This Fall, I received a promotional sneak preview booklet of the first two titles from Simon and Schuster’s new children’s book imprint Salaam Reads: The Gauntlet by Karuna Riazi and Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan. Both are middle grade titles to be launched in March 2017, and from these excerpts, I highly recommend adding both to your Goodreads “To Read” list. These are both books I can imagine reading and loving as a child, and I definitely enjoyed reading the excerpts as an adult.

The Gauntlet by Karuna Riazi

The Gauntlet starts off with the same basic premise as Jumanji. Farah Mirza receives a board game from her aunt for her birthday, and when her younger brother Ahmad touches it, he disappears into the world inside the game. To save him, Farah and her friends must enter the game themselves and play by its rules. The excerpt had me glued to the page and excited to see how it turns out.

According to the press release, Salaam Reads aims to “share the stories of Muslim children, in all their diversity.” In The Gauntlet, we not only have a Muslim protagonist and meet her family, we also have a scene at Farah’s birthday party where her mother serves chakphati (“chickpeas and egg and plenty of delectable, generous spices”) and Farah’s classmate Jeff calls it “disgusting” and asks for fries or pizza instead.

Jeff, who couldn’t pronounce Iran and didn’t know how many pins it took for Farah to keep her scarf out of his overly inquisitive fingers, but would insist up and down that Farah’s curry in her lunch box was gross-looking and her plain yogurt was no better than baby spit. [p. 8]

Riazi’s description of Farah’s mother “just [standing] there, smiling and nodding and wringing her hem between her fingers” and Jeff’s mother “[laughing] nervously through her teeth” is particularly vivid. I felt such a layering of emotion I can’t even begin to explain, but it’s a beautifully crafted scene, and I can only imagine its impact on young readers who may relate to the experience. I somehow hope a real-life Jeff will read this too, and realize how hurtful such thoughtless comments could be.

Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan

Amina’s Voice is a completely different genre of story, which is awesome because this imprint will then attract a larger range of potential readers. Amina Khoker has a beautiful singing voice but is too shy to perform in public. When she starts middle school, she notices her best friend Soojin Park is hanging out a lot more with one of the “cool” kids, Emily, whom both Amina and Soojin pretty much hated throughout elementary school. To top it all off, Amina’s uncle is coming from Pakistan for an extended visit and her father wants everything to be perfect for his more traditional brother, which includes signing up Amina and her brother for a Quran competition. The blurb at the back of the book mentions that the local mosque Amina’s family attends is vandalized, so the story just keeps ramping up from there.

I can totally see myself reading and loving this book as a kid. I realize that the story is mainly about Amina, but I absolutely love that one of the main characters is Korean, and even better, that her family is still waiting for their citizenship! There are a lot of stories out there about immigration, but not usually (in my experience at least) treated in this way, where the character is just like any other school girl and her main conflicts are about friendship and popularity, and she just happens to mention in passing that her family is about to take their oath of citizenship. It seems a minor thing, but as an immigrant myself, it means a lot to see this story told in this way, and I don’t know if I can even fully explain why.

I also love that Soojin sees her citizenship as the opportunity to change her name to something more like “American” like Melanie or Jessica. Amina doesn’t quite support the change, because to her, Soojin changing her name is akin to Soojin changing to a more “cool” and popular version of her old friend, and I just love seeing the dynamics between the two in what, ultimately, was a very brief and casual conversation.

There is so much realness going on in just the first few chapters, and I am so excited to find out how things turn out for Amina and Soojin! I’m even curious about Emily, as it would be so easy to paint her as a typical mean girl but from what I’ve seen of Khan’s storytelling so far, she seems to eschew easy stereotypes and create highly textured characters that practically breathe on the page. I’d love to see this happen in Emily’s case as well, and am both concerned and curious about how Amina’s family and her community will respond to the vandalizing of the mosque.

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NOTE that any quotes in the above are from the uncorrected Advance Reader’s Chapter Sampler, and so may be edited for the final copy.

