ALL-AMERICAN MUSLIM GIRL
by Nadine Jolie Courtney is an
#OwnVoices young adult novel which deals with colorism and religion. The book begins powerfully with a scene on an
airplane where the main character, teenager Allie Abraham, has to defuse
another passenger’s concern about Allie’s Dad speaking Arabic on a phone call.
Allie thinks, “Smiling is key. It confuses them. Anger … indignation … that’s a
luxury we don’t have.” Although Allie’s Dad
is often marked as different (“From Somewhere Else”), her heritage is
Circassian so with reddish-blonde hair and hazel eyes, she looks like other light-skinned
Muslims from the Caucasus region and is more readily accepted. That causes
Allie to struggle with questions of identity, thinking: “Maybe I’m betraying my
fellow Muslims by stuffing half of my identity away. Maybe I’m just a cowardly
traitor dripping in white privilege.”
The author spends
quite a while setting up the premise and introducing other characters, like
Wells, a boyfriend for Allie, but the story gradually builds momentum and
interest again as Allie decides to learn more about the Arabic language and the
Qur’an, joining a small group of new friends to discuss Islam and women’s
rights. Allie struggles with maintaining friendships, with conflicts with her
own parents, and with pressures from Wells’ Dad, a kind of anti-immigrant “shock
jock.” In addition to many questions about being an ally, prejudice, and bias, middle
school and early high school readers will find much to relate to here: “I’ve
spent my entire life like an outsider: the perennial new girl, forever the
tiniest bit out of sync.” ALL-AMERICAN
MUSLIM GIRL received multiple (Bulletin of the Center for Children's
Books, Kirkus, Publishers Weekly) starred reviews and I expect to see it on
state award lists in the next few years.
On a related note,
here is some information from School Library Journal, which in addition to promoting the We Need Diverse Books initiative, says “The American Library Association’s ‘Great Stories Club’ series on Truth, Racial Healing & Transformation is a
valuable resource. The reading and discussion program curates a list of books
to help readers engage with the topic of racial healing. [Also,] We Stories is dedicated to
encouraging white Americans to read diverse books with their children in order
to decrease and counteract racial bias. Check out the facts and research on the
ways children experience race to better understand how and why reading racially
diverse titles for kids and teens can make such a big impact.”
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