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jenkepesh 's review for:
Ayesha at Last
by Uzma Jalaluddin
This is another of the Modern Mrs. Darcy Summer Reading Challenge picks. When Ann described this one in the online "unveiling," it was near the top of my list. I had to order it from England (who knows why it was only available that way, I'm not e-sales expert) and was a little annoyed that it arrived while we had guests, because that meant I wouldn't be able to submerge myself.
If I hadn't built up my expectations, I would not have been left with the little let-down. It's a pretty good book. I liked the way that Ayesha and her grandfather trade literary references. I liked the various members of the cast: Ayesha and her best friend Clara, her grandfather and grandmother and her love interest, Khalid. These characters are all fairly well rounded; all of the others are cartoons or deux-ex-machinae. And that's ok, for a lightweight book. The plot has multiple strands: Ayesha is torn between her heart's desire to be a poet and her practical desire to be a good person, a person who follows her mother's advice to be financially independent, who takes a scatterbrain cousin under her wing in gratitude to her uncle for providing her family with refuge when they arrived from India, who believes in being a good friend. She embodies good intentions, and outwardly shows them in her faith-based attire and behavior. Khalid is a pious Muslim who also wants to do the right thing: to remain a virgin until married, to follow precepts of conservative Islam even when he attends a more relaxed mosque. He is quick to judge others but holds himself to an impossible standard. His widowed mother's family money means he needn't work, but he works to send money to his sister in India. In the face of harassment at work, he does his best to temporize without sacrificing his personal principals (clothing, beard, prayer, no touching women). He is a little rigid, a little judgmental, and he holds himself as aloof as he can from temptation. But he is tempted by Ayesha, and she by him. Unfortunately, his mother's need for control, her cousin's need for shenanigans, and their own pride keep them apart (though it is a comedy, so it ends with love).
I appreciated Jalaluddin's riffs on characters from Jane Austen. Khalid's mother is something like Lady Catherine de Bourgh; Mr. Collins gets a remake in the goofball person of Majoob, Life Coach to the Wrestling Stars; the young ditzy cousin is of course Lydia, and their grandfather is Mr. Bennett, but much more sweet-natured. And then there are some fun surprises, like Nani, the grandmother, who occasionally lets her Sherlock/Lt. Columbo freak flag fly.
But other characters are just too crudely drawn; Sheila, the mean, Islamophobic boss; Tarek, a Wickham wannabe who takes it a bit farther with internet pornography. Scenes of Ayesha's first teaching job seem to be set up simply to provide another place for Ayesha to be. Shouldn't it feel as though they'd been written thoroughly and then edited to a few words that captured a real environment?
So, not perfect, though fun. I much preferred Unmarriageable by Soniah Kamal, which also riffs on Pride and Prejudice in an Islamic setting, but does so more faithfully and more successfully.
If I hadn't built up my expectations, I would not have been left with the little let-down. It's a pretty good book. I liked the way that Ayesha and her grandfather trade literary references. I liked the various members of the cast: Ayesha and her best friend Clara, her grandfather and grandmother and her love interest, Khalid. These characters are all fairly well rounded; all of the others are cartoons or deux-ex-machinae. And that's ok, for a lightweight book. The plot has multiple strands: Ayesha is torn between her heart's desire to be a poet and her practical desire to be a good person, a person who follows her mother's advice to be financially independent, who takes a scatterbrain cousin under her wing in gratitude to her uncle for providing her family with refuge when they arrived from India, who believes in being a good friend. She embodies good intentions, and outwardly shows them in her faith-based attire and behavior. Khalid is a pious Muslim who also wants to do the right thing: to remain a virgin until married, to follow precepts of conservative Islam even when he attends a more relaxed mosque. He is quick to judge others but holds himself to an impossible standard. His widowed mother's family money means he needn't work, but he works to send money to his sister in India. In the face of harassment at work, he does his best to temporize without sacrificing his personal principals (clothing, beard, prayer, no touching women). He is a little rigid, a little judgmental, and he holds himself as aloof as he can from temptation. But he is tempted by Ayesha, and she by him. Unfortunately, his mother's need for control, her cousin's need for shenanigans, and their own pride keep them apart (though it is a comedy, so it ends with love).
I appreciated Jalaluddin's riffs on characters from Jane Austen. Khalid's mother is something like Lady Catherine de Bourgh; Mr. Collins gets a remake in the goofball person of Majoob, Life Coach to the Wrestling Stars; the young ditzy cousin is of course Lydia, and their grandfather is Mr. Bennett, but much more sweet-natured. And then there are some fun surprises, like Nani, the grandmother, who occasionally lets her Sherlock/Lt. Columbo freak flag fly.
But other characters are just too crudely drawn; Sheila, the mean, Islamophobic boss; Tarek, a Wickham wannabe who takes it a bit farther with internet pornography. Scenes of Ayesha's first teaching job seem to be set up simply to provide another place for Ayesha to be. Shouldn't it feel as though they'd been written thoroughly and then edited to a few words that captured a real environment?
So, not perfect, though fun. I much preferred Unmarriageable by Soniah Kamal, which also riffs on Pride and Prejudice in an Islamic setting, but does so more faithfully and more successfully.