Children of Dust

The husband of a dear friend has just published a book called Home Boy. The New York Times seems to love it. Naqvi’s smart and sorrowful debut is at once immigrant narrative, bildungs roman and New York City novel, with a dash of the picaresque. Immigrant stories are often appealing not only because they dramatize the longing to trade oppression for freedom and prosperity, but also because they have the perfect antagonist: America itself. Set in Manhattan just after Sept. 11, 2001, this novel follows three bright and likable college- age Pakistani men — AC, Jimbo and Chuck. Before 9/11,…

Rearrange Your Head: An Interview with American Muslim Convert and Memoirist G. Willow Wilson | RDBook | ReligionDispatches. Sheikhas and alimas [female spiritual and religious authorities], if you can find any — and you have to look pretty hard — will totally change the way you think about Islam and gender. There is a long and revered tradition of female scholarship in this religion, but it’s dying out. Most of the female scholarship we have now is part of a new tradition—postmodern academia—not a continuation of the old. Old school sheikhas, educated the traditional way, will rearrange your head. In…

Very excited that the website for a book in which I have an essay is up. All American Muslim Men. Contributors include high profile figures in the American Muslim community, representing a new generation that is making a profound impact inside and outside the Muslim world.