MEANWHILE, BACK HOME...

Nothing Good Happens in Wazirabad on Wednesday by Jamaluddin Aram, Scribner Canada, $24.99. After the withdrawal of the Soviet troops from Afghanistan in the early 1990s, the small working-class town of Wazirabad, not too far from Kabul, is still struggling to find its balance.

People are poor and on edge. Sporadic fighting rages on. Armed militiamen still roam the streets. Recent burglaries have made people even more tense. Rumours swirl.

Even in the middle of this chaos and desperation, debut author Jamaluddin Aram finds room to tease out the ordinariness of everyday existence. The Baker, the Vegetable Seller, the Tailor and the Watchmaker are making their modest living. A widow is the object of men’s lust and women’s scorn. The Bonesetter reads poetry to his cat. And young Sikander, who works at the store, and Husnia, whose husband is too tired every night after he returns from his work, find themselves drawn to each other in a town where everyone’s watching everything.

Without looking at him, she asked him to tell her something because she was worried that he might have forever lost his faculty of speech. The rooster was among the hens in the courtyard, but Sikander still hadn’t talked. Then she faced him and saw that he was still very much in the grip of his bewilderment.

“I’ll never dress up for you again,” she said.

The reader is left to wander the alleys of Wazirabad, but it could have been a town anywhere else in the subcontinent – in Bihar or in Sindh. The families and the friends, the lovers and the loners are familiar, yet remote. The fighting may have ended on the battlefield, but a post-traumatic war rages on in the minds of Wazirabadis, and they have no place to hide. Yet there’s humour to be found in these dark, desperate lives.

Nothing good ever happens in Wazirabad. Period.

Jamaluddin Aram is a writer to watch. He’s just gotten going.

OBSESSION

 I’m A Fan by Sheena Patel, Random House, $24.95. “I stalk a woman on the internet who is sleeping with the same man as I am.” Thus begins the slim book.

The narrator remains unnamed, as do the others, referred to as The man I want to be with and The woman I am obsessed with. The narrator is obsessed with the married man she is sleeping with and one of his other lovers who is an influencer. She examines the complexities of desire and privilege through the prism of this unequal, unfaithful relationship.

With an unforgiving eye, the narrator relentlessly dissects the behaviour of all involved in the entanglement, herself included, and makes startling connections between the power struggles at the heart of human relationships and those of the wider world.

On the woman she is obsessed with: She will happily spend $300 on a vase where she displays really, really organic fennel flowers, by which she says there’s organic and then organic.

On herself: I fit into spaces that already exist and contort myself to fit a shape which has been allocated for me.

I’m a Fan won the British Book Awards for Book of the Year-Discovery. It was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, the Dylan Thomas Prize, and The Republic of Consciousness Prize. Sheena Patel was chosen as one of the Observer’s Top 10 best debut novelists.

The often unsettling book is a critique of class, race, social media, patriarchy’s hold on us, and our cultural obsession with status and how that status is conveyed.

The narratives open to us are the ones based on our identities as it is these stories that are market and social media approved. They have a numbing familiarity to them. We second generation immigrants have the privilege of self-actualization.

LOOK BACK

Hidden Heritage by Fatima Manji, Chatto & Windus, London, £20. Long before Sadiq Khan became the mayor of London, long before Rishi Sunak and the new Scottish first minister Yousaf Hamza, Britain enjoyed an enriching relationship with the people and the societies of the Orient.

In fact, global village is an idea imagined by Great Britain’s empire builders who connected distant dots on the globe and created a web of conquest and commerce.

Britain’s museums and galleries, civic buildings and stately homes point to a more complex national history than is commonly remembered.

Fatima Manji explores cultural landmarks to bring to life an 18th century Turkish mosque that once adorned a famous botanic garden, but is no longer there; Tipu Sultan’s Persian-inscribed cannon in rural Wales; a Moroccan diplomat who stole British hearts; and the stories behind Queen Victoria’s lifelong friendship with Munshi Abdul Karim.

To understand the political and social contexts of Britain today, one must start somewhere around the 15th century.

