got in the car and she turned the ignition, Mom began. “I never thought we’d have this sort of trouble with you, Zayneb. A threat against your teacher? A knife?” “It wasn’t a threat! It was about getting him fired. And the knife was a butter knife. I was just about to draw the fork.” I frowned at the front of Alexander Porter High with its ugly green double doors. “We didn’t bring you up like this. I’m ashamed.” Mom’s voice was small, which meant it was going to be the crying kind of lecture. “You didn’t say anything!” I turned to her. “Nothing about what he’s doing! You acted like it was my fault!” “I can’t prove anything about your teacher. Every time Dad and I offered to talk to him before, you said no.” With the car stopped where the entrance of the school parking lot met the road, she glanced at me, mouth trembling slightly. “Can’t you just graduate in peace?” “You mean, Shut up, Zayneb! Don’t make a scene, Zayneb!” I put my hand on the door handle. “Can I get out? I’ll just walk home like I always do.” She let me. He stroked his beard and cleared his throat. Okay, I don’t want you to see this as a reward, but Auntie Natasha is on the phone with Mom. Trying to convince her to let you come earlier. I didn’t have to open my mouth or do anything for people to judge me. I just had to be born into a Muslim family and grow up to want to become a visible member of my community by wrapping a cloth on my head. I just had to be me. Angry people are not known to be public criers. They usually don’t succumb to displays of grief. But I let the tears fall and fall without a care of who saw them. I didn’t sob or heave or make any movements. I just sat there staring at the white girl coloring happily and cried. Maybe it was Fencer’s sigh in the principal’s office yesterday, the suspension note in my student file, and the fact that Ayaan hadn’t replied to any of my messages before I’d left home this afternoon. Maybe it was imagining Hateful Woman enjoying first class, getting rewarded for her rudeness to me. Maybe it was everything for a long time. I succumbed to the sadness I’d held at bay. And the questions flooded in: If I had been that white, blond girl with a lap full of a journal, a pen, headphones, phone, and a sandwich, a coffee in my hand, would Hateful Woman have slammed her carry-on so hard above me? Would she have excused the time I’d taken to get up, thinking of her own daughter or granddaughter and how it took them a while to get their stuff together? Would she have made small talk and gotten to know me a teeny bit? Then would she have smiled fondly at me like the flight attendant walking by the coloring girl had smiled at her right now? I just held myself, alone on a full plane, and mourned silently until I fell asleep for the rest of the flight. • • • And then, Marvels and Oddities, I landed in London. She’s ISIS. ISIS girl should have been expelled. Zee-naab, office. Now. He had the calm face of someone who already knew they’d won before the game had started. I’ll be there in five with this threat of yours.

So to really freak her out, here, journal, have some Arabic words, written nice and big. إن شاء الله MARVEL: AIR Eighteen now, Adam is a freshman in college, but it’s important to know that he has stopped going to classes two months ago. the only issue i had with the book was that the romance was a liiiittle too fast to start with. they were doing the mental 'it's better we dont get involved with each other, i'll just ignore them' just a couple meetings inBut this is not a reward, you understand? Dad crossed his arms. You’ll have to do whatever Auntie Natasha says. She’s still working, you know. She’s not going to appreciate you giving her problems. When she gets suspended for confronting her teacher, and he begins investigating her activist friends, Zayneb heads to her aunt’s house in Doha, Qatar, for an early start to spring break. And was there something that these countries had in common? Come on, people. Someone other than Mike? Clears throat* When I heard that a book like this was going to exists I was ecstatic. S.K. Ali wrote a book that made me feel seen. Books featuring Muslim characters are quite rare. I've made it my goal to read as many books centering around Muslims as possible this year. This book right here is what every Muslim reader should get their hands on. The struggles that Muslim's go through is depicted so so well. Especially, for girls who wear the Hijab (headscarf). The other thing is that Ayaan doesn’t wear hijab. She’s Muslim, and Fencer knows it from her full name—Ayaan Ahmed—but he’s not sure what kind.

It wasn’t a threat! It was about getting him fired. And the knife was a butter knife. I was just about to draw the fork. I frowned at the front of Alexander Porter High with its ugly green double doors. From William C. Morris Award Finalist S.K. Ali comes an unforgettable romance that is The Sun Is Also a Star meets Anna and the French Kiss, following two Muslim teens who meet during a spring break trip. She lifted her carry-on suitcase and slammed it into the overhead bin so hard, I was sure she damaged the wheels on it. He doesn’t know what I know: that Ayaan is a devout Muslim who goes to the mosque more than hijabi me. That she prays and believes and is on a million Muslim committees. Yeah, I know, not the lightest topics on the planet, but they are real. And this story just shows how are they applied.

I couldn’t stop myself from jumping up. I went to stand in front of them, my arms open slightly, a hug cue. I’m not a violent person. I’m not advocating violence. But I am an angry person. I’m advocating for more people to get angry. Get moved.” A thirteenth-century drawing of a tree caught his gaze. It wasn’t particularly striking or artistic. He didn’t know why this tree caused him to stride forward as if magnetized. (When he thinks about it now, his guess is thus: Trees were kind of missing in the landscape he found himself in at the time, and so he was hungry for them.) Love from A to Z is one of the most unapologetically Muslim books that I’ve ever read, and I’m so glad it exists. It resonated in chambers of my heart I’d never known existed. There is still an expansiveness in my chest that reminds me of how important voices like these are, for readers like us. This feeling is a language all its own: to reach and find, to be reached for and found, to belong to a mutual certainty.