A review by sbelasco40
The Love and Lies of Rukhsana Ali by Sabina Khan

3.0

3.5 stars. I thought the premise of this and the details about the Bengali family were great, and this is definitely a kind of story you don’t see depicted much in YA. But there was so much covered in this, from the intersection of conservative religious beliefs and queerness to hate crimes to sexual assault, and it felt like none of these super complex subjects quite got enough time on the page to be fully developed. I mostly just wanted more. This was particularly true towards the end, where a number of truly horrifying things are revealed or occur quite quickly, and then are sort of brushed aside for the sake of Rukshana reuniting with her family and her girlfriend. I just kept wondering why she even wanted to have anything to do with her family after all the terrible things they put her through — imho it would have been more interesting and perhaps realistic to have her actually leave her family and rely on found family instead, which is in fact what happens to many queer people who have families who don’t understand or accept them.