LIFE’S LIKE THAT

The Direction of the Wind by Mansi Shah, Lake Union, USD 14.95. Sophie Shah was six when she learned her mother Nita had passed away.

For 22 years, she shared the loss and the pain with her father, the two becoming inseparable. But a shocking secret comes to light at his sudden passing away. Her mother didn’t die. She left. How does a young wo-man grappling with the loss of a parent even process this information?

Alternating between Sophie’s life and Nita’s, Mansi Patel unveils, layer by layer, what transpired. In searching for her mother and her parents’ truth, Sophie discovers new facets of herself.

The nuanced writing introduces readers to women who are so real.

Nita spun around, quickly swallowing the bite of bread she had been chewing and hoping she didn’t have crumbs littering her clothes but did not look down because she was too self-conscious to show how self-conscious she was.

The Direction of the Wind is an exploration of fate, expectations and what a woman wants in her life. Because, as Sophie’s father tells her, “The direction of the wind cannot be changed, but we can change the direction of our sails.”

CHRISTMAS COMES EARLY

The Penguin Book of Christmas Stories, edited by Jessica Harrison, Penguin Classics, $29.99. For some strange reason, I used to believe – like many others, I am willing to bet – that there’s a season for Christmas stories.

With this little gem of a book, I realize that the beauty of these tales can be enjoyed year-round. And at any age. Any time one is in need of some magic.

Hans Christian Anderson and O. Henry (of course!), but also Chekov, Saki, Dorothy Sayers and Truman Capote, and many other not-so-familiar names. Their Christmas stories are a treat, and full of surprises. Like the raisins children find in their shoes in Angela Carter’s The Ghost Ships.

DOG DAYS

The Speckled Beauty by Rick Bragg, Vintage, $23. Rick Bragg’s life was transformed by his love for a poorly-behaved, half-blind stray dog.

The starved creature of wet hair and poor decisions arrived at a time of looming uncertainty, grief and declining health in Bragg’s life and helped.

“He’s helping still, when he’s not peeing on the rose of sharon.”

The book about “a dog and his people” is so delicious, such a treat, that dog lovers will treasure it.

CATCH A TIGER BY THE TALE

When You Trap A Tiger by Tae Keller, Random House, $24.99. When Lily and her family move in with her sick grandmother (halmoni), a magical tiger straight out of her halmoni’s Korean folk tales also arrives, prompting Lily to unravel secret family history. Winner of the prestigious Newbery Medal for children’s literature, this is an engrossing tale in which Lily has to outwit the tiger who wants something in return for halmoni’s health.

THREE, TWO, ONE, LAUNCH!

The Interplanetary Expedition of Mars Patel by Sheela Chari, Walker Books, $11.99. Mars Patel is on a mission to save his friend Aurora. But all is not well on Mars... or back on earth. A fun adventure for young fans of sci-fi and mystery.

TEEN REVIEW

By JASJEET SIDHU

A Furry Faux Paw by Jessica Kara,  A Furry Faux Paw is a unique story shedding light on an under-recognized community.

It is the story of a teen living two lives. One is Mauve Stephens, the lonely girl who lives with her hoarder mother. She prefers her fursona, MauveCat, a confident and friendly cat. When presented with the opportunity to go to Furlympia, she can’t refuse even though her mother doesn’t want her to leave.

The author portrays the furry fandom perfectly, with excellent character development. The best part of the book is that it doesn’t end with everything working out. Books sometimes give us a feeling that we are not capable of fixing our problems, but this one demonstrates progress, reaching the end goal one step at a time.

This story relates to my personal experiences. I would change myself to make friends until I found a group that I could be myself with. I felt much more at ease and accepted, like how Mauve felt at Furlympia.

A Furry Faux Paw is a story of struggles. It is hard being different, but instead of covering it up, Mauve decided to project it. She says, “There’s the public you, smiling, polite, restrained – or funny, loud and popular. And there’s the inside you. Real you.” 

• Jasjeet Sidhu is a youth volunteer at Brampton Library.