Pakistani American Archives

The Last White Man by Mohsin Hamid [in Booklist]

30 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian, South Asian American

*STARRED REVIEW Twice Booker-shortlisted author Mohsin Hamid’s opening sentence immediately recalls one of western literature’s most notable first lines: “As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect.” Hamid’s transformer here is Anders, “a white...

Talking Stories for Asian/Pacific American Heritage Month [in Booklist Reader]

05 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Cambodian, Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Chinese American, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Indian American, Korean American, Lists, Pakistani American, Repost, Short Stories, South Asian American, Southeast Asian American

Short-story collections can be uneven, but readers will be consistently impressed by these extraordinary, resonant, and exhilarating debuts by a dozen diverse writers. Afterparties. By Anthony Veasna So. 2021. Ecco. So’s nine electrifying stories magnificently create an interconnected Cambodian American community. So’s death in December 2020 at just...

Booklist Backlist: Diverse Debut Story Collections [in Booklist]

21 Mar, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Black/African American, Cambodian American, Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Chinese American, Fiction, Indian American, Korean American, Laotian American, Latina/o/x, Lists, Mexican American, Pakistani American, Repost, Short Stories, South Asian American, Southeast Asian American

Short-story collections can be uneven, but readers will be consistently impressed by these extraordinary, resonant, and exhilarating debuts by a dozen diverse writers. Afterparties. By Anthony Veasna So. 2021. Ecco. So’s nine electrifying stories magnificently create an interconnected Cambodian American community. The most autobiographical is “Human Development,” in...

Zara Hossain Is Here by Sabina Khan [in School Library Journal]

21 Jul, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Audio, Fiction, Indian American, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

Making her solo audiobook debut, Richa Moorjani affectingly channels Zara Hossain, a Corpus Christi, TX, high school senior who stands up to Tyler Benson, the school’s football star who’s also a racist bully. After Zara refuses to stay silent while Tyler and his cronies hassle...

Asian American #OwnVoices: Artfully Narrated Middle Grade, YA, and Crossover Audiobooks [in School Library Journal]

17 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Chinese American, Fiction, Filipina/o American, Hapa/Mixed-race, Indian American, Iranian American, Japanese American, Korean American, Lists, Memoir, Middle Grade Readers, Nonfiction, Pakistani American, Persian American, Repost, South Asian American, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

Welcome to Asian Pacific American (APA) Heritage Month. The year remains somber, as the APA community combats dramatically increasing anti-Asian violence around the country and continues to mourn the eight people, including six women of Asian descent, killed in a Georgia mass shooting. Despite a U.S....

The Bad Muslim Discount by Syed M. Masood [in Booklist]

12 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American, Repost

YA novelist Syed M. Masood (More than Just a Pretty Face, 2019) makes his adult debut with a seemingly disparate dual narrative headed for collision. Self-described “lapsed lawyer” Anvar is drifting – he’s lost his love-of-his-life-since-childhood Zuha; he consistently embarrasses his devout Muslim Pakistani American family;...

Yes No Maybe So by Becky Albertalli and Aisha Saeed [in Booklist]

22 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Audio, Fiction, Jewish, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

Friends from infancy, Jamie and Maya haven’t seen each other in almost 10 years – until food-related fiascos (runaway tangelos, tipped-over soggy pastries) lead to an awkward reunion. Both now 17, white Jewish Jamie has grown up shy, clumsy, and especially wary of public speaking....

99 Nights in Logar by Jamil Jan Kochai [in Booklist]

14 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Afghan, Afghan American, Audio, Central Asian, Fiction, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

During summer 2005, when “the American war was sort of dozing,” 12-year-old Marwand, his brother, and mother arrived in Logar, Afghanistan to visit extended family. The six years since Marwand’s last visit from the U.S. isn’t enough for Budabash – more wolf than dog –...

More to the Story by Hena Khan [in Booklist]

28 Oct, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Audio, Fiction, Middle Grade Readers, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian American

Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women gets a diverse contemporary makeover in Hena Khan’s (Amina’s Voice) latest middle-grade novel, relocated to Atlanta, featuring the Muslim Pakistani American Mirza family’s four daughters – Maryam, Jameela, Bisma, and Aleeza – with their father working in Abu Dhabi, and...

