A review by reads2cope
Courting Samira by Amal Awad

4.0

This was cute! Took me a long time because it wasn’t in the mood for a RomCom when I started it, and then the library hold line was long, but I’m glad I came back to it!
I liked Samira and loved getting to know her friends, with a few exceptions. Lara really makes no sense. She wants Samira to be with Hakeem so much so that she takes Samiras phone to call him to “rescue them” when they have a flat tire, then as soon as he’s done changing it out, she demands they leave immediately, not letting Samira and Hakeem chat at all. Then she almost ruins things with Menem, but faces no consequences for it? I would love a Jane Austen Emma-esque story on Lara to watch her grow up next!

The white co-workers also fell a little flat…. I’m dreaming of reading Arab stories that aren’t forced to explain every cultural thing. The zaghrouta shouldn’t have to be defined twice in the novel and in a glossary at the end. It felt like Samira’s white friends and colleagues were just a transparent device to explain Arab culture to non-Arab readers. Search engines are free! I even looked up some Australian sayings I wasn’t familiar with while reading. Or, I could figure it out myself. What is a cadetship outside military contexts? I can infer! Let people learn without disrupting the flow of the book. I doubt that was the authors fault though, or at least not her choice alone.
Finally, I agree with other reviews that the love triangle aspect didn’t feel totally developed.

However, I didn’t want her to like Hakeem in that way, so I’m a little happy it didn’t fully go there. Still, that plot line, as well as some others, were resolved too quickly or dropped without explanation.