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Thanks to Simon and Schuster Canada for a sneak preview of The Gauntlet and Amina’s Voice in exchange for an honest review.

Twenty-two-year-old Linda Wise escapes her overprotective parents and hometown where everyone knows of the sexual assault she survived as a teenager, by marrying the charismatic Ron Brunson, a newly ordained Methodist minister who catches her eye with his passion for social justice. Set in the late 1960s and early 1970s, the story alternates between the early days of their relationship, when Lin moves with him to a church in Minnesota, to a few years hence when Lin takes their son Tavis to an apartment in Hopkins, west of Minneapolis. Though they live apart, they are still clearly together, and the first thing Lin does upon arrival is check on the emergency kit Ron has packed and use a payphone to let him know they’re safe.

I really, really wanted to like Becoming Lin. The summary touched on many topics I like to read about — a woman coming into her own, major political events in history such as the Freedom Riders for civil rights, the fight for women’s rights and the challenge to traditional expectations around marriage. Unfortunately, it just wasn’t the book for me. I read about a third of the way through, and flipped forward to several chapters at random to see if it captured my interest any better later on, but ultimately decided not to continue reading.

That being said, there were a couple of gems in the early pages. In particular, I love Lin and Ron’s early flirtation. At a church buffet, someone brings up the subject of Ron needing a wife for a better chance at a church appointment. Someone else suggests that a wife could also help with typing church bulletins and

Mr. Sloan laughs. “You should put a Wife Wanted ad in the paper.”

“I type. I can do the bulletins,” Linda says and the table goes quiet. She’s always had terrible timing. [p. 21]

Her timing may be terrible for social niceties, but it was such a perfect, snappy response to the conversation and a not-so-subtle hint at her suitability for the role of wife that I wanted to cheer out loud.

I also like that Lin is a plus size woman, “more curvy than jiggly” though many in her hometown still think of her as weighing over two hundred pounds. I’m always for more plus size heroines in fiction, and from what I’ve read, she seems to grow out of her shyness at some point in the story.

The main reason that I ended up not enjoying the story as much as I expected to is that it’s just really slow. The story flips from one point in time in Lin’s story to the other without clear time markers, which was confusing and disorienting at first. For example, I went from reading about Lin and Ron’s flirtation to Lin taking her son and leaving Ron for some unnamed reason within the space of two chapters, then back to Lin’s father talking to her on her wedding day in Chapter 3. The “present day” sections were especially boring to me, and I found the detailing of the minutiae of Lin building a new life (settling into her new apartment, finding a job, etc) tedious. I didn’t know enough of the character at that point nor of the circumstances under which she left her husband to care much about what she did, and having to flip back every other chapter to the time when the couple began their life together was an unwelcome distraction.

It’s possible that the story picks up later on, but I think I’ve read enough to know that the story and the author’s style just aren’t working for me. I should point out that based on Goodreads and online reviews, my opinion is in the minority and many other readers thoroughly enjoyed the story. So if you enjoy meditative literary fiction about a woman coming of age as a wife and mother, do check out some of the other reviews and decide for yourself if it’s worth a go. The author has also written an earlier novel Stony River, about Lin’s teenage years, so if you’ve read and enjoyed that one, you’ll likely enjoy reading more of Lin’s story. But I’m afraid I’ll pass on finishing this one.

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Thank you to Caitlin Press for an advance reading copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely adored Nilanjana Roy’s The Wildlings, so you can bet I gasp-squee’d with joy when I saw the ARC of its sequel and conclusion The Hundred Names of Darkness at a recent Penguin Random House Canada event.

Book table at the Penguin Random House Canada Blockbuster Books event

It’s a story about alley cats in a Delhi neighbourhood called Nizamuddin. A house cat Mara serves as their Sender, which means she can use her whiskers to travel across great distances and communicate with other cats without ever leaving her house. In Wildlings, Mara’s powers prove instrumental in the Nizamuddin cats’ battle against a group of feral cats threatening to take over their territory.