Unmarriageable by Soniah Kamal [in Booklist]

17 Apr, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

Since Jane Austen published Pride and Prejudice in 1813, hundreds of adaptations have followed, but Soniah Kamal is the first to set the affair in Pakistan, her birth country. Meet feisty girls’-school English-literature teacher Alys Binat and arrogant Valentine Darsee. The rest is ...

I Should Have Honor: A Memoir of Hope and Pride in Pakistan by Khalida Brodi [in Library Journal]

06 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Memoir, Nonfiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

When she was 25, Forbes named Khalida Brohi to its 2014 "30 Under 30: Social Entrepreneurs" list for founding Sughar Foundation, which trains and empowers rural Pakistani women. Brohi makes both her authorial and performance debuts as she chronicles her journey from a rural Pakistani...

How to Be a Muslim: An American Story by Haroon Moghul [in Library Journal]

08 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Memoir, Nonfiction, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian American

With raw honesty (the memoir opens with suicide ideation), debilitating angst (the unrelenting hold of mental illness), and humor when least expected (the terrors of securing a prom date), Haroon Moghul’s memoir becomes an illuminating antidote to contemporary Islamophobia. As the U.S.-born son of immigrant Pakistani...

Exit West by Mohsin Hamid [in Library Journal]

02 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, British Asian, Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American, Repost, South Asian, South Asian American

*STARRED REVIEW "We are all migrants through time," observes Man Booker Prize short-lister Mohsin Hamid (The Reluctant Fundamentalist). The impulses driving such movement, especially when rooted in violent conflict, is at the core of Hamid's exceptional fourth novel. In an unnamed city (not unlike the author's native...

King for a Day by Rukhsana Khan, illustrated by Christiane Krömer

14 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Canadian Asian Pacific American, Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American, South Asian American

With the arrival of the spring festival in Lahore, Pakistan, no one is more excited than Malik who is ready for the upcoming kite-flying battles armed with Falcon. "'How can you be king of Basant with only one kite?'" his sister teases. "'Insha Allah, it...

American Dervish by Ayad Akhtar

14 May, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Pakistani American, South Asian American

In a sentence, American Dervish is about a young boy's indoctrination into Islam – the religion he was born into, but from the practice of which his parents have lapsed (by choice) – and his eventual withdrawal from his fervent childhood devotion. By extension, the novel...

The Wish Maker by Ali Sethi

08 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Pakistani, Pakistani American

I confess the main reason I finally plucked this debut novel (written by its author when he was just 23) from my never-shrinking 'to-read' pile was because I found the audible version is narrated by Indian American actor Firdous Bamji. After finishing Amitav Ghosh's The...

Wanting Mor by Rukhsana Khan

10 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Afghan, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Fiction, Middle Grade Readers, Pakistani American, Young Adult Readers

Sometimes even the saddest tragedies can eventually lead to happy new beginnings ...

Indivisible: An Anthology of Contemporary South Asian American Poetry edited by Neelajana Banerjee, Summi Kaipa, and Pireeni Sundaralingam

11 Nov, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Bangladeshi American, Indian American, Nepali American, Pakistani American, Poetry, South Asian American, Sri Lankan American, Young Adult Readers

The title – Indivisible – the editors explain, is "a word taken from the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance." Through the 49 diverse American voices represented here with roots in Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and...

The Big Red Lollipop by Rukhsana Khan, illustrated by Sophie Blackall

05 Oct, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Canadian, Canadian Asian Pacific American, Children/Picture Books, Fiction, Pakistani American, South Asian American

Pakistani Canadian writer Rukhsana Khan takes on sibling rivalry once again, but unlike her adorable 2005 title, Silly Chicken, this time, all her characters are all of the human variety ...

Skunk Girl by Sheba Karim

03 Jun, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Fiction, Pakistani American, South Asian American, Young Adult Readers

Without giving too much away, I have to say that this heartfelt debut has one of the most touching first-kiss scenes ever: up on a snowy mountain under a bright clear sky, having just taken a tumble while skiing, making snow angels and laughing ...

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