A masterful story of a family caught between two cultures -- and the first novel published under Sarah Jessica Parker´s SJP for Hogarth banner
A Place for Us catches an Indian Muslim family on the eve of the eldest daughter’s wedding. As Hadia’s marriage -- one chosen of love, not tradition -- gathers the family back together, her parents Rafiq and Layla must come to terms with the choices that their two daughters, and their estranged son Amar, have made.
Weaving through time, we see the detail of family life, all the crucial and tiny moments, through the eyes of each family member. And as Hadia, Huda and Amar attempt to carve out a life for themselves, they must reconcile their present culture with their parent’s faith, tread a path between the old world and the new and learn how the smallest decisions can lead to the deepest betrayals.
This is the story of one family, but all family life is here. It is a novel for our times: a deeply moving examination of love, identity and belonging. It announces Fatima Farheen Mirza as a major new literary talent.
About the Author
Fatima Farheen Mirza was born and raised in California. Her parents are of Indian descent; her mother grew up in Birmingham, her father in Hyderabad. She is a graduate of the Iowa Writers´ Workshop, where she was a Teaching-Writing Fellow. She is 26 years old. A Place for Us is her first novel.