Hundred Names of Darkness takes us deeper into Mara’s psyche. Human habitation threatens the neighbourhood hunting grounds, and Nizamuddin cats are struggling to find enough food to survive. The clan faces the very real possibility that they may need to find a new neighbourhood to call home. Traditionally, such big change is guided by the clan’s Sender, but all too aware of how odd her clan views her status as an indoor cat, Mara keeps herself apart. While Senders in other cities patrol their streets at night, ensuring the well being of their clans, Mara remains terrified of venturing beyond her home, and knows very little of the struggles her clan faces.

A parallel storyline involves a golf course a few neighbourhoods away, where cats, peacocks, bandicoots, rats and other wildlife live together in relative harmony, with plenty of hunting to be found. When a rogue bandicoot amasses an army to rise up in revolt and there aren’t enough cats and peacocks to defend the space, the delicate balance between the species is threatened, and the animals face the risk of humans taking the territory back away from them.

The title of the novel comes from a feline myth recounted midway through the book, about a powerful cat who travelled the world and, feeling empty, decided to seek out the cat who lives on the other side of the night. A battle with darkness itself ensues, and provides a beautiful metaphor for what it is Mara has to do in order to conquer her fear.

Original cover (Aleph Book, 2013)

New cover (Penguin Random House Canada, 2016)

If I loved The Wildlings, I adored Hundred Names. What a thrilling and beautifully written conclusion to the Nizamuddin cats’ tale! It’s fantastic to see Mara grow up, from a frightened kitten who broadcasts her thoughts to random neighbourhoods, to an adult cat who embraces her destiny and explores the full extent of her powers. I also loved seeing old favourites again, the warrior queen Beraal now a doting mother, the trouble-making Southpaw now a full fledged hunter with a strong sense of duty to his clan, and warriors Katar and Hulo now aged and while still strong, definitely weatherbeaten. We also meet Hatch, the child of Wildlings’ Tooth and Claw and a cheel afraid to fly. His muttered “whatever”s bely the depth of his fear, and I loved seeing Mara draw from her own experiences to help him face his fears.

Mara’s Bigfeet play a somewhat more visible role in this story, and there are a lot more references to Indian food and to other Delhi neighbourhoods, which I loved because it gave this story a much stronger sense of place than Wildlings. Whereas Wildlings felt like it could have been written about one of many other neighbourhoods, Hundred Names gave a much clearer picture of Nizamuddin, and its use of human markers made the place feel more tangible to its human readers.

I also loved meeting Senders from other neighbourhoods. These scenes give Mara a chance to learn more about her role as Sender, as well as situate the Nizamuddin cats among a much larger community of cats across the region. And I absolutely loved learning more about Mara’s mother and the circumstances in which she ended up at the drain pipe where her Bigfeet found her.

The duology’s story seems to grow up in this instalment much like Mara does. Whereas the conflict in Wildlings is tough and exciting (feral cats encroaching on territory!), the conflict here feels more subdued, wistful, un-winnable without necessarily being hopeless. It’s time for the Nizamuddin clan to move on, and fight though they might, there’s a sense of inevitability about it as well, for how much can they really fight against human progress? If Wildlings is about fighting for what’s yours, Hundred Names is about knowing when the fight is over and it’s time to move on. The ending is filled with hope, but the taste is bittersweet, and even Mara’s exploration of the extent of her powers is tinged by the realization of the responsibilities that come with the role of Sender.

I can’t say enough good things about this book and this duology as a whole. If you loved The Wildlings, you’ll enjoy this book and delight in returning to the company of Mara and the Nizamuddin cats. If you haven’t read The Wildlings yet, I highly recommend giving it a try if you like cats and stories of magic, friendship and the importance of home.

As an aside, in my review of Wildlings, I mentioned my disappointment that the Canadian edition didn’t include the beautiful illustrations that I hear were in the original edition. Hundred Names also likely misses out on many of these sketches, but I thought the two they did include are beautifully evocative. You can almost feel the softness of the cats’ fur. (If anyone sees this edition still in print, I’d love to know!)

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Thanks to Penguin Random House Canada for an advance reading